Scott Edgar and, in bizarre circumstances, Christopher Keir – both notably in older 182 models – took the wins in the new-look Renault Clio Sport Championship as the 750 Motor Club’s 2022 season got under way amid intermittent hail at Croft.
Former karting ace Owain Rosser, in a newer 197, qualified on pole for the opening Clio encounter – his car racing debut – but a loss of power off the start meant he ended the opening lap in 16th. In contrast, Edgar made a rocket launch to go from seventh into the lead at the opening bend, Clervaux, but then came nine very hard laps to stay ahead of those behind.
TRACK TEST: The Clio revamp that will boost a hidden club racing gem
Tim Bentley (182) initially took up the chase before giving way to Justin Griffiths’s 197. Bentley, though, retaliated, diving back past exiting the Jim Clark Esses and taking fellow 182 racers, reigning champion Jack Dwane and Keir, with him. Dwane closed in but Edgar held strong for his second win in the category. Dwane took second, while Griffiths held off Keir for his first outright podium result in third.
After lap one of race two on Sunday, a first victory for a 197 looked a very real possibility. Rosser again started on pole, but Griffiths got the jump on him at the start and, together, they started to build a gap to the following Keir and Dwane.On lap two, though, there was contact between Griffiths and Rosser entering the complex. Both were eliminated, and suddenly Keir was leading a Clio race for the first time. Like Edgar the day before, he had Dwane in his mirrors, but also like Edgar he held his nerve to record a first ever win – and at his home circuit.
But things had been far from straightforward inside the car for the Newcastle-upon-Tyne driver. “The right-hand air vent popped out of the dashboard and got caught under the pedals – I spent a lap trying to fish it out with my hand and managed to sling it over my shoulder, only for the left one to then do the same!” said Keir. “Luckily I managed to grab that one too and throw it in the boot with the other one. They spent the rest of the race rattling around behind me.”
As expected, the Honda Civic Type Rs of Philip Wright and Ryan Polley were the winners of two very entertaining Hot Hatch races, but both were almost defeated by Kris McCloy’s older Civic, much improved with a punchier KT24 Honda Accord engine.
McCloy qualified on pole for the opener and led it for the first five laps until a slight hesitation lapping a backmarker created the tiniest of gaps for Wright to wriggle through as they approached Barcroft. By Sunny In, Polley was also through as McCloy kept going to take third.
Wright’s win gave him pole for race two, but he knew beforehand he would be beaten off the line. “We’d needed to change the gearbox on Friday night/Saturday morning before qualifying and, with the new one, I couldn’t change from first to second so needed to start in second,” he explained.
Sure enough, Polley and McCloy were ahead of him on the run to Clervaux and another intense three-way fight between them followed. But McCloy was again out of luck when his engine spluttered exiting the chicane, Wright’s Type R rear-ending the Civic as he swerved to avoid it. Undeterred, Wright was then able to close in on Polley but there was no way through, hence a win and a second place apiece.
Importantly in the outright championship, Paul Jarvis (Citroen Saxo VTS) took a pair of Class B wins. Reigning champion David Drinkwater (BMW Compact) won Class C in race one, but in race two suffered a rare defeat as Paul Dyrdal (Saxo VTR) took the honours.
Christopher Nylan impressively took pole and victory on his debut in the Type R Trophy, taking advantage of a ferocious scrap for second behind him to build a seven-second lead by the end. Mark Dicken finished runner-up but later confessed he’d “never defended like that in my life” to keep Jake Hewlett behind. Hewlett, a semi-pro sim racer, had remarkably qualified second fastest to Nylan for his first ever car race before finishing it in third.
Another third for Hewlett in race two (starting with race one’s top 10 reversed) was to follow, but in different circumstances. Travis Coyne was the winner on the road and believed he had secured his first win in the category, only for officials to later disqualify him from the results after he momentarily lost control under double waved yellow flags at Clervaux.
This meant Joe Jessup, who’d muscled his way past Hewlett in a hard but fair move at Clervaux to be second on the road, thus inherited the victory. Matt Digby was second, with Hewlett third after falling back in his clash with Jessup.
