Ernest Owen Memorial Car Trial

Event Report

The sixth round of the 2023 car trials championship was hosted by Owen Motoring Club and held at the Apley Estate near Bridgenorth. This new venue is extensive with a lot of scope to set out some very challenging hills. With the weather forecast to be overcast all day conditions were set to only slightly improve.

There were twenty starters across 5 classes the largest being Class B with 9, Class C with 2 and Class D with 6. Eight hills were set out spread out across the site using some very steep inclines which resulted in some high scores throughout the day.

Round 1 saw further dominance of Tim and Charlie Dovey in the formidable Renault Clio Sport leading the class from hill 2. By the end of the round Tim was ahead of Charlie by 4 points and 12 ahead of the next closest Garry Preston.

Nigel jones and Kevin Roberts were double driving a Mazda MX5 in class C and were having a close battle with both managing to clean a few hills with Nigel completing the round 10 ahead of Kevin.

Dave Oliver was able to take a small lead in class D over Mark Hoppe and Barrie Parker who were both tied 5 points behind.

Round 2 saw slight alterations to the hills to allow slight improvements on the scores with the benefit of the grass slowly drying. Tim Dovey increased his lead slightly over Charlie by a further two points with the rest of the class falling away out of contention. Nigel and Kevin continued to perform well again both posting the lowest round scores with Nigel improving his lead over Kevin. Dave made a few mistakes dropping points on a few hills reducing his class lead to 1 point over Barrie with Mark a few points further behind.

The afternoon rounds saw continual dropping of points on all hills but with no significant changes in positions. Tim Dovey secured another 1^st Overall in his maiden championship season. Charlie was 1^st in class B with Garry Preston being awarded Best Owen. Nigel Jones was 1^st in class C with the lowest score of the day. Dave was able to maintain and slightly improve his lead over Barrie to secure the 1^st in class D.

TM