The track is a tight and twisty track and gives the drives another element to racing.
Accuracy is of all importance and Kev Lee told me first thing in the morning, its actually ‘paramount’

Practice was a slippery affair ….no one was quick or consistent.  Track was very wet so it was just a matter of learning the layout

Well the track was still a little wet for some of the early heats and then like a bolt from the sky – Boom – it was dry.  Well for the last heat it was.  I was in the heat before the top (not sure why) and i just went round clean with no heroics   The top heat for sure had massive more traction and we saw Glen Westwood have a great run to set TQ.  Kev lee was 2nd……the sun is out now so lets rock!!!

The sun has gone already and its doom above.  Glen Westwood unfortunately broke his car on the first lap so he was out for this round.  Kev Lee drove an immaculate race to TQ and make a 15 lapper.  I did my steady Eddie drive and managed 2nd in round so happy days!! 

Round 3 came very quickly and I did some Kev Lee set up changes.  Now listen up everyone!!  You must always watch and learn from the faster guys.  My car was all of a sudden faster, easier and so on.  Thanks Kev……rock on round 4

The weather is now rubbish – Its cold, windy and i am wishing for the Bahamas!!!
Anyways, Kev is moaning that I didn’t marshal him in a speedy fashion and I am telling him, keep it on its wheels you old man!!!
Now with all serious notes, the track has stayed in a good order and no excuses that there are some quick lads here.  Happily settle for 4th on the grid and lets see what we can do from there 🙂

The Finals were very interesting.  All the drivers went out on the fast dry tyres.  Everyone started to circulate and instantly there was no grip.  The few rain drops effected the track that much that everyone had to change to their wet weather tyres.

First leg was a good race with Glen, Kev and myself building a bit of a gap on the others and just basically keeping the cars on their wheels.  I decided to go for it and when Glen took a corner just a fraction wide, I fed my RB6 in the gap.  The race was won by Kev from myself.

Leg 2 was disappointing for me as i got involved and didn’t really run my own race.  Kev had a problem around the end of the race which dropped him back behind myself,  The race was won by Chris Grainger

Leg 3 came round real quick and the rain was also coming down too.  Off we went and similar to leg 1, Kev got away and i just followed him through into 2nd.  From my point of view a bit boring as i circulated without any errors in my steady Eddie fashion and knew i was in with a chance of top 3.  2 wins meant Kev won the meeting and with a 1 and 3 Chris beat my 2 and 2 fro 2nd overall,  I finished 3rd and happy with it.  Thanks Kev for the help and well done mate 🙂

Also well done to all the organisers for a good meeting in horrible afternoon conditions.

Kev Lee, Chris Grainger and Tony Evdoka

Hi yah all, here we are at the Southport track in the north west of England.
A 6 hour drive to get here hitting the horrible M6 and so on but seeing the track its all beautifully presented and for once the weather is actually sunny.

Two practice sessions of 4 minutes each.  Firs one is really to just get the feel of the track and the 2nd to hopefully find the fast parts.  The back section of this track is the difficult part and if you can drive that then you are in business.
Usual suspects were quick in practice so lets see whats what after round 1

Simon Moss tops round 1 with some of the top drivers making errors.  Si just kept it on its wheels and just kept it consistent.  Neil Cragg got in on the 2 spot as Lee Martin made some small errors to drop him off potential round 1 TQ.  We saw Darren Bloomfield making a shout for the top spot but a couple of errors saw him drop down.  Elliott Boots running some 10th this year, was on for 5th but again some errors saw him drop out of the top ten.  Others to note were some local drivers in the names of Evisson and Parr making top times

Lee Martin set a time that really I didn’t think could be beat.  That was in heat 10.  Neil Cragg in heat 11 really pushed and as you can see took theTQ off Lee by 0.6 of a sec.  Kev Lee had a great run to go 4th in round and more or less secure his A final.  I did a school boy error where I set my slipper way way too loose and melted it together.  Silly boy

Well round 3 was full of cars breaking.  The highlight was Neil changing from BB tyres to Schumacher stagger and minis.  He beat Lee in round 2 by 0.06 and this time had a wonder last lap to take TQ from Lee again by 0.1.  Dear oh dear – At least Lee had a smile on his face.  I had a much better run and had exact time with Dave Burton that was 24th in round.  The sun is out and at least that is a bonus!

