MIXED WEEKEND FOR SMITH AT SNETTERTON

The latest British Automobile Racing Club Intermarque meeting at Snetterton was a topsy-turvy affair. Points leader heading into the weekend, Malcolm Blackman, missed both races with a valve guide problem, while Lewis Smith’s Vauxhall Tigra led most of race one but got a puncture, letting Chris Brockhurst’s Tigra triumph.

Brockhurst couldn’t get to the race two grid with a battery problem and Smith won that race comfortably, rising from ninth to lead by Turn 2. “I thought it was going to be a bit greasy to start with but we seemed to make it work,” Smith said. Steve Burrows’ Peugeot 206cc finished second twice and takes the championship lead.

It was a fruitful meeting for BARC Tin Tops table leader Rikki Taylor. He finished third in class in race one when his Ford Fiesta stuck in fourth gear, but in race two’s damp conditions he inherited the win when Dan Fisher’s Honda Civic had a spectacular engine blow-up. Fisher had dominated race one from pole.

“It was an excellent day,” said rain specialist Taylor. “I look at the rain and could have a party in the car! It’s given me a nice jump in the points.”

Alex Sidwell’s Holden Commodore got both Modified Saloon wins while championship leader Rod Birley’s meeting ended three laps into race one with wheel bearing failure.

The Vintage Sports-car Club held its final 2018 Formula Vintage round the next day, in treacherous conditions.

Gareth Burnett in an Alta 2 Litre won the race for Pre-1961 cars, and with it claimed the longstanding Historic Seaman Trophy. Simon Diffley was next home in his 1955 Connaught Type B and got the Flockhart Trophy for post-war cars.

“I’ve never driven a race that’s been so slippery – in a car that isn’t very good in the wet!” Burnett said. “I got the feel of the track very quickly.”

The meeting also featured the Mike Stripe Team race, for teams of three cars whose times were aggregated with a handicap then applied. Participants included a team of young drivers, two in Frazer Nashes and one in an MG. It was won by ‘Pip, Squeak and Wilfred’ made up of Fred Boothby, Chris Cadman and Hamish Mcninch, all driving MGS.

George Shackleton’s Cooper MK11 took both races for 500cc Formula 3 cars, in the first one prevailing in a close battle with Stuart Wright’s Cooper, passing on the final lap.

Race-one puncture was followed by win

Brian Arculus took his Lotus Elite to a dominant win by over a minute in the FISCAR race for 1950s cars.it’s a car well accustomed to beating those of its era and even from later ones.“it’s just a delightful little thing on the track,” said Arculus.“[colin] Chapman did very well with this design because it’s so advanced, when you put it in the category of 1950s and, even with 1200cc, it can beat the big stuff.”

Julian Majzub in his 1927 Bugattitype 35B won thevintage Racing Cars and Special Pre-war Cars race and took thewilliams Trophy for the third time.the prize is named afterwilliam Grover-williams and it was highly appropriate as Majzub was driving the very car in which Williams had his first ever Bugatti works drive, in the 1927 British Grand Prix at Brooklands.