Article by John Wilson

Lydden Hill, about 12 miles from Dover, has to be the best viewing circuit in the country with virtually every part of this challenging racetrack visible to the spectators. Format for the day was one three lap practice followed by three timed runs of 2 laps each - a long event by normal sprint standards - and it was hot!

Lydden 17th June was open to various championships including the ACSMC regional championship, MG Speed Championship, the Caterham Academy, the tvr Speed Championship AND the Nat A Speed Championship which hosts some of the fastest Speed and Hillclimb cars in the country in the shape of ex Formula 3000 single seaters and such like.

Our first practice saw John Wilson in good form as the silver Cerb showed the rest of us a clean pair of heels but with Dave Morris only one second behind in the Tuscan racer.  Dave Jenkins also put in a good
practice run making use of the knowledge gained during his visit a couple of weeks previously.  Alan Davies was there or thereabouts as ever with championship absentee David Balderson showing the remainder around his favourite circuit.

On the first timed run Steve Cox put in a storming 86.45 (net 83.93 after the algorithm) with John Wilson chomping at his heels with an 87.10 (84.16).  Dave Balderson's Tasmin claimed third spot but the Chimps of Mike Horn and Hugh Davies were picking up the pace and only a handicap second or so behind. The other chimps of Dave Jenkins and Alan Davies were sharing a banana and swinging through the trees whilst they and Dave Morris had 4 wheels off at some time during their runs, Jenk’s 150 metre fishtail out of the main spectator bend keeping the crowds entertained.  Meanwhile, new boy Tim Scrivens was having a whale of a time in his Cerbera - to put in times in the 92s during a first visit to the wicked track is no small achievement. Tim’s Cerb is the one that was sprayed as new at the factory to match a lady’s ski-boots, a great colour it is too.

Second timed runs saw Coxy/Wilson chipping the tenths away at the top of the leaderboard but Alan Davies was up for it with 90.15 (net 85.15) but it was Dave Morris' 6 litre Chevvy powered Tuscan putting in a blistering 83.62 (net 85.59) that clearly showing it wasn't all over yet!

There was then a break while the National A Speed Championship got two runs in each, the speeds were astounding but the fragility of these cars was demonstrated when one lost a wheel at the tight left hander “Devil’s Elbow” and careered into the gravel and the tyre wall, the driver wasn’t hurt thank goodness.  The tyre bounced off the track and into the paddock area until it hit the run-off Armco, travelling some 150 yards!

We were then back on!

A third timed run at the end of a hot day on a hot track (air temperature was at 28 celcius and the track was in the 40s) seldom yields much improvement as the air loses that nice density that makes engines so crisp on autumn mornings and the cars gasp for breath. But Dave Morris was not done yet. His last run of 82.66 (net 84.61) lit up the tyres, the spectators and the championship as he fought for grip all the way but unfortunately Dave's handicap of 1.02 was 0.75 of a second away from his first championship win.

It was unbelievably close on the final leaderboard for the day. Coxy's final run of 86.07 was good enough to keep the top gong out of John Wilson's hands by a quarter of a second. Less than 1.75 handicap seconds separated the next six cars namely David Balderson, Dave Morris, Alan Davies, Dave Jenkins, Mike Horn, and Hugh Davies. And Tim Scrivens score of 19.38 points is a superb tally at his first race track sprint. The whole event just could not have been closer.

Our commiserations to Jes Firth who's Cerbera is still in the naughty corner - we hope that its behaviour improves in time for Prescott on 22nd July.