With Brands Hatch just 2 weeks away, it is time to bring you up to date on the season so far. There have been 3 races for CF3 so far, the first at Castle Combe on 16/17 April combined with URS FF2000, the second the Silverstone International Trophy meeting combined with Derek Bell Trophy and third, at Snetterton for the AutoSport 1 Hour Trophy, where we were combined with URS FF2000 again. At the forthcoming Brands round we will be with the French and there will be Championship points for both the UK and French series. Eleven French entries have been received and there could be one or two more to come. To date we have 25 UK entries, which are made up of 21 Formula 3 cars and 4 FF2000 that totals 36 with a maximum starting number of 38 on the Grand Prix Circuit. I am already aware of some late entries from CF3 and I would advise anybody that is wishing to race to get an entry in quickly. There is still some space, but as you can see from the numbers above, it is nearly full.

There are some entries from Marcel Biehle’s Series in Germany, as well as from Italy; a truly International grid, so hopefully the British will be able to show the way.

Castle Combe, 16th/17th April 2016>

This meeting was not originally on our schedule, but as it was the 50th Anniversary of the HSCC they were keen to have all their Championship series represented. I was pleased for the first race of this season that we were able to get 19 entries, which was 11 Formula 3, of which 3 were 1600 cars and 8 were URS FF2000. Despite an extremely cold and frosty start, the day turned into a nice warm spring day! Our compliment of 19 entries was supplemented by 2 additional late entries, Paul Smith and Tony Hancock in F3’s bringing the F3 compliment to 13, not bad at all.

Richard Trott dominated qualifying being 1.3 seconds ahead of Simon Jackson. Ian Pearson URS FF2000, Keith White and Paul Smith were next in. The 20 minute race followed a very similar pattern, Richard winning the race by 2.5 seconds from Simon, though Simon had closed the qualifying gap after more laps to 0.1 of a second. He chased Richard all the way to the flag with Tony Hancock in 3rd for CF3, Paul Smith 4th and Marcus Mussa 5th. Glenn Eagling in his beautiful ex-Mo Harness Ensign, appeared for the first time and duly won the 1600cc class from Andy Langridge and Albert Clements. It’s always nice to see well prepared new cars joining our grid and Glen’s Ensign certainly did us proud in that respect.

Silverstone International, 21st/22nd May 2016

We then moved on to the Silverstone Grand Prix circuit for a race, combined with the Derek Bell Trophy. 31 cars entered, of which unfortunately only 9 were for Formula 3. David Shaw was making a reappearance in his ex-Piquet Ralt RT1, which had not been seen since Monaco 2014 and Ian Flux was out for the first time in Sean Walker’s March 783.

The Silverstone Grand Prix circuit is a wonderful track, but I can only think that it’s the combination with DBT, which keeps us from having more entries.

Dominic Jackson, Simon Jackson’s son was a late entry in his newly acquired March 803, as was Mark Hulme in his Toj Modus. The first race was held in appallingly wet conditions on the Saturday. Dominic Jackson duly won race 1, pipping his father on the line with Richard Trott back in 3rd place. Glenn Eagling once again took 1600 honours from Adrian Langridge, Andy’s son. The weather improved dramatically for race 2 and Simon Jackson this time was able to exert his dominance and won the race comfortably. David Shaw came from behind to catch Ian Flux and then they had a fantastic scrap, with David Shaw pipping Ian on the line by a nose. Richard Trott unfortunately suffered a broken drive shaft and had to retire and Glenn Eagling won the 1600cc again.

Snetterton, 4th/5th June 2016

For Snetterton we were treated to 2 glorious days of Norfolk sunshine! 17 cars turned up for qualifying, of which 11 were CF3. Adrian Langridge, Andy’s son, took over his Dastle to compete against Glenn Eagling and Albert Clements for 1600 honours. Geoff Hoodless normally a runner in the French CF3 series joined a few regulars on the CF3 grid. Simon Jackson though was in a class of his own being chased by Ian Pearson from the URS FF2000 series with Paul Dibden and Hugh Price being 3rd and 4th in qualifying. A broken throttle spring at the start of race 1 eliminated Hugh Price and Simon Jackson ran away the winner by 17 seconds from Ian Pearson and 30 seconds from Paul Dibden, 2nd in CF3 with Geoff Hoodless 3rd. Adrian Langridge got the better of Glenn Eagling to win 1600 honours.

Race 2 was very much a repeat. Simon Jackson walked away with it again, this time by 7 seconds from Ian Pearson and Paul Dibden. Hugh Price started from the back and worked his way up to 5th overall and 3rd in CF3, having been assisted by Geoff Hoodless who decided to spin rather than be overtaken, to help him on his way. Glenn Eagling pipped Adrian Langridge by 0.2 of a second for 1600 honours, after a good dice.

I was hoping for a good turnout at Snetterton, it is in my view a wonderful venue, especially when the sun shines and those who did participate had a thoroughly good weekend with the very affable URS FF2000 competitors. We blend well together and I was pleased in the end with the number of combined entries that we had, as all fields at Snetterton were slightly below par.

I look forward to seeing you all at Brands.