Well I have to now be honest and say that i screwed up – The most basic error of a loose pinion has cost me! My RB6 felt so so good too!
There were many that gave it all a good go and as I think this is the first National that has had dry qualyfing in all four rounds for the last near 3 years!!!
Southport have set the standard – LOL

Final result here – more laters

Neil has decided to raise some money for charity.  He has asked for some basic change that really we all so take as just change.  Everyone has been doing very well with the collection and Neil has actually said he will double the figure if it reaches the 120 drivers that are in attendance – WOW!  Nice job Neil 🙂

Live Updates today

A gorgeous track layout by the TORCH crew.  They have built a rhythm section and it really puts a good test on the drivers..  They moved the straight to under the rostrum instead of the far side of the track and it all seems to blend very well indeed.

Two practice sessions run by the club today and they were running more to a National format rather than a Regional format. Darren Bloomfiel is here today and he was dominating the practice OPEN sessions with his TLR22.
Practice 1 saw Tony Evdoka 🙂 fastest on a single lap while round 2 saw Matt Owen and Steve Brown quickest on a single lap.  Matt driving a K1 Schumacher and Steve running a prototype DB4 Kyosho.  Kev Lee was in the top 5 in practice and he is for sure a contender as defending regional champion

Well I suppose the cream rises to the top, and it did – Kev Lee, defending 4wd Mid_south Champion, driving his Kyosho car, drove an immaculate first round qualifier to take the first round. Steve Brown had a fairly clean run to go second and John Spencer took the three spot.  Many of the other top drivers made errors which in my opinion leaves it open to some spicy qualifying to come.  Round one done, so i think a cup of tea is in order 🙂

Round 2 saw some interesting developments as many of the drivers not really showing in round 1 did better.  Great racing throughout saw Kev Lee again TQ round 2.  It will take a brave person to bet on Kev not taking the overall pole with 2 TQed rounds in the bag.  Glen Westwood had a great round as did many others.  Shaping up nicely now….

Round 3 has come and many of the top drivers now choosing a 2wd front tyre glued on a 4wd wheel.  I personally never like this but Kev Lee just drove as if it was a demonstration of excellence.  Steve Brown also had a good round with a second and Matt Owen driving his K1 got a third.  The A final is far from concluded but for sure the TQ is secure for Kev Lee – 3 perfect scores cannot be beat – Well done Kev 🙂

Well there were many drivers needing a run to get them anywhere near the A final and certainly it was very entertaining.  Mark Sadler needed a run and got it to go 8th in the A – i was sort of in the final but secured the 7th spot with a 4th in round.  Dave Burton hanged on in 10th but the last round went to Steve Brown with a blistering run to put his DB4 Kyosho just 0.7 off Kevs time and second on the grid – It will certainly be 3 legs of excitement – Looking forward to it

Leg 1

Leg 2

 

 

 

 

 

Leg 3

Congratulations to Kev Lee, Steve Brown and Glen Westwood (1st, 2nd and 3rd)

In my opinion this is one of the best regional events i have attended in many years.  Great organisation and a great track   Nice features  easy to drive and all in general a great atmosphere.  A big well done to the TORCH crew.

A thumbs up from me

Practice went well and everyone had their run and many used or scrubbed new tyres in.  My car was good i was and still am looking forward to the weekend. Round 1 was dominated by Darren Bloomfield as he just drove off in the distance in the top heat (14)  i had some transponder troubles so an estimated time had to be posted.  John, Lee and many other superstars where getting the grips with the track – i am sure the racing will get much tighter

Round 2 has come round very quickly and Darren Bloomfield is really shinning on this track.  No errors thus far and has improved his TQ by a few seconds.  Kev Lee driving his Kyosho is looking good and with an error is sitting in 6th.  Lee, Jorn and the others are quick, sure they are but not yet a challenge to Darren.  i sort of had some errors but still feel confident something can happen.  I just have to pay the cream some serious dosh – LOL 🙂

Round 3 and Lee Martin making his move to 2nd on the grid and David Poulter and Ellis Stafford setting the same time for 3rd and 4th on the grid.  The competition is certainlytight but some good times coming in from Craig Collinson among others

Darren Bloomfield is looking hot though and the others are chasing it

Darrens car currently on TQ spot after 3 rounds

If you don’t know this guy its Craig Collinson.
Most of his friends call him the Hulk – Craig is currently sitting in the A final and by the way he doesn’t normally pull nice faces 🙂

Round 4 was really the round to do it and when we look at the sheet, European Champion Jorn was only sitting 10th with one run to go – That is the level of competition here at Maritime. It was all happening all over the list with improvements and not.  I was on a extremely good run when a small incident really cost me some time and a spring cup off, that was that.
They say the cream rises to the top and Jorn put it a top 3 time so 3rd on the grid.  Kev Lee that dropped out of the A Final put a steady Eddie run to put his RB6 7th.
No one beat Darrens time so he is TQ
Here is your top ten……

There was open practice for everyone and after more or less all had 3 or so long runs we were off.