With chief rival Michael Cutt starting from the rear after braking problems in qualifying, Graham Crowhurst dominated the opening BMW Car Club Racing encounter, which finished behind the safety car. Cutt was able to come through for second ahead of Paul Cook as M3s inevitably filled the lead positions. Cutt was not to be denied in race two, leading from start to finish, but he had Crowhurst right behind him all the way. Cook was again third.
Richard Webb in his newly built Spire RGBR was untouchable in both Sports 1000 races. Michael Roots (Mittell MC-53) and reigning champion Ryan Yarrow (Spire GT3-Y) were second and third each time. Yarrow’s two outings were not without incident: in race one he survived a spin while avoiding Paul Smith’s faltering Mittell SSRD MC-53, and in race two he finished second on the road but dropped to third with a five-second penalty for exceeding track limits.
Pip Hammond (Vauxhall Nova GTE) survived attacks from Stewart Place and Chris Dear (both in Peugeot 205 GTIs) to win the opening Classic Stock Hatch race. Place was pressing him hard until he retired with a suspected blown valve, which prevented him starting race two from pole.Pete Morgan (Ford Fiesta XR2) won race two ahead of Hammond, these two well clear of the rest after Dear had slowed with electrical problems.
Donington Park MSVR: McLaren 3, Mercedes 1 as GT Cup begins
A grid of nearly 40 cars assembled for the opening round of the 2022 GT Cup Championship, which featured four races at Donington Park last weekend.
Only minutes into Saturday’s free practice, the Mercedes-AMG GT3 of reigning champions Richard and Sam Neary suffered a brake disc failure that forced the Team Abba car to miss qualifying, just as they had done nine months earlier. But, unlike the events of 2021, there would be no fairytale ending for the father-son duo.
Fellow British GT runner Ian Loggie placed his RAM Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 on pole for the opener, and a strong start bought him time to focus on bringing his Pirelli tyres up to temperature before leaving the rest behind. Neary Sr not only had to work his way through the order, but also had to safely bed in new brake discs. He too measured his race and, from 35th and last, he finished seventh and picked up fastest lap, which awarded him pole for the afternoon’s endurance race.
As a lone amateur, fellow front-row starter Loggie gained from a shorter stop in the second contest, but struggled in traffic, which allowed Marcus Clutton’s McLaren 720S to close up. Loggie did his best to defend but, approaching Coppice, the leaders hit yet more traffic. This wrong-footed Loggie, who headed through the gravel, allowing Enduro Motorsport duo Clutton and Morgan Tillbrook to repeat their success from last year’s Donington Park British GT finale. Simon Orange and Michael O’Brien came home second in their McLaren, while Loggie finished fifth behind the Neary Mercedes.
Sunday’s races were all-McLaren affairs. Orange and O’Brien had shown pace all weekend, and Orange was rewarded in race three. Greystone GT also had something to cheer about in race four, when Oli Webb (sharing with Iain Campbell) was able to hunt down Loggie before holding off the Neary Mercedes in the closing stages.
The GT4 cars in GTH produced a constant stream of three-wide battles, with the Stephen Walton/Chris Hart Mercedes winning twice, while in GTO the McLaren MP4-12C Cam Am of Paul Bailey and Ross Wylie couldn’t find the pace to overhaul the lone Radical RXC of Steve Burgess and Ben Dimmack.
Radical brought two grids to Donington, with wins shared out across the Radical Challenge. The first encounter was hit by a burst of rain. While some drivers pitted, others stayed out, with Jason Rishover heading home Ben Stone, John Macleod and Elliot Goodman by less than half a second. Anthony Ayres and Chris Short claimed the other two wins.
James Beckett’s new United Formula Ford series attracted a healthy grid of 18 cars spanning five decades. James Hadfield’s beautifully prepared Van Diemen RF03 earned pole with Matt Rivett’s RF91 behind. Heading into Redgate for the first time, Rivett sold Hadfield the dummy and took the lead but, with an oil-gushing car behind, an immediate red flag and extensive track repair was required.
At the restart, Hadfield went defensive, so Rivett simply drove around his outside, the 2006 Castle Combe FF1600 champion looking certain of victory, only to coast out of contention a few laps later. In a reversal of fortunes, race two should have been Hadfield’s, but a collision at the final corner between other drivers left fluid on the racing line, sending Hadfield through the gravel and promoting Rivett before the race was stopped.
