Rounds 7 & 8

Hard act to follow north of the border

Round 7

Bracemotorsport headed north to Knockhill for round 7,  known to the locals as God’s country, maybe its because when you see the weather forecast each morning you may well say ”For God’s sake, not more rain”!  To be fair the weather was good for the nationals boys visit,  was damp, cold and windy but the rain held off.   The journey started at 6.30am on the Thursday for the team with Dean and Gary taking the lorry and the motorhome leaving with Julie, Donna and Nick and Alex at 7.30am, the trip went well and we arrived mid afternoon. The pits were awash with MX5’s as they had over 250 entries for the SMRC weekends racing.  It was gonna be a busy weekend.

Practice went well for the Bracemotorsport drivers. We were scrubbing in fresh tyres so we had to except we would not be on the ultimate pace but a 3^rd for Nick and 8^th for Dean and 7^th for Ben we looked in good shape.

Race 1

Race 1 would see Ben on pole, Nick on row 7 and Dean Brace on row 8.  Ben took the lead while Dean made his way up to 3^rd and Nick jumped up to 5th on the first lap. Dean Brace and Lawrence Davey hit the front of the pack and scrapped until the flag, with Dean Brace finishing 2nd and Ben Power coming in 3rd. Unfortunately for Nick Brace a DNF was in store as he had an engine failure on the last lap. Fastest lap went to our very own Dean Brace.

Race 2

As the second race began Dean Brace and John Mickle hit the front with Nick Brace in 3rd. Lawrence Davey came up to play and it all ended in tears for John Mickle when Lawrence Davey got the better of a coming together with him. Lawrence Davey took the win with Dean Brace in 2nd and Nick Brace in 3rd. Ben Power back in 10th place came out with fastest lap. A very eventful race.

Race 3

Race 3 saw much the same as the previous races. With the top guns at the front except for Lawrence Davey who, for this race at least, was not getting the rub of the luck and finished 20th, although he still received good points due to the invited driver‘s not scoring. Dean Brace was to take the win with John Mickle 2nd, Nick Brace 3rd and Ben Power in 4th, which gave him a good 3rd overall on the day.  Dean Brace took the overall win and had it not been for Nick Brace’s none finish it would have been a top three for the team.

Round 8

Race 1

Race 1 and the top 3 from last years championship were to get to the front in the first lap. Nick Brace had made a good start but got stopped in his tracks by a crash at the hair pin that cost him dearly. Dean Brace went on to take a fine win over Lawrence Davey and Steve Whitelegg finishing in a great 3rd. John Mickle would not finish as he was beached in the gravel. Ben Power crossed the line in 5^th place.

Race 2

Dean Brace led more or less from the off and looked sure for the win but John Mickle out dragged him on the last lap out of the last hair pin to take the win by 0.014 seconds, John sure had good drive out of the hair pin all weekend!! Ben Power came in 4th with Nick Brace just in front at 3rd.

Race 3

John Mickle and Richard Pocklington were way out in front having their own battle from start to finish, but behind them was a scene somewhat like wacky racers, with 10 dnf’s, one of which was our very own Dean Brace (not good for our championship campaign). The end result was to be Ben Power in 5^th and Nick Brace in 6^th.. Ben getting 2^nd overall on the day.

So now Dean currently rests 2nd in the championship with Nick well out of position in 8^th, Ben is in 3rd but there is still a long way to go before the season ends for all the boys. Now we go in to our summer break of 7 weeks so we look forward to seeing you all soon.

Next round is at Cadwell Park for Rounds 9 and 10, where we will sort out the men from the boys!