UK Karting - MBKC 3S Club Championship Race Report

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MBKC - 3S Club Championship

MBKC - 3S Club Championship
Round 4 - Three Sisters - 20th March 2005
Including the TKM Platinum Cup

Another amazing day at Three Sisters as championship round four also saw the inaugural running of the long and eagerly awaited TKM Platinum Cup, an event which saw a total of nearly 100 TKM drivers in both the junior and senior divisions, together with large cadet and rotax grids, swelling the entry to around the 230 mark.

The weather was actually a little disappointing, being much cooler than it had been for practice on Saturday, although in fairness to the weather Gods, it did stay dry and, to be honest, Saturday was a total freak, the circuit being bathed in July style sunshine, which had rather spoiled everyone.

Certainly the racing was never a let down, with fantastic clashes in most classes, particuarly so in the TKM classes, as had been expected, with a great coming together of local drivers together with a number of long distance guest drivers. It really was an eagerly awaited day and the action was nothing if not gripping from start to finish.

The cadet class got us underway in the afternoon finals and this very quickly became a five kart battle involving Chris Warburton, Connor McManus, Ethan Patterson, James Tunnicliffe and Alex Walker and, in true cadet style, the lead changed hands on several occasions. Unfortunately for McManus, engine problems forced him out by lap eight, and it was a mightily tight thing throughout, but the cool defensive skills of Warburton eventually saw him home by a narrow margin from Patterson with Tunnicliffe a little further back in third spot.

Running along with the W-60 cadets was a very small entry of S-60 drivers, with novice driver Jacob Hunstone taking the victory in good style from Bradley Ord, with Jordan Keelan taking the third place.

Next up, we had the first of the TKM platinum cup finals of the day, with the junior entry taking to the track. Billy Patterson started on pole having been hugely impressive in the earlier heats and quickly took up the mantle again in the final, although he certainly wasn`t having things entirely his own way, as Joe Morrison, Jake Ball, Lee Morgan, Martin Lyell and Max Buckley all looked pretty menacing, in fact, briefly, on lap seven, Ball took the lead and Morrison also came through to demote Patterson to third, however it was short lived with Patterson soon battling his way through to the head of the field again and, by the later laps, he began to stretch his advantage to, perhaps not exactly a comfortable one, but he certainly wasn`t under the extreme pressure of earlier in the race and he came home in fine style to record the victory from Ball, with Morrison taking the final podium spot.

Oliver Webb is most certainly a very busy young man racing in both the Minimax and Junior Rotax classes. He has looked almost unstoppable in Minimax since the start of the year and, once again here, he had looked impressive all day and, from pole, left the rest in his wake as he quickly pulled out a winning advantage in the final. Behind him a superb battle for second spot was developing between Josh Butcher and Jonathan Crankshaw, Butcher just about having the upper hand, although Crankshaw did squeeze past briefly before Butcher got his nose in front again. Amanda Lassu also began to feature and briefly took up third place, but then a mistake dropped her to fourth, and that was how it finished, a superb lights to flag victory for Webb by a large margin from Butcher, with Crankshaw taking third.

In the Junior Rotax final, Webb featured heavily again, however this time he had some intense competition from Nico Angelides and the latter it was who quickly powered into the early lead and, by lap three had stretched that lead from Webb, Micheal Janney settling into third spot. Webb began to close down Angelides again and, by lap six, had edged in front with Sam Pollitt coming through into third place. It was proving a tremendous battle between the front pair, with Webb holding his advantage for a number of laps until, on the final lap, Angelides got the right line out of Dunlop to squeeze through and just manage to see it out to record a mightily hard fought victory. Pollitt it was who held on to the third place.

The Rotax 177 final was a fairly straight forward affair. Paul Manton had looked quickest pretty much throughout the day and he quickly made his final pole count to pull out a comfortable advantage initially over Damian Tonge, then Dean Bednarek eased into second place and, whilst he was never seriously going to threaten the advantage of Manton, by the end of the race he had made second spot comfortable. Tonge took third place after the threatening George Harris became involved in contact with Terence O`Neill.

