2004 Stock Hatch Round 2, Donington Park
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More changeable weather meant that the qualifying conditions were deemed to have changed between the sessions, and so the grids were formed by splicing the order from each session. Andy Burgess put his VW Lupo on pole in only its second outing - must be because I told him to stop sandbagging! Richard Kingsnorth took his new car (ex Glenn Stokes 106 Rallye) to a very creditable 5th, whilst Champion Taylor was unexpectedly lower down the grid. The first heat started with a bit of a shunt (see my video), but soon settled with Neep taking a healthy lead from Munday. The second heat started much better, and Gordon Macmillan made up for an electrical fault in his qualifying session to win comfortably from 15th on the grid. In the final conditions were a little more tricky. It started with Gareth Wright and a Nova taking to the gravel at the first corner, and then taking out John Munday too. At the old hairpin, Richard Kingsnorth squeezed through a gap that did not look big enough to go from the inside to the outside and wide over the gravel, rejoining way down the order. On subsequent laps there were several spinners through the Craners, including Matt Lewis, Terry Roughton, Gordon Macmillan to name but a few. Up front, Andy Burgess had been passed for the lead by Craig Shepherd on the first lap, and the two of them were building a healthy lead on the rest of the field. The race was stopped early when Gordon Macmillan lost it in the Craners for a second time and rolled in the gravel at the bottom. He says he could not see through the screen because of the mud from his previous spin! As far as I understand it, 4 cars were subsequently excluded for a minor technical infringement, so they will all be hoping to make amends in the next few races. |
