Race Report for 20th December

ZLK Snatch Lead on Final Lap!

Geographics and Allied 2 Very Close

There was excitement at the start, maximum excitement at the end, and in the middle, rain, wind and standing water. The date being 24 hours before the shortest day of the year it was no real surprise that the weather was less than clement for the third round of the Promax SE Winter challenge at Bayford Meadows. What I did find surprising and greatly satisfying was that twenty four teams presented themselves for a thorough soaking. This shows the strength of Promax as a class and bodes well for the 2004 Southern Promax Series that takes us into year three.

On arrival it was a tricky tyre choice as it was not yet raining in the proper sense of the word and the forecast was distinctly ambiguous. Worn wets were the tyre of choice for at least half the entrants, though this, as so often happens, turned out to be a wrong decision. By the time the half hour open practice merged seamlessly into the fifteen minute qualifier, many teams had had second thoughts and were busy in the pits swapping tyres and rim widths. Some even decided to forgo the greater part of qualifying on the premise that thirty metres back down the order would be more than offset by a second a lap gain during the race. With hindsight, this group were the wise ones.

Extreme Racing set the pace in qualifying and earned pole by half a second from Special Racing Projects. Allied’s 1 & 2 lined up in numerical order (very tidy!) on the second row while 2002 British Champions ZLK joined Levoi’s Suzuki on row three. Nearly half the field chose to pop back to the pits for some set up changes as the weather took a turn for the worse.

The opening lap was surprisingly accident free despite the copious quantity of standing water and it was lap two that caused the first incident of the day. A tangle into turn one resulted in Dogz getting caught up in the middle and a very early temporary retirement for Russell Crowe to get a cut thumb attended to in the (nice & warm!) ambulance. Extreme were well clear of the tangle and headed the field for the first sixteen minutes of the race until Allied 2 slipped past to assume the leaders mantle. Coming through the pack like a dose of salts were Geographics whose P17 grid start was I’m sure designed to lull the rest of us into a false sense of security. With the race clock standing at forty minutes Geographics were up to third place and only four seconds behind Extreme.
Fuel was the topic on many drivers minds as with the lap times around the mid to upper sixties, would it be possible to one stop this race? Several teams could be seen hanging around the fuel bay as the early stoppers came in just before the one hour mark. My judgement was that a one stopper was out the question and this must have been the general consensus as the fuel bay soon resembled the car park at Bluewater with tail backs stretching almost to the weighbridge.

Geographics moved up to second place around the time of the first refuel and tucked up behind Allied 2 who were certainly setting a blistering pace, if that is an appropriate word to use now that the rain was falling sideways. Almost unnoticed, Cobra ASM had come up through the field from a lowly P21 on the grid and were now to be found knocking on the back door of the top three and one place ahead of ZLK. As Allied 2 came in for fuel Geographics became the top dogs and quickly began to stretch the lead. Dogz suffered their second visit to the medics when Roy Sinclair pitted with no vision after picking up some grit in his eye.

The dramas for HWB continued throughout the race but can be summarised here. A badly set up front end resulted in the team collecting more than their fair share of mud and a subsequent sticky throttle only exacerbated their frustration. A new inner cable failed to cure the problem. A complete new cable, throttle slide, cover and spring made no noticeable difference and for the boys it became a series of very fast straight lines punctuated by equally quick tyre wall visits. Been there, done that and it’s no fun when you lift your right foot and nothing happens. Augustea Racing have been very much in the ascendancy of late though this has not always been borne out in the race results as mechanical problems have played a part. This month the boys lost an entire carburettor, but fought back bravely for a fine midfield finish.

The second fuel stop narrowed the gap once more but the order remained relatively undisturbed as Geographics retained the lead, by now virtually a lap, over Cobra ASM. ZLK moved ahead of Extreme for third place to make it an all LRG top three. With some fascination I noted that the four Allied teams were now lined up together in 1,2,3,4 order to hold 5th, 6th, 7th & 8th. I wonder how many times that has happened before, or was it team orders coming into play!

It’s so easy when writing these reports to concentrate solely on the top five and those unfortunate teams who plummet to the bottom through some misfortune or another. Of course there is always some pretty interesting action going on in the midfield and a sentence or two now would not go amiss. Screenvyn 86 headed the previously unmentioned teams from 8th on circuit and the team enjoyed a steady if unremarkable race. Racing this series for only the second time were Lead Foot Boys and perhaps their lead feet gave more front end grip because the team were running inside the top ten all day and have managed to accrue in two rounds the same points it has taken others three races to achieve. Top of the lease teams were Zero Racing who held P10 with twenty minutes to go.

Things began to get interesting as the race entered the final twenty minutes. It was clear that ZLK had the legs over Geographics and with Allied 2 now back in front of Cobra ASM but with less than five seconds between them it was obviously going to be a close finish. With every passing lap the margin narrowed and to add to the interest Allied 2 joined the fray and were close enough that even the tiniest of mistakes by the lead duo would lead to a place lost. As the final lap board went out to Geographics it was simultaneously seen by ZLK and was also fully in focus to Allied 2. Coming out of the hairpin and onto the infield leading to Boot Hill, Roy Watts of ZLK made his move and took the lead. Would we witness a late lunge at the top of the rise by Geographics? No, it was done and dusted and ZLK crossed the line just five tenths clear of Geographics and Allied 2 crossed for third just five seconds later. Collecting the fourth place trophies were Cobra ASM, while Extreme picked up the final award of the day for a fine fifth place. The Promax circus moves back to Buckmore on the 24th January where we will probably trade the rain for a dose of the white stuff!

Report author: Alan Wood