Fives Garage delight after double Tin Tops success
THRUXTON CSCC 23-24 APRIL
The Classic Sports Car Club’s Thruxton Thriller lived up to its title in parts, although too many competitors attracted penalties, mainly for pit infringements. Nonetheless, Saturday’s combative
Tin Tops and Turbo Tin Tops contests rewarded Adam Brown (Ford Fiesta ST) and John Hammersley/nigel Tongue (VW Scirocco Type R), who scored a memorable double in Fives Garage-prepared cars.
Andrew Windmill (Honda Civic) negated his 30-second Snetterton Tin Tops success penalty and a stop/go, only to cop a further 30s, which left him third, behind the Field family’s Proton Persona. Brown took the win, having scrapped with Manoj Patel, who had a minute added to his time for not switching his Civic’s ignition off at the stop.
Hammersley took a 10s hit for jumping the Turbo start, but relayed the lead to Tongue. With Carl Chambers’s Peugeot 208 GTI out, they beat Simon Smail (Ford Fiesta) after Charlie Newton-darby (Mini), second on the road, was among seven docked 60s for pitlane speeding.
Open Series and New Millennium winner Brad Sheehan (BMW E46 M3) relied on his daughter’s stopwatch to time his stops. When second-placed Nathan Wells/mark Steward were penalised for stopping short, Kevin Clarke (M3 CSL) was promoted.
Sheehan finished behind Jamie Sturges’s VW Golf TCR after a tough New Millennium fight, but Sturges rejoined 0.8s too soon and was exasperated to be demoted to third behind Michael Vitulli (M3).
A five-place Magnificent Sevens grid drop for his Snetterton win didn’t hinder Christian Pittard, who passed Ben Simonds for a Team Leos Caterham CSR 1-2 over 40 minutes. A leaking brake caliper cost Tim Davis (C400) third, advancing Richard Carter (R300). Pittard withdrew from the sprint race in which Davis and Simonds jumped the chicane, whereupon a heavy landing sidelined Simonds. Duellists Carter and David Holroyd (CSR 1600 turbo) completed the podium.
“I’m 73, Chris [Conoley] is 75 and the car is 60,” smiled Allen Tice, who “drove around” oil surge to nurse their faithful Marcos-volvo to victory in Sunday’s one-hour Classic K race. With runaway leader Murray Shepherd pitting Anthony Hancock’s Lotus Elan for its exhaust to be lashed up prior to engine problems, and chaser Paul Tooms’s Elan GTS out on lap one in a plume of smoke from a melted oil capillary, the veterans were surprised to win. Alex Thistlethwayte soloed his Ford Mustang to second, ahead of Ollie Streek, utterly brilliant in his Mini Cooper S, which finished with a bald left-front tyre.
TVR Tuscan drivers Alex Taylor and Stuart Daburn won Modern and Future Classics respectively. Oliver Smith’s rapid BMW E36 M3 was about to lap Taylor, having passed his shadow Matt Holben in the safety car-disrupted former race, when it broke at Church on the penultimate lap.
Daburn’s success came after Mark Chilton’s ballistic Nissan Skyline split another engine block. Following a caution period when Bob Searles’s Aston Martin DBS and Chris Pidcock’s Porsche 924 sideswiped at Church, Miles Masarati’s 911 Turbo wouldn’t restart at the stops. It left David Burke (Porsche RSR clone) to hunt down Ryan Mone’s well-driven 944 for second. Burke fell just short, but was demoted to sixth behind Rob Hardy (944), Ian Knight (VW Golf GTI) and Matthew Irons/jake Severs (BMW 323i).
Attrition decimated the small Special Saloons & Modsports field. Jack Gadd put
his 2.8-litre RSR Ford Escort on pole and stormed the first race, restarted after Tom Carey’s Honda CRX’S engine bay erupted into flames at Allard. Gadd’s closest rival Clive Anderson spun his BMW E30 on the first and last laps, advantaging Ian Hall (Darrian Wildcat) and Rod Birley (E36 M3). In the sequel, Gadd shot from the back to the front as Hall’s fifth gear exploded, before Anderson blasted back past Gadd.
Swinging Sixties dominator Jamie Keevill (Elan) was disgruntled to receive a jumpedstart penalty, which promoted Ray Barrow’s Chevrolet Camaro. Jack Smith hustled his MGA superbly, relaying dad Steve to third before Dean Halsey’s Datsun 240Z hit the barrier at Allard and brought out red flags.