Another rather dissapointingly small grid of 125 open gearbox entries provided the perfect opportunity for Andrew Hazlehurst to stamp his mark on proceedings. Virtually unstoppable all day, he took both heats and then made short work of his final opponents, powering into a substantial lead and, although David Higgins tried to haul him back, it quickly became clear that Hazlehurst was not going to be headed and he took the lights to flag victory quite comfortably. Former Rotax 177 driver Steven Chapman drove an excellent race to pick up third spot.

The Rotax Max final saw the ex 100 national club champion Daniel Chesters on the pole spot and, though he headed the field for six laps, the ever dangerous Dean Parker began to look extremely threatening and he took it up on lap seven. It was a close affair with the consistent duo of Paul Pendlebury and Matt Bedford also very much in the picture as the race entered it`s later stages, in fact, on the penultimate lap, Pendlebury edged through into second place to leave Chesters having to settle for third with Bedford taking fourth spot.

Final event of the day was the eagerly awaited Senior TKM platinum cup final. Despite some hard luck stories developing throughout the heats, several impressive performances had been witnessed during the earlier heats. Young S1 driver James Duxbury, having only recently moved up from the junior class looked very good indeed and took the pole spot, but he certainly had some fierce opposition around him, local driver Paul Monks, another S1 competitor fancied his chances, then there was the current open champion Ryan Cole right up there at the sharp end together with Scottish charger Anthony Lester and also Michael Collins who had not raced on the Three Sisters circuit previously. It proved to be a remarkable race, in keeping with the day, and a magnificent triumph for Duxbury who lead from start to finish. At mid stage it all looked relatively comfortable for the leader as the battle went on behind him between Lester, Cole, Monks and Collins. Cole took up the second place from Lester for a time, but the pressure on Duxbury became more intense after Monks eased through into second place and began to hunt down the front man with some success. In the end, the margin of victory proved much narrower than had looked likely at one point, although it was a richly deserved success for young Duxbury who punched the air in delight as he crossed the line. A wonderful race too from Monks to take second spot in the high class field. Cole completed the podium with Lester fourth, Collins fifth and Alex Jones sixth.

A superb end to a hugely entertaining afternoon, with the TKM Platinum Cup already looking like a firmly established event for future years.

Report by: Mel Tipton

Results

Full Race Results from Round 4 & TKM Platinum Cup...

FORMULA W-60 CADET
Chris Warburton (Wright/Comer)
Ethan Patterson (Zip/Comer)
James Tunnicliffe (Zip/Comer)

FORMULA S-60 CADET
Jacob Hunstone (Tony/Comer)
Bradley Ord (Zip/Comer)
Jordan Keelan (Zip/Comer)

FORMULA JUNIOR TKM
Billy Patterson (JKH/TKM)
Jake Ball (Venom/TKM)
Joe Morrison (DK/TKM)

FORMULA MINIMAX
Oliver Webb (Gillard/Rotax)
Josh Butcher (Maranello/Rotax)
Jonathan Crankshaw (KMS/Rotax)

FORMULA SENIOR TKM
James Duxbury (JKH/TKM)
Paul Monks (Venom/TKM)
Ryan Cole (Sidewinder/TKM)

FORMULA JUNIOR ROTAX MAX
Nico Angelides (Birel/Rotax)
Oliver Webb (Gillard/Rotax)
Sam Pollitt (KMS/Rotax)

FORMULA ROTAX 177
Paul Manton (Gillard/Rotax)
Dean Bednarek (Tony/Rotax)
Damian Tonge (Haase/Rotax)

FORMULA 125 OPEN GEARBOX
Andrew Hazlehurst (Mach1/TM)
David Higgins (Energy/TM)
Steven Chapman (CRG/TM)

FORMULA ROTAX MAX
Dean Parker (JKH/Rotax)
Paul Pendlebury (Cat/Rotax)
Daniel Chesters (Intrepid/Rotax)

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