The Madman Writes - 13/14th June 2009
Ok, hands up if you went to Cowdenbeath for the racing on Saturday purely out of habit. Hopefully, the penny clicked as soon as you turned into the deserted Racewall car park and headed the 9 miles to Knockhill where you are reading this and enjoying watching the mighty Brisca F1’s in action.
I must confess that I have not followed the exploits of the formula very closely this season but expect to see the usual suspects such as Andy and Stuart Smith battling it out with Frankie Wainman Jnr over the two days. I was reading on one of the forums that Tony Smith had been out for a while through injury and was hoping to be back again for the weekend. Tony is one of those characters who has been racing in the formula for years with only the odd win here and there to show for his efforts. He epitomises what stock car racing is all about. There are countless drivers like him in every form of motor sport. Here’s to seeing some of the less familiar names doing well this weekend.
The big event last week was the F2 Nationals which saw the return of the legendry Rob Speak into the formula. It looked as if he could have had the perfect start by drawing a second row grid position in the main race but it isn’t that easy when you have been away from the formula for the best part of ten years. The car still needed sorting out to handle the way he wanted but it good to see his refusal to move over and let anyone past without a fight. It won’t be long before he is winning regularly in the formula. He was upstaged last week by Mickey Brennan and World champion Ian Thompson in the main event with the latter looking to be in a different class from his opponents. A long chase after Mickey in the main race saw him run out an easy winner once he got past. That was followed up by a last to first performance in the final then finishing second over the line in the Grand National which was later elevated to first after a technical infringement was discovered on James Harris’s car. Regular racing at the Racewall has improved his driving leaps and bounds and he will be a potent force again over the weekend.
Gavin Scott may have a long way to go until he reaches the greatness of the drivers mentioned in the last paragraph but he will have a good tale to tell for many years to come as to how he humbled the mighty Rob Speak in a heat at the Racewall last week. It was a long overdue success for youngster who has led many races this year only to fall by the wayside in the closing stages. He followed it up by leading everyone a merry dance in the Grand National up at Crimond on Sunday. The final was won by Stuart Kelly from the blue grade and had the calculator out to see if he would be forced to race from a higher grade at the Irish open meeting which took place on Thursday and Friday. We worked out that he should have been able to keep his blue grade status for the first of them before being upgraded under the five day rule where an lower grade final winner is automatically upgraded. George Macmillan won finals from the blue on a Saturday and Wednesday so Sunday to Thursday should theoretically be the same. A famous name from Knockhill, Alan Kirkaldy, ran well all weekend with a third place in the Crimond final the best of his efforts.
Well done to Ross Waters on winning the Scottish Ministox championship last week. He had a great battle with Robert Gemmell and Kyle Irvine which any of the trio could have won until Ross asserted command on the very last lap. He has still more than a year to go in the formula and followed up his success with three easy wins at Crimond the next day.
Elsewhere the final National Hot Rod World qualifier was held at Northampton last Sunday where David Newall took a heat victory. The grid format has been one the success stories of the year which made the even the greatest mathematician needing to get a slide rule out to determine who had won the points as at least 8 drivers stood a chance going into the meeting. Our own Hot Rods should provide a big field of cars and many people will be getting the first chance to view the Lightning Rods who shown great potential at their first meeting in Scotland last month and you can judge for yourselves as to what a future they have.
Meantime sit back and let the action commence.