[woodcote]

Five finals tonight - and we started with a head-to-head E Final between Isaac and Rob...

   

Rob led through the line at the end of the first lap, but Isaac got in front next time round. Four laps in and a lengthy off for Rob dropped him three laps back. All Isaac had to do was keep things clean - which he did. There was no way back for Rob, the margin of victory nearly six and a half laps - Isaac getting by far his best score of the night...

   

Isaac stepped up to white lane in the D Final. There he met Ollie, who had at least one hand on the Junior Mod trophy - Isaac needing to win a couple more finals tonight to threaten his championship lead. Also on the line were Tracy and Daniel...

   

Isaac had a 'mare of a first lap, Tracy blasting her way into an early lead - Ollie and Daniel trying to stay in touch. Tracy was on great form, stretching out a significant gap, although a brief off on lap 15 did bunch the top 3 right back together. With the end of the race in sight, disaster struck for the race leader - both hers and Isaac's car left the track, Isaac's was retrieved, but Tracy's nestled against a pillar out of the marshal's sight. What seemed an age was only 10 seconds, but it was enough to let Ollie and Daniel through...

   

Ollie had the advantage, but lap times ebbed and flowed between the two - Ollie banging in the quickest and most consistent times over the final half-dozen laps. He won by just 0.45 of a lap - and was confirmed our 2023 Junior Mod champion!

   

The C Final saw Ollie stay in yellow lane - Stephen having chosen white. The other two racers will have been disappointed to not to have qualified higher - both Matthew and Keith showing awesome pace in the heats, but missing out due to car issues and plain bad luck. Yet it was Stephen who led the early stages, finding the inside lane the fastest way round. However, that lane is also the most tricky - and an off on lap 4 dropped him behind Matthew, both Keith and Ollie already losing time with off-road excursions...

   

Matthew got his head down and eased away from the others - he's a difficult man to beat when things go right. Behind, Keith was still a little ring-rusty after ten months away from racing. He had a great battle with Stephen, Keith eventually coming out on top by 0.2 of a lap. Matthew was long gone - the margin of victory five laps.

   

Mike had qualified top of the B Final, but faced Matthew, 2020-2 champion Deborah and 2019 champion Andy for a crack at tonight's feature race. This was an incredibly close two-minutes! Mike took the lead from the start and kept his nose in front from red lane. Andy sat just a couple of feet away, unable to close the gap in the outside yellow lane. Inside them, Deborah and Matthew were in their own battle about a quarter of a lap back. The pace was relentless - and no-one was crashing. That was until Mike had a brief off on lap 21 - letting Andy through, but still in front of Deborah, who'd managed to drop Matthew...

   

With the pace barely dropping, that's how the final part of the race panned out - Andy finishing two laps clear with the second 40+ lap score of the night, Mike second and just 0.15 of a lap ahead of Deborah after a late off. Matthew came in fourth after a scrappy end to his race.


   

The A final lined up with three possible champions and one potential disruptor - if Andy won and Ryan came second, Jerome and Pete could still end the night as joint champions! The pre-race smiles didn't tell the whole story...

   

It was Ryan who took the race by the scruff of its neck in the early stages, leading the championship trio by the smallest of margins, Oliver second and Terry in third. Andy was immediately fiddling with his brake settings and dropped back half a lap. Terry gradually cranked up the pace, passing Oliver on lap 8 and taking the lead from Ryan on lap 11...

   

All four cars were lapping on exactly the same pace - 2.9s - until Terry cranked things up and got into the 2.8s and then the 2.7s. He'd stretched out a decent lead over Oliver and Ryan, when Andy had an off and popped his rear axle. Any chance of a surprise win was gone. Ryan found some extra pace in the second half of the race, overtaking Oliver for second, but still losing a couple of tenths a lap to Terry. It would all be down to any late race nerves and crashes... but there were none. 

   

As the chequered flag fell, Terry had passed the 41 lap mark for the biggest score of the night. Disaster struck for Ryan on his final lap when his pinion stripped - letting Oliver through for runner-up spot in the race and the championship...

   

Huge congratulations to Terry on his race win and to Ollie for his junior medal...

   

Here are all the finals results...

   
Click the image to make it bigger.

Tonight's results meant this year's truncated 3-race WHO Mod championship table looks like this...

   

That's a first WHO championship for Terry and a first WHO junior championship for Ollie!

   

Congratulations to our new champions and a very big thank you to everyone who came along for another excellent night's racing at the Barn. Special thanks go to the set-up and tear-down crews, Ollie for A & B Final photos, plus all those who mucked in on race control. Ash will be back next time, so things should be back to normal. The next HO race is Nascar on Wednesday 1 November - we're planning a big homage to the original Daytona Beach circuit, where Nascar racing was born.