As you can see Grant Williams was off to a good start and without repeating this over and over he is sort of good – LOL
He will like me saying this!!

I should of had 2nd but some silly error (random too) saw me being back to 3rd after Mark Sadler stole it from me 🙁

In 4wd Glen Westwood was on his way to round 1 TQ with his XB4

 

Round came round quickly actually and i think the track was probably as good as it would be through the day.  When Astro is wet it seems to be grippy before it gets dirty from the mud under it and then the grip seems to dissapear and it gets greasy as we call it

Time for a good run and i did just that with a 2nd in round and an improved time.

Grant had another 1st in round with Mark 3rd

I was happy with my car but as always wanted to go faster like any racer does

Another TQ in round for Glen in 4wd

Round by round qualification it can be a pain sometimes as really you are not racing against the clock but your competitors.  Of course we want to go fast but no good throwing a run away because we are trying too hard.

In this run i did just that.
Managed to get a 2nd in round but we a slower time.
Some of the lads said the track slowed up but i wasn’t too sure

Matt Benfield was now making his move in 4wd as he TQed the 3rd round with the fastest time of the day

LOL before I even start.
Yes when you look at the sheet you will see Grant ahead again from myself that actually did a slower run than the round 2 time.

BUT

And I know some of you will be surprised I switched to Big Bore shocks and I thought the car was for sure quicker.

The proof of course is always the clock and as you can see, although rare, i had the quickest lap….Yes you read it right

🙂

Not sure why i took a photo of the heat rather than the overall so sorry for that.

I played a little with my set up as now i like the Big Bore baddies and as you can see still had the 2nd faster single lap.

Not mad for an old dog eh!!

Matt Benfield TQed the last round too of the 4wd cars and took TQ from Glen
That would be a B44 from a XB4 on the grid

 

 

Mark Sadler qualified 3rd

Mark has been around the sport for some 29-30 years (Yes he is old)
Still races hard but also seems to enjoy his sons racing as it develops too…..look out for Mason Sadler

Some of you may remember the famous Wasp Products
That was Marks dad – we all miss him

Catch up soon Mark 🙂

 

 

The final was great – well I enjoyed it anyways 🙂

We started off and i decide the only chance was to go for it.

Well go for it i did, got to the first corner and was full on the handbrake and threw my RB6 up the inside of Grants Cougar……all good for now till i realised that once the momentum was lost then the get up and go was all too difficult and as soon as I tried to power away i was doing donuts and dropping down to 4th.

Ah well I was trying – LOL – my car was good so nothing lost or gained at the first corner.  5 mins is a long time in RC….off we went again and managed to get to 3rd by Chris Brooke that was doing OK himself.

Up front Grant got it slightly wrong and Mark Sadler jumped to the lead.
It was a great battle thus far and this is all in the first 2 laps or so.
Grant was patient by the sound of the commentary by Steve and got out in front once again

I hunted down Mark and sat behind him for a while but had to make a move otherwise Grant would settle and be off in the distance like he can.

I got past Mark and set off to catch Grant but I just knew he had too much of a gap and this was going to be a fight for 2nd with Mark.  Had a great battle for the remainder of the race and managed to hold him off to take the 2nd place.
Well done to Grant for his win and now he can go off to Canada for his hols all happy – 🙂

TQed man Matt Benfield lined up on the grid but no 2nd place man Glen Westwood.  Not sure why but Glen that TQed the 1st and 2nd rounds wasn’t running

In 3rd and now 2nd but with a grid space clear was Kit Jones with his Schumacher K1 car
4th now 3rd was young Mason Sadler

The buzzer went and it was all very civilised among the front runners.
Matt Benfield slowly but surely was building a gap and was to go on and take the win.

Mason Sadler though was in a right ding dong battle with 6th on the grid Billy Fletcher.
A wonderful race between them that went all the way to the line.  Mason got a great 2nd place with Billy just behind.

The club once more gave us all a very good event and I really enjoyed it

Thanks EPR

The weather the evening beforehand was shocking….Rain rain and more rain
It sort of makes you think why hasn’t a club or even an individual opened an indoor permanent facility that just keeps us dry.

Woke up in the morning and it was dipping it down and now I had to make a decision.
Drive an hour in this relentless rain on a maybe or go back to bed and the warmth.
Knowing that the TORCH crew would do everything in their power to get the event running, and the car was already packed and ready, off I went.  Worse way is say hello if it was all cancelled.

It was near dark when I got to trackside.  To my surprise there were committee members already on the track hoovering the water way.  Not much one can say to the devotion of the personnel of TORCH.  Outstanding!

