Oxford Autumn AutoSolo

Event Report

The rain which had threatened to make the Oxford MC Boanerges AutoSOLO at the old Finmere airfield didn’t appear until competitors were on their way home. Instead, from the previous days downpours it had left a damp track to start off with which, with the addition of the leaves from the trees, made for some slippery moments for the drivers on the almost 1 mile course laid out with 47 numbered cones. In the end there was no advantage to be first or last in the running order with the 14 Nat B competitors almost all in one group except for the double driven entries which followed in the next group.

Jamie Yapp used the 4WD of the Golf to good effect in the morning tests and was up by 2.8 secs over Steve Conner in his Puma after Test 1 which was extended to 5.5 secs after the reverse run of the layout. After lunch the revised course was quicker, down to 77.0 secs for Jamie, and Jamie ended up a comfortable FTD by 8.7 secs. That 10 points puts him in with a good chance of taking the BTRDA AutoSOLO Championship. It will all depend on the final Knutsford MC round at Booths Hall on the 19th November.

Alan Wakeman is the man tying for Jamie at the head of the points table but at this event he had 2 strong contenders in Class A for his Nissan Micra. Loughborough CC’s Andy Lewin pushed Alan hard with quicker times in his well modded Micra but then a change of tyres for test 2 didn’t work out and Alan was ahead by 2.2 secs at lunch. The extra power of Andy’s Micra told in the drying courses 3 and 4 and in the end Alan was in second spot 3.9 secs down. Richard Pain in his Toyota Starlet was a good 3rd in Class A.

In Class B Richard Yapp was driving the Clio on this event (Jamie was in the Golf) and used the single driving to good effect at one time being ahead of Haydn Marks in his BMW 318i. The pair were trying to beat the well driven Puma of Steve Conner but to no avail with Haydn ending up in second spot and Richard third. Richard and Emma Olsen share the yellow MG ZR without quite the same power of the top drivers and they finished 4th and 6th in Class B.

Mark Summers had sorted out the diff in his MX5 but it was the rapid MX5 of Antony Brown who took the Class honours with Peter Cox in his Honda S2000 a distant 4th.