The Clubmans Sports Prototypes continue to attract well-supported grids and, despite sizeable differences in performance, positions were keenly contested throughout. Clive Wood’s Mallock Mk23 won the first two of three races, but Cody Tree’s outstanding race two drive from the back to third in his Phantom, and then race-three win, was the highlight.
There were some tremendous battles elsewhere, such as in the Racing Saloons encounters that were shared with Z Cars. Callum Bates came out on top overall and in the latter category in race one, with Matt Dance emulating him in the sequel. Chris Boon’s Jaguar XK8 and Kris Dean’s Renault Clio 172 enjoyed an unlikely ding-dong in the Racing Saloons, and were separated by just over a tenth at the line in race two.
Brands Hatch BRSCC: Horrobin holds on to win Fiesta double
Simon Horrobin twice withstood race-long pressure to open his account for 2022 with a pair of Fiesta Championship victories at Brands Hatch.
After polesitting debutant Jenson Brickley was jumped by both Horrobin and Alastair Kellett at the start, Horrobin then passed Kellett at McLaren on the opening lap before fighting a rearguard action. A failed attack from Kellett let Brickley into second, before the Fiesta Junior champion’s last-lap challenge for the lead at Druids was also rebuffed, with light contact. Kellett nipped back through at Graham Hill Bend, and the Irishman fell less than 0.2 seconds shy of Horrobin, who was short on brakes.
A slow green-flag lap by Horrobin ahead of race two may have contributed to a first-corner spin on cold tyres for Kellett and a huge tankslapper for Zachary Lucas, who’d climbed from the back of the ST240 class to fourth in the opener after gearbox trouble in qualifying. While most avoided the confusion, Kellett was collected by reigning champion Rob Smith and was out. Brickley was unable to find a way past Horrobin when the race went green, while John Cooper drove a lonely race to third.
A large Modified Ford field was split for drivers to contest two races from three. Dave Cockell put mechanical woe at the Silverstone opener behind him to take a pair of comfortable wins in his four-wheel-drive Escort Cosworth. Behind, Malcolm Harding’s Smith & Jones-engined Escort Mk2 just held off the closing BDX-powered example of Dan Minton in the opener. Minton enjoyed a close contest for second with Neil Jessop’s Duratec-motivated Zakspeed-style version in race two before losing out when he tangled in traffic.
With no Cockell in race three, the spaceframe Escort RSR Mk1 driven by Jack Gadd – who spun from third in the opener – looked to have beaten Harding, only to lose the lead while lapping his father Dave.
After dominating the opening race for Caterham 310Rs (which also ran a two-from-three races format), Pete Walters had to fight back from being shuffled down the order in race three. A late safety car set up a two-lap dash to the flag, where a twitch at McLaren for Stephen Lyall allowed Walters to pip him by just 0.073s. Lyall also lost out in race two, when a 5s track-limits penalty handed Tom Wyllys victory.
Sid Smith steered clear of chaos to claim a maiden Fiesta Junior win. Front-row starters Deagen Fairclough and Albert Webster slid off at Paddock Hill Bend and, while both initially dragged their cars back on track, the oil deposited around the circuit by Fairclough before his engine blew contributed to multiple spins. Just three cars stayed on the lead lap, Thomas Lee and Jake Maynard trailing Smith home. Maynard’s last-lap spin gifted Lee the sequel after both had passed Smith, while Fairclough salvaged third with a replacement engine.
Mikey Doble’s second BMW Compact Cup win required an impressive fightback after a slow getaway. After climbing up to second, Doble was eating into Ian Howes’s advantage before a late safety car left Howes a sitting duck, with Lee Dendy-Sadler also demoting him. Polesitter Doble won the opener after repassing Dendy-Sadler, who secured his maiden series podiums.
Reports by Carl McKellar, Steve Hindle and Mark Paulson. Photography by Steve Jones, Ollie Read and Gary Hawkins. Want more reports from the world of national motorsport? Subscribe today and never miss your weekly fix of motorsport with Autosport magazine