Around 8.15 ish it was announced that open practice would commence and i was ready.  I was pitting under my usual gazebo with Scott Faulkner and Simon Fearn.  Goods lad the pair of them and we had a laugh through the day 🙂
I was running yet another set up on my RB6 Kyosho as I get towards the fine tuning option of a base set up.
Car felt very good from word go and had 2 full practice sessions without any major changes

OK….of we went and I settled very quickly into the run.  Not trying any heroics at this stage proceeded to follow the local lads and ended up with a 2nd in round
Steve Brown TQed round one with a near perfect opening run

 

 

 

 

 

In round 2 I was determined not to make that one error that pulled me back into the pack like I did in round 1.

Of we went and not starting behind Steve it theoretically should be an easier run following him round.

Its never that easy (LOL)
A good run but the wind got heavier and heavier and everyone was suffering over the jump section.
At one point i thought my car turned into a glider.

Got 3rd in round but could of been so much better.
Steve TQed once more with Mark Sadler in on the 2 spot

Decided to make some minor changes to an already good set up.

Steve would lead the top heat out, followed by Mark Sadler and myself.
Steve was really driving very well indeed and he had his RB6 pretty much dialed to his liking.
An early mistake by Mark let me through and i set off to catch or to at least minimise the gap between Steve and I.
The weather certainly didn’t help matters at all.
The wind would just randomly take the flight of the cars at any given lap and we were all in the lap of the Gods when this happened.
On one lap in the run the car just sort of hanged in the air just waiting for someone to snap some pictures but only to land on the track marker and yet again ruin another fair and decent run

Same for everyone though so no complaints at all

I don’t recall actually taking a snap shoot of the results in round 4 but after a small about of rain the track slowed up a little and there wasn’t any significant faster times than before

Chris Ellis one of the organisers of the Surrey and Hants club in Farnborough Hampshire making the main A Final with his Kyosho DB1.

Chris has been an ambassador for the sport for many many years and now enjoys his racing more than ever.

Chris and I go back over 20 years and it is very pleasing to see him getting good results

Well dome mate

A critical part of TORCH is their triple jump sequence.  The wind today though was causing havoc

 

 

 

The main A Final started with a few laughs on the rostrum as Jays car started to have a mind of its self and went off on its own.  We all checked up and waited but all started laughing when Jay said it does it all the time – LOL

The buzzer went and we all started very clean.  From 2nd on the grid i put some early pressure on Steve with lap 2 being my actual fastest lap of the final and the 3rd fastest of the main.
Steve kept cool as ever and went about his business.
Mark and Sam to be fair were not being dropped…far from it in fact.
Sam got by Mark for 3rd and when i made a small error he didn’t hesitate to go by into 2nd place.

Many places swapped between all of us all the way down the main final but Steve held off Sam to take the win.

I was possibly trying a little too hard and a few error really took me out of the equation for the win but finished 3rd at the end.

Conclusion is simple here.
Compliments to everyone at TORCH for yet another smoothly run meeting  manner in horrible weather conditions

The club runs a practice session the day before (Saturday) their winter series which I think is really nice for the devoted racers to dial their cars in to the track – Starting at 10.0am till 4.0pm is just perfect – I like it!

Well the first round should not be counting for anyone.
It was a scrappy affair in the top 3 heats and more or less everyone having errors of some sort.

It is FTD racing by the way which really means you have to be on it

 

 

 

 

 

Darren is running his Orion powered TLR 22.  He TQed round 1

 

 

 

 

Well the grip seems to have come up a little and many of the drivers have improved in this the 2nd round.
Darren Bloomfield and Ellis Stafford I believe run their outboard cars.  There isn’t much grip out there and Darren improved on his time by 6sec.
I made some small fine tuning and now currently sitting 8th.
Lets see if we can improve in the 3rd round and see if the lads decide to stay with the outboard cars?!

 

 

 

 

Matt Benfield.
Editor of Racer magazine and F1 National driver looking very serious about racing these days.
Currently sitting in 7th place after 2 runs.
Good job Matt 🙂

 

Round 3 and now we have a decision to make.  Do we run new or older tyres.  I went with older tyres and I can’t say they were bad but I didn’t improve on my run.
Others put better tyres and improved.  Now I am sitting out of the main so looking towards experience to get the car in the main.

 

 

 

 

As ever, Ellis Stafford is typing on his PC.
Now i wonder if this has anything to do with his speed he has shown in the taking the 3rd round to go 2nd overall.

