Sorrymate.com-Hottrax Motorsport 2011 Round Seven at Oulton Park, Cheshire on 17th September 2011 – National and Junior Endurance, MICHELIN Power Cup, MotoGrande – Race Report - words by Alfonso Lygo

National and Junior Endurance Race – Three Hours

In qualifying we lost a returning Hazel Drury who was rendered unconscious with rib and arm damage bringing out the red flag, her place in Well Oiled Racing was take by Ducks X stalwart Russell Horton who joined Steve Griffiths at Well Oiled Racing for the day.

Despite a grid packed full of talent it was title favourites Sweatshop Racing (Mick Godfrey/Mike Dickinson), needing 15 points to wrap up the title, that took pole from series returnees Uprite Racing (Damian Rowley/John Crockford), now in the safe hands of Triff Stevens. Also hoping to wrap the National 600 title up this weekend were M & M (Lewis Mason/Robbie Moore) who qualified in third spot.

Crockford reinforced his speed and ability by grabbing the head of the pack and building up a respectable lead pulling out each lap from Sweatshop, Pit Stop (Mark Affleck/Peter Dilks) M &M, Sorrymate (Richard Dilks/Mark Cooper) TANC (Chris Mason/James McBride), Banzai (Ben Jenkins/Rupert Thompson) Initiatec (John Burr/Arron Harte), Redmond Racing 4 (Tony Rogers/Neil Garnham) and BLDS
(Bill Lilly/Jonty Dixon). This lasted around 30 mins after which Croc was off and into the pits to hand over to ex World Endurance Championship regular Rowley who came back out in tenth at the same time as Sweatshop were leading and working towards that championship, Brand Brothers (Martin & Peter) were second on the road, not bad for a Junior 600 team! and Visorvision (Keith Flint/Ben Neeves) were a healthy third ahead of National 600 crew Pit Stop.

At the hour mark the timing sheets showed that Sweatshop were at the front, on the same lap were the Brands, Pit Stop, TANC and Visorvision. Uprite were up to sixth on the same tour as BLDS, Banzai, RR4, Vendetta (Steve Blakeney/Alan Boyter), Blujets (Carl Hodgkins/Ash Rothwell), Ridgeback (Mark Clark/David Stolliday) and Insignia (Einar Torlen/Rob Loveday) - Sorrymate were handed a stop/go penalty and a few minutes later Robbie Moore was off in the wet causing damage to his left wrist, leaving Mason to carry on as a lone rider with the possibility of grabbing a few points toward their title chase. By half distance we had the pace car out and then the sun emerged drying off some of the wet which was just as dangerous as the track was never in a constant condition. Sweatshop still lead from Brand Brothers by a lap, TANC by two, ditto distance over Pit Stop, BLDS, Uprite, RR4, 1491 (Andy Pulling/Ian Cooper) who were on a charge, Ridgeback, Blujets (after an off), Initiatec (John Burr/Arron Harte) and Old & Bold (Paul Burbage/Andy Main). Banzai were also struggling after Thompson had bailed out leaving any further riding duties to Jenkins.

Dramas for a couple of our heroes just before the two hour mark; Vendetta crashed out at Druids and Blujets spilt before returning to the pits; Sweatshop now held a lap over Brand and TANC with Pit Stop, Uprite and Visorvison all another lap down. Just when the Brand Brothers thought things were great they had a crash dropping them down to 12th whilst Initiatec suffered a similar fate bouncing then into fourteenth. Sweatshop, TANC, Visorvision, BLDS and Pit Stop all continued in formation and the only real question was whether Uprite could catch and pass TANC for second spot on the road...the separation came down lap by lap...58s...50s...42s...24s...19s...8s then the black Suzuki passed the green Kawasaki, unknown to most was that McBride was having to watch the temperature of his newly acquired ex Pere Riba works bike and nurse it to the end.

This meant that Sweatshop are the 2011 National 1000 Champions with a round to go. They won on the road and their class 2 laps ahead of one off returnees Uprite and TANC, who were only 0.8s away from the runners up. Ridgeback were fourth in class, 30s in front of BLDS with Well Oiled Racing and Insignia both finishing on the same lap.

