Running with the CCMC Super Saloons & Tin Tops at Thruxton on Saturday 29th July , The Welsh Sports & Saloon Car Championship (WSSCC) ran rounds 5 & 6 at Thruxton There are a mixture of familiar faces and cars, with some new Faces and some new cars. After several false alarms, Nigel Mustil who lives in nearby Salisbury, actually turned up his potent Volvo S60 which has a 7litre Chevy engine! Nigel was in Class Five, the same class as WSSCC stalwart Chris Everill. Also In Class Five was fellow WSSCC stalwart Keith Butcher, who entered his new black Lamborghini Huracan! However Keith couldn’t get the engine fired up for more than a few seconds and sadly had to put it back in the trailer and head home, having never turned a wheel! Ian Hall was having another outing with his Darrian T98. Both Ian and newcomer Tommy Field (spaceframe Ford Escort RSR 2000T) were running as Non point scoring guests.
Although the weather forecast was for rain-showers throughout the day, and we had 5 minutes of heavy drizzle about an hour before Quali , but that was it! The rest of the day was Sunny, Cloudy but Dry! After Quali we had a WSSCC lock out of the first 2 rows! Nigel Mustil was fastest with a pole time of 1min 20 seconds dead! (lap speed of 106.02 mph)Tommy Fileld was next (1.20.66) 3rd fastest was Chris Everill (1.21.531) with Ian Hall 4th (l1.24.553 a lap speed of 100.31 mph) No one else could crack the 100 mph barrier! Wayne Spiller was 9th fastest but on Class Two pole (1.28.478) Craig Attard was 11th and Mark Williams 14th. Mike Cook was 17th and Verity Banks was 21st on her Class One treaded Tyres. Andrew Williams was looking after Veritys’ car as he wasn’t able to drive himself, but he hopes to be out again at Silverstone.
Race 1 15 minutes . rolling start. Tommy Field took an immediate lead and lead for first 3 laps. Initially Nigel Mustil had Chris Everill alongside him, but a heavy moment over the kerb saw Chris out of race 1 with a broken half shaft. Nigel quickly reeled in Tommy’s flying Ford and then pulled out a lead that grew to almost 8 seconds after the 11 lap race! Ian Hall was 3rd but had a gaggle of BMWs for Company! After successfully defending 3rd place for a long period, the BMW of Ronan Bradley slipped by with3 laps to go! Ian won the Driver of the Race award for his efforts! In Class Two Mark Williams made a fast start, but Wayne Spiller took over on lap 2 but it took some time for Craig Attard to latch onto the back of Marks Clio, but lap 9 he made a big effort, setting the Class Two fastest lap, as he passed Mark in the later stages. Wayne in 9th place was 1 lap down with 10 laps done as did everybody, including Mike Cook who had Rod Birley for company in the later stages. Verity Banks was 19th but the only driver on Class 1a tyres!
Race 2 Before the start we had lost Nigel Mustil and Ian Davies, both with a variety of reasons. Chris Everills team worked hard rebuilding his broken half shaft and hub on the picnic table, and got him back on the grid (Defo a candidate for Team of the Year)
Race2 15 minutes –rolling start. There were several false starts as one car stopped on the circuit and had to be recovered, and at the second time of asking, another car one stopped on the circuit and had to be recovered. On the 3rd time of asking the grid got away! Tommy Fields team had worked hard to balance the car, as in race one, the front tyres of the Ford Escort RSR had taken a pounding! This time he took off like a rocket and built a substantial lead he was never to loose! The only opposition was likely to come from Chris Everill who had to start from the back as he was a DNF in race 1. He sliced through the grid but had to work hard to make his way through the top 5, eventually moving into 2nd place by lap 3, but by then Tommy was long gone. Chris got his head down, setting his fastest lap of the race on lap 9 but still was unable to significantly dent Tommys lead. However as Tommy was running as a 'no points scoring guest', Chris was the first points scorer in the race, so can chalk it up towards the Blake Edwards Trophy.
In Class 2 Wayne Spiller was an early leader, until he retired on lap 4 with no clutch. This left Mark Williams in the class lead, but he was overtaken on lap 5 by Craig Attard. However Mark kept the pressure on Craig throughout the race and set the Class 2 fastest lap on lap 7! Even so Graig was awarded the ‘Driver of the Day’ for his efforts! So with Wayne only scoring points in race one, Craig took 17 points out of Waynes lead and Mark Williams took 14 points. So Class 2 honours are still up for grabs!