Round four of the 2024 FPR Championship took us all the way down to Kent and the Brands Hatch circuit on the Indy circuit, so the shortest one of the season. The weather was very warm, and the Friday test day went well.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite the same story, come race day! Light mist / rain at the start of the day and practise was cut short, with several fallers, bringing out red flags.
Qualifying got underway, but only two laps in before someone’s engine said, “no more!” and left oil on the circuit halfway down Cooper straight and through Surtees corner.
After the marshals had done a great job cleaning up, racing then got underway.
By now the sun had come through and it was another warm one.
Race One: FPR Bandit Challenge
It was great to see ex multiple Champion and now BSB F900 cup racer, Harley Prebble back out in the Bandits and not too surprisingly he took a convincing victory, from current Championship leader Neil Attenborough. Mark Wardle had a very scary moment on the first lap where he went into the gravel trap at high speed at Paddock Hill. somehow, he managed to stay onboard and exit the gravel some 70 or 80 metres on towards the back of the grid. Then having quite, a word with himself, inside his helmet, he had a fabulous ride, to eventually finish in third place!
Adrian O’Connor, a rookie just last year, has made fabulous progress and had another strong race in to fourth, followed home by Craig Harris and Grant Davies.
Bandit Seniors saw another strong ride, by the ever-improving Richard Davis to take victory over early Championship leader Keith Chambers, Tim Hawkins had another good ride into third place, ahead a much improved (and not long back from a long-suffering injury) Kevin Gale. He was followed by Shane Watson and John Goulding.
FP1: Unfortunately, with the general decline in entries, it was sole entry and current class Champion, Andy Green taking maximum points once again.
FP2: Another convincing win by Championship leader Lee Marks, Paul Willis made a return to the class and didn’t look too rusty with a solid second place finish. Andrew Howe took another good point scoring finish in third place.
FP3: Championship leader Shaun Hennessy took another class victory, ahead of Keith Clarke and a switch of classes for Dan Kift, back on to his old faithful YZF750 saw him take the third place, from the consistent Gareth Sutton.
FPR EVO: Ian Agnew seems to be getting to grips with his new R1 (having changed classes this year from FP3) as he took a solid victory over the current FP2 Champion turned EVO racer, Nick Williamson. Stuart Goodson took third place, from Jamie Thomas.
Sunday Races
After an unfortunate multi bike “pile up” in practise, leaving a large amount of oil on the circuit, all the way around Clearways, the officials had no alternative, but to call a halt on proceedings, in order to clean up the track.
After a long delay, we finally got the call for the first race of the day, but after the sighting lap(s), it was decided that the track was unsafe for racing, meaning another delay, whilst the marshals jet wash the contaminated circuit.
The marshals and officials worked extremely hard to get the track cleaned up enough to start racing, but this took a great deal of time.
With time now against us, the officials took the decision to drop from two races, to one slightly longer race per class.
Race Two: FPR Bandit Challenge
It was an unexpected, one-off return by current and double Bandit Champion, Chris Edwards (borrowing Harris’ bike). And although he had to start at the back of the grid, he soon made his way through the field, to finish in a very respectable second place, behind double victor, Prebble. Attenborough took a strong point scoring third, from Wardle, O’Connor and Davies.
Bandit Seniors: It was Davis who took another convincing win over Chambers, with Watson having a much stronger finish in third place, from Gale and Hawkins. This being a much closer race for second place, with only 0.6 sec covering the four riders!
FP1: Any Green once again took maximum points.
FP2: Marks took, yet another convincing win, this time over Greg Gibson and Howe took the final rostrum place.
FP3: Hennessy continued to dominate the class, this time from class newcomer Haydon Smith, who is starting to get to grips with his ZXR750, which is quite a different animal from the ZXR400 that he also races. Clarke finished third, from Sutton.
FPR EVO: Agnew continued where he left off in race one, but this time Williamson pushed him all the way, with Thomas in third, from Goodson.
We would like to say a very big thank you to all the NG staff, officials, medical staff and all the marshals, who worked tirelessly all weekend, to ensure that we got some racing.
We now look forward to Castle Combe for round five of the series!
Formula Prostocks would, once again like to thank NG Road Racing for hosting the events and inviting us to be a part of their programme.
FPR is a small, independent, ACU affiliated club. Anyone wishing to race in any of our classes, MUST be an FPR club member, please contact us for membership details, either through our website: www.formulaprostocksracing.co.uk or email: formulaprostocks@gmail.com
Keith Chambers (Club Chairman)
Pictures: Gordon Brady, gordie1960@hotmail.com