Pit Stop capitalised on M & M's rare mishap to win the National 600 class from the charging 1491 with Roundall Racing (Simon Allen/Al Waring) who were over the moon to be third ahead of Spark (Shelley Pike/Rob Knoyle) and Ducks Cross (Martin Landmann/Mike Eglington). Lewis Mason was unable to earn enough distance to be classified so M & M go into the final round with only an 11 point advantage - all up for grabs in Norfolk then.

Without lead rider, Paul Berryman, Visorvision had a great race to pull off a class win in the Junior 1000s after finishing a non too shabby fourth on the road overall. They were a lap ahead of RR4 and Blujets who were apart by a slim 8 seconds. Old and Bold were rewarded with fourth after a steady day ahead of DR400 (Pete Douglas/Derek Redmond) and DR200 (Andy Dix/Jonathon Garnett) with newcomers Still Game Racing (James Butterwoth/David Muir) bringing up the rear.

Despite their off recently crowned Brand Brothers Racing stayed at the front of their class on the same lap as fellow fallers Initiatec and third spotters Sorrymate.com - all covered by 76 seconds - Apex (Glen Levy/Nick Matthews) were two laps down and a valuable fourth in class after what has been a tough season for the hard working team.


Michelin Power Cup 1000 & 600

1000 Race 1

The weather played havoc with the Michelin Power Cup fraternity, riders on slicks with torrential rain and more to come meant an early lunch and a delayed start to the opening race. With Mike Dickinson holding a glorious 127 points over nearest challenger Shane Pearson it would have been simple to settle for a steady ride - 5 points would do Mike. However Race 1 was a wipeout for Pearson as he crashed out on the opening lap establishing Dickinson as the worthy champion, Mike had also pulled in after one lap "I've gotta go to work on Monday morning" was the comment. This left Gaz Evans to slug it out with poleman Tony Keilty just before the BMW man fell in water at Old Hall leaving Keilty to paddle carefully around to the flag. Toby Simpson would have had a decent ride as he was promoted to second before falling and the red flag being shown. Stephen Harrison was delighted to be in the runner up spot ahead of Andy Rouse, Greg Allsop, Rhalf Lo Turco and Steve Bentley. All this meant that Mike Dickinson, the very professional and amiable South African walks away with the MPC 1000cc title after a campaign that started at Brands back in March. Like many racers Mike is fully supported by wife Sara, often his only pit crew.

1000 Race 2

With some of the pressure off - Dicko, Pearson, Evans and Kielty were left to battle it out over 8 laps of the parkland circuit. We lost Pearson after a crash out of the lead in the first lap. Evans led for a while before getfaster.co.uk Mike stole the lead and, despite pressure from both Evans and Kielty he never looked too concerned. Unfortunately we lost Evans with a lap to go whereas Kielty was less than 1/20th of a second down on our leader at the drop of the cloth. Greg Allsop regained some of his early season form to finish third from Harrison, Rouse, Bentley and Kevin Allen.

600 Race 1

It was all about Danny Imberg and Grant Wagstaff rocking up to Oulton, with a maximum of 125 points left to earn could Wag do anything to deny Danny the title and could Ady Allsopp snatch second place honours of Wagstaff, who had a magnificent ride in the Senior Manx Grand Prix with a second place and fastest lap of the week? At the start will all riders on wets Imberg made a most impressive start, so quick was he that he soon caught the 1000 machines who started 25 seconds before the 600s. Whilst Danny played with the big boys he was pulling away from his other class mates with Peter Dilks 28 seconds adrift, ahead of Wagstaff, Marc Dilks, Richard Charlton and Dominic De Leon. Still the fallers were reported by the corner marshals including Ady Allsopp who missed out on harvesting any more much needed points.

600 Race 2

Run concurrently with the 1000s, albeit making a start 25 seconds after the big bikes it didn't take long for Imberg to trounce the rest of the 600s and start mixing it with the litre machines, Danny finished fourth on the road to win his class from the hard pushing Wagstaff, Charlton and Ady Allsopp; who was 4th after out riding Peter & Marc Dilks and Mark Affleck - this gives Ady bragging rights for a night on the town with the Pit Stop crew in deepest Mansfield that evening- nightmare! That absolutely dominant performance put Imberg in an unassailable position to make him the 2011 Michelin Power Cup 600 Champion.


