Reports > Combe May Race Day May 6 2024
Walker makes impressive debut and Class wins for Mac, Mitchell, Bracegirdle & Cox
This event saw British GT driver and Bath University student, Alex Walker, making his debut for Wayne Poole Racing driving the Richard Hudson-Evans owned and Classic Auction Review
backed Van Diemen RF01.
Qualifying in the dry for the first of the two Gulf Race Fuels FF1600 Championship races, Alex set very competitive times to line up third on the grid. However, by the time the race began the rain had arrived making for a challenging debut. Alex kept up a race long duel for third place with Rory Smith, losing out by a couple of tenths on the line. The track was drying for the start of Race Two and, starting from third on the grid again, Alex briefly got up into second before dropping back for another race long duel for third - this time with Felix Fisher - which he won to take a debut podium for the team.
Tommy Mac was out in the team's Class C Van Diemen RF89 and qualified second in Class for both races. In Race One Tommy squeezed past Class C rival, David Cobbold, on Lap 2 to go on and take a good class win. History repeated itself in Race 2 but this time Tommy took the fastest lap as well. As usual, Sam Mitchell was in his usual Classic Auction Review backed Class D Merlyn MK20 and once again won Class D with fastest lap in both races while mixing it with much more modern machinery.
Graham Cox was out in his Clio and qualified well, in mid grid, for the two Samcosport Hot Hatch Championship races. It was raining by the time the first race started but undeterred, Graham had one of his best races in the Clio, From 18th on the grid he moved up to 8th by lap 3, 3rd on lap 5 and 2nd on lap 7! In the difficult conditions Graham dropped back to 5th by the end but this still netted first in Class A. A tremendous result. Although due to line up 17th for Race Two Graham was unable to make the start as his R/H rear shock had snapped.
Wayne Rushworth was again entered in the South Cerney Engineering Saloon Car Championship races with his MG ZR 1800, qualifying midfield for both races. In Race One Wayne finished 8th and third in class but less than half a second behind his class rivals. In Race 2 an incident on Lap 6 dropped Wayne down the field, finishing in 12th place.
Steve Bracegirdle entered the annual Dave Allen trophy in his Mini Cooper S. Driving single handedly, in the 40 minute race including a pit stop, Steve won Class 4 and took fastest lap to round out a very successful event for WPR.
Many thanks to Phil Johnson for the images
