There’s a bumper programme of grass track racing this coming Sunday, June 9th as the Bewdley MCC stage their Summer Spectacular Grasstrack in memory of John Bennett, John Pearson and Lucy Tibbets. With practice at 11am and the first race scheduled for 12.30pm, the action will be fast and furious and featuring solo’s, sidecars, youth and quads. The circuit venue is Lowe Farm, Lowe Lane, Alveley in Shropshire, DY12 1SU, and admission costs are Adults £15, OAPs £12 and U16s FREE.
Starting with the Youths, the classes cover Cadets, Auto’s, Inters and Juniors. Recent winner at Chaddesley, Albie South will face Alfie Shipp, Levi Collins and Charlie Dowd in the Cadets and Auto’s event. Finley Theobald tops the Youth Juniors entry list, which Ryan Curl and Brayden Blyth could challenge. Super-fast Thomas Vinning, also a winner at Chaddesley, should be the lad to beat in the Inters, but watch out for Liam Cox, who had an outing in the 250cc solo contest at Ledbury, winning the ‘B’ Final.
You can be sure of some great entertainment in the GT140’s solo clash, where Ian Clark is currently displaying some fantastic form and is certainly the man to beat at present. Clark has scored recent wins at both Chaddesley and Ledbury but the likes of Max Broadhurst, Wayne Broadhurst, Mark Chessell, Paul Smith and Luke Wicks will certainly be trying extra hard to get the better of the flying Clark! Sunday’s 250cc solo class also looks likely to be a pretty tasty affair as entertaining Ledbury winner Aidan Arthur takes on plenty of serious opposition, which includes Ricky Scarboro, Karl Beddingfield, Max Derrick, Shane Knight, Austin Riches, Graham Thomas and Hayden Watts amongst others.
In the 350cc contest, Jack Roberts travels from Derbyshire to take on Max Broadhurst, John Cox, Steve Garside, Barry Powell and co. As normal, Roberts will be doubling up on Sunday and going to the start line in the 500cc solo class. Likewise, Will Thurlby has entered both the 350cc and 500cc events, and in that 500cc contest, he will face Luke Harris, who certainly looks like a possible front-runner; the Ashcrofts, Phil and Ryan both also go in this one. The man they all might have to beat, though, is Martin Williams, who recently returned to racing in style and taking the Chaddesley victory. Solo classes will also see the Pre75 and Uprights go to the line. Ricky Scarboro tops the Pre75 entry list, whilst British Champion Tony Atkin is the main man in the Uprights.
The standout names in the always exciting 1,000cc Sidecars is multiple British Masters Champions Mark Cossar/Carl Blyth. Their main challengers on Sunday could well be Billy Winterburn/Ryan Wharton, Clint Blondell/Connor Measor, Stef Blyth/Morgan Blyth and Michael Austin/Vinny Branch. Last weekend at Ledbury, though, Austin did not have a passenger available, so his participation for this coming Sunday is still unsure! There’s also a 500cc Sidecar class which at present shows four crews entered.
Completing what promises to be an interesting and varied programme will be racing for Quads and E-Bikes. The Quads will be competing for the ACU Gold Cup so expect the action to be red hot in that one!
Words and Images by Mike Wood