MotoGrande 1000 & 600

1000 Race 1

New face to Hottrax Sam West made a brilliant start and was never heeded in the first eight lap race, another newcomer Ben Scranage slotted into second and had the almost perfect ride to hang onto the runner up spot from the rapid progressing Rhalf Lo Turco who was sixth on the opening lap. Rhalf displaced Andrew Haines who slipped a place whilst championship leader Julian Hughes fell off at Deers Leap and despite having a healthy cushion in the points situation, he must still take care as Ash Daughtrey is still within striking distance after a fifth place, finishing ahead of Derek Gulbransden, Andrew Fenton-Copeland, Adam Reeve, Justin Stephenson and Stephen Bridle.

1000 Race 2

With title favourite Hughes unable to take to the grid, the riders lined up in torrential rain for the eight lap thrash. First race winner Scranage replicated his earlier appearance and began building up a commanding lead over Haines and Reeve who, after half distance had gapped the rest of the field. In their wake were; Daughtrey netting more points, Bridle, Andrew Duncan and Nick Masterson - the pack retaining that order until the end of the race which saw the track drying a little. The MotoGrande now go into the final round at Snetterton, at the end of October with the title and positions to race for.

600 Race 1

Andrew Nicholson was out to grab as many points to secure the 2011 title and he did enough to do that. Leader on the first lap was endurance man Richard Dilks and made a battle for the lead with Nicholson and Paul O'Connor. Champion elect took over P1 in the middle part of the race before relinquishing the front place to O'Connor who held off Nicholson from Dilks, Roger Slater, Colin Norris, Warren Verwey, Nick Matthews, Nick Barnes, George Harvey and William Bateman. Nicholson celebrated with an obligatory burnout and with Shaun Champion absent Norris made hay with his sights now set firmly on making the runner up spot in the table all his own.

600 Race 2

Warren Verwey was first across the line at the end of the opening lap but it didn't take long for Nicholson to take over and start building some space between himself and O'Connor with Dilks not letting go in third spot. Slater was best of the rest from Andy Lund, Norris, Apex man Matthews with Barnes following home ahead of Harvey and Paul Martin. Just to note that in the two MG600 races ex endurance man Pete Gibson snapped up a twelfth and thirteenth spot in order to collect some signatures towards his 2012 Manx Grand Prix entry.


Desmo Ducatis

Matthew Lawson and Andy Challis had a ding dong battle in Race 1 and after 8 laps were only separated by 5 seconds, these two were ahead of Neil Appleby who has had a brilliant season on the Dukes. Three more Class A machines filled the rest of the top seven in the capable hands of Andy Pike, Dallas Hornblow, Kevin Ellis and West Bridgford rider Steve Hands before the first of the Class B riders - Phil Wilcock.

In the best race of the season it was almost a replica of the opening encounter seeing Lawson taking the chequer less than 3 seconds ahead of rival Challis. In a race that was rain affected and many riders were lost to the gravel, Hands had a fantastic third spot ahead of Pike, Tom Roberts and first Class B machine home with Wilcock on board.

Its another six weeks before Hottrax Motorsport invade Snetterton and there are still championships to be won, places to be settled and fun to be had so make sure you have it in your diary; Racing on Saturday the 29th and Sunday the 30th of October with a test day on the Friday.

Sorrymate.com-Hottrax Motorsport 2011 Round Seven at Oulton Park, Cheshire on 16th and 17st August 2011 – National and Junior Endurance, MICHELIN Power Cup, MotoGrande – Preview - words by Alfonso Lygo

If you only attend one round of the 2011 Hottrax Motorsport Championship, this should be the one – so much action packed into one day at the demanding Oulton Park is a mouth watering prospect. Due to the compact timetable we will see the 600s and 1000s in the same race in both the Michelin Power Cup and MotoGrande action – whilst still racing for class positions, some of the 600s will be chasing overall podium places.


National and Junior Endurance

The last round at Cadwell Park was a cracker with the Hottrax Motorsport regulars being joined by wild-cards prior to the BSB round a week later – wild cards were unplaced at the end of the race as not to affect championship points.


600cc National

Going into the penultimate round of the season M & M still need to work hard if they are to snaffle the title from last year’s champions Pit Stop Racing. Despite a 36 point advantage with two rounds to go nothing is impossible as the Juniors proved in 2010 going into the final round with all to play for. M & M and Pit Stop were second and third at Cadwell with probable one offs PS Racing taking the win, 1491 were fourth which moved them into third in the rankings with Spark being away at the Manx Grand Prix.


