[woodcote]

Race Report Part One - Heats

We welcomed seventeen racers for our October HO race - the final round of the 2020-22 WHO Mod and WHO Tuners championship. A special welcome went to Ash B, who was making his racing debut at the Barn - and to Gary, who was back for the first time since February 2020...

   

Simon's layout was certainly going to be a thrilling challenge for all the cars - and we had tight championship battles in both the main WHO Mod and secondary WHO Tuners categories. The later was pretty much decided when Simon and Duncan were unable to attend - meaning Ash only had to score six points to clinch his first ever HO title. In the super-fast, lexan-clad WHO Mod class, the qualifying heats would certainly throw up some surprises and put the championship leader in some difficulty...

   

Measure and control was the recipe for a good score on this track - there were simply too many places to catch out a flat-out attack. All four lanes were good for the Mod cars, although red lane had a slight power drop in the middle sector - something we couldn't locate or fix in set-up or practice. That would remain disconcerting to some throughout the night. The Tuners cars had no problems with power, it was the gutter lanes that were the challenge. After everyone had completed two heats of their four, Keith led the way - half a lap ahead of Andy and Oliver, with Deborah a further lap back. Championship leader Jerome was back in seventh place - nearly ten laps adrift of Keith. Over a lap, his car was extremely fast, but he was crashing far too much. Of the five Tuners runners, Kevin was running in tenth place with a three lap advantage over Ash and Isaac...

   

The tension was raised a notch in the second half of qualifying as Deborah went top after a sensational 23.35 lap run in blue lane - no-one could match that. She followed up with a 21.8 in white in the final heat to take pole, just under three laps ahead of Andy in second. Behind them, Pete took the final guaranteed A Final spot, a fraction ahead of Keith and Oliver who'd be battling Ryan for the B Final win and a step-up. Jerome had a better second pair of heats, but languished down in eighth place - he'd need to win the C and the B finals to keep his championship hopes alive...

   

Kevin put in a magnificent performance for pole (and a bonus point) in the Tuners competition, Ash J was second, Isaac third - and Ollie beat Ash B to fourth. It was a solid debut for the newcomer with consistent scores across all four lanes...

   

Don't forget, you can click on the tables to make them bigger.

Next, the finals!