 

 

i am sort of speachless with my personal performance as I thought after a very clean run I would be very close (at least) to the main A final.
I have found myself mid B final as apparently one can have a bad set of tyres.  I haven’t had this before but all i did is change my tyres for a better set and went backwards.  Ah well…..

Darren Bloomfield improved on TQ by around 4 sec and has the honor of pole in the main.

Should  be an interesting final as some of the guys are real close in lap times.

 

 

The 4wd final saw Ed Kerry TQ the event with Chris Crainger 2nd.
The final started and it look to be a close affair with Chris starting off a little slow as Ed flew out of the traps and was on a mission.  A small error form Ed saw Chris catching and catching and it was getting very friendly and close till Ed had some sort of problem that allowed Chris to ease away and really cruise to the 4wd victory……very good racing.  Well done lads

 

 

 

The A final was full of superstars and a 4wd car running without front drive shafts and so on (XB4)
The final started and the first 4 were just on a mission.
TQ man Darren started off on a flyer with Ellis and Grant in hot pursuit.  In 4th was Chris Delves and certainly he was not out of the picture.  In fact with only a couple of laps down, Chris looked real strong and his car was real quick in speed too.
Grant touched Ellis over the centre small ski jump and it all go a little messy between the 2nd, 3rd and 4th paces till they sorted that out.  An unfortunate touch but in my opinion these things happen when drivers are so equally matched and driving so close.
Darren was on his way to Waitrose and checking out, but Ellis had some other ideas with fast lap after fast lap.  Hunting Darren down but realistically it would require an error from Darren for it to be real close again.
It wasn’t to be and Darren won the 2wd event from Ellis 2nd and Grant coming in at 3rd.
I do believe there is a video of the final and i will send some emails to locate.

A big congratulations to the club for a great event and we all thank you for your efforts.
Catch up next time

The club runs open practice so it was perfect for some very early testing.

Today i was testing various items and actually trying to run my RB6 as light as possible.
At home the car all up was actually under weight so some had to be added.
The track layout was actually easy but hard to go real fast.
My car felt a little on edge although the track was real slippery and everyone was on wet weather set ups

There was something like 8 F1 drivers here today but they were slit between 2wd and 4wd.  Not to mention other top drivers that did not compete in the National series last year to obtain a good licence grade.

I would like to say that my car was great but it really wasn’t.
This is the whole idea of testing of course.
The club was doing the same thing with their layout.  Testing it before bigger events.  Mmm!!
Anyways, i was circulating sort of OK until i spun in front of Grant and POW!, BANG!, don’t worry i just popped a ball joint when he drove into me.  Before people misunderstand and get it all wrong like some have, it was my fault – LOL
I was going to pull over at that point as when you loose so much time for a marshal to pop your ball stud on (and he was quick too), it sort of feels like a waste of time.  A lesson for you all here.  Carry on and do your best and you will see today why!!

I ended up with a 4th in round.  Grant was quickest with his Schumacher car

As I mentioned earlier I was doing a lot of testing today.

I changed loads on my car and even added a brass bulkhead on (which I swore I would never do).
One has to test everything of course!!

I will keep this brief.
My bulk head dropped off – LOL

I have no idea what i did but clearly talking to people I fitted something wrong and it just fell off.  I am still laughing about it now 🙂

I got a nothing for the round.

Now i did say earlier carry on even if you think its not worth it.  I hope you all took note because on this round the club decided to cut qualifying from 4 rounds down to 3 rounds.  If I stopped in round 1, I would be deep in trouble right now but the 4th in round 1 would need to count.

Well as you can see from the overall results sheet of round 3, I managed a 2nd in round behind Grant that really was driving very well.

The changes where taking place now and although I wanted another round the finals where coming up next.
I was to line up 3rd behind Kit Jones that had 2nd in round 1 and 2 and he was driving well too.

Lets go racing!

We set off at the buzzer and i had an amazing start out of my Orion powered RB6.  It just laughed off and overtook Kit for 2nd place.  Right i thought, lets sit behind Grant and see what develops.  Well what developed was the next corner was real slippery and I just got it all wrong.  Kit didn’t really get it much better i think and nor did anyone else to be honest.  After the 3rd corner mayhem, I really thought i would come out it it all in last place.  No!!…. I was still 2nd although a little way back from Grant now.  Try try as hard as one can, the time against Grant could not be made up.  For those that don’t know Grant not so long ago was winning part of the National here at EPR.  With Kit driving real hard to catch up from 3rd, I settled for 2nd and that’s how it finished

The club did a good job as they usually do at all their events.

Not sure why the meeting got cut down to 3 qualifiers though.  I didn’t think that was very efficient which is very unusual for EPR.  Maybe there was a problem we were not aware of.  Thanks lads and catch up soon