1000cc National

Sweatshop will be pleased to be having a smoother second half to the season than the dramas that affected the earlier rounds, despite finishing behind a wild card Triumph 675 pairing on the road at Cadwell they bagged max points in the last round and now sit with a reasonable lead over TANC Racing, BLDS and Insignia. BLDS had a profitable round in Lincolnshire, a race that TANC will probably want to forget when their Suzuki went up in a cloud of steam. The Oulton line up for Sweatshop will be regular Mick Godfrey, back from the Isle of Man and current Michelin Power Cup 1000 champion elect, Mick Dickenson who will match Mick for lap times making them the team to chase.


600cc Junior

Peter and Martin Brand have been on the money the whole season but what this class lacks in numbers is made up for in competitiveness, their 165 points from Initiatec’s 79 is testament to their riding, strategy and consistency, a massive congratulations to the two brothers who have performed faultless during the season to wrap up the Junior 600 title with two rounds to go. Initiatec were not helped by being un classified at Cadwell as they only ran a single rider, currently third in the points sorrymate.com suffered the same fate. We will see four teams battling it out over the final two rounds of the championship for runner up spot to the mighty Brands.


1000cc Junior

Derek Redmond 4 is the most successful team in the class, winning at Cadwell despite a crash; that said, only a handful of points adrift are Banzai who were third in Lincolnshire with a new rider added to the line up. The well run Blujets posted second at Cadwell only 1.2 seconds in front of Banzai and any of these three could take the title which will most likely go down to the wire at Snetterton at the end of October. Visorvision Traction Control failed to add to their points tally in the last race as Paul Berryman’s Suzuki boiled up, leaving it impossible for Keith Flint to earn some much needed points in their 2011 campaign.


Michelin Power Cup

600 cc

The steamroller that is Danny Imberg continued at Cadwell Park as title rivals Grant Wagstaff and Richard Charlton were away competing in the Manx Grand Prix. Imberg didn’t have it easy over the August weekend in the sunshine as hot on his heels was an ‘on song’ Ady Allsopp who pushed him all the way in the three races to take three runner up spots, doing his points tally no harm at all. Danny has a pile of points over the chasers but never say never with masses of points left on the table. Nick Green had three thirds managing to finish in front of a Dilks in all the races, whether it was Marc or Peter.


1000cc

Since the departure of Daz Bellworthy from the MPC, Mike Dickinson wanted someone to scrap with and it came about in the last round in the form of Shane Pearson on his Fireblade. The results sheets show 3 wins for Dicko and three seconds for Shane but on the tarmac it was nip and tuck and in the final race of the Cadwell weekend Shane lead the race all the way being closely shadowed by the South African; Pearson made an unforced error at the bottom of the Mountain in front of family and friends only to see the blue + white BMW dive through and take the flag. Another to watch is Rhalf Lo Turco, the Brazilian getting better and better with each round.


MotoGrande

600cc

The regulars had to put up with appearances from Dave Sellars and 2010 MotoGrande 600 champ Sam Ludgate – these two carved up the top two steps of the podium in a ratio of two to one. Matt Smith was pleased with three thirds but did wonder what he had to do to get higher. Shaun Champion and Jake Kay missed Cadwell and Andrew Nicholson had to be happy with a seventh and fourth place, still keeping him best placed to blag the title.

1000cc

Local lad Phil Crow and Dan Flower put the cat amongst the pigeons at Cadwell taking the wins, that said Julian Hughes mustn’t grumble from the points earned that opened the gap further over Phil Brooks, Ash Daughtrey, Adam Reeve and Stephen Bridle. This title is not settled yet and places could change in the next six races. MOPC man Lo Turco is quite capable of race wins, expect to see full grids and close racing in the sweeps and turns of Oulton Park.


Ducati Desmo Due

This class to date has been mostly about Neil Appleby and Andy Challis, Neil seeing the top step of the podium more than his rival. Some finishes have been close but mostly Appleby has bossed the opposition. Dallas Hornblow has been there or there abouts with three fine thirds as the Class A machines populate the top places in the results. At the last round it was double class winner Paul Bradbury and David Jenkins to show how to get the most out of a Class B device. There are two races for Dukes at Oulton, sit back and enjoy the sound of the singles as they blast around the parkland venue.


The single race day at Oulton will run with seven races but what a stormer as the 600s and 1000s join together in MotoGrande and Michelin Power Cup twice, the Dukes have a couple of races and the 3 hour endurance race starts at around half past two.