Three different winners as Fiesta ST150s entertain at Donington Park BRSCC event

There were three races and three different winners in the Fiesta ST150 contests at last weekend’s Donington Park British Racing & Sports Car Club event as the category provided plenty of action.

Michael Blackburn and Stephanie Sore made an early break in race one, while Oliver Sweetman led a huge pack for third. The pressure finally told on Sweetman after going three-abreast down the Craner Curves on lap five of 11, under attack from Samuel Watkins and George Foxlow.

Foxlow led the trio from the Old Hairpin, but the lead pair were long gone, as Blackburn took an 0.555-second win over Sore, with Foxlow and Watkins completing the top four. Sweetnam, meanwhile, slipped back to eighth.

Blackburn led the second race too but, after a brief safety car intervention, he was soon under attack from Foxlow, with Watkins and Daniel Robinson joining in. Foxlow went ahead at McLeans on lap four but, after Robinson took Watkins a couple of tours later, it became a three-way fight for the win. Once Robinson had ousted Blackburn from second, he began to threaten Foxlow’s lead, but the latter held on to take victory by 0.497s.

Blackburn was third on the road, but track-limits penalties dropped him and Watkins down the order, moving Spencer Lane up to third and Colin Smith into fourth.

Robinson led the third race from lap two, with Foxlow taking second a lap later, as Blackburn, Watkins and Smith lost out. While the spoils went to Robinson, Blackburn reclaimed second from Foxlow.

There was little to split Kamal Kalsi and Dan Parrans-Smith in the first of the Mazda MX-5 Supercup races either. Separated by just 0.288s at the flag, Alistair Dendy did his best to hold on to the lead duo, but had to settle for a solitary third on the road, before penalties dropped him behind the guesting Mk4 of Zihuai Wang.

Wang comfortably won the second race, after breaking from a six-car battle. Parrans-Smith was in second until he went off at Redgate with two laps to go, which left Kalsi and Thomas Langford battling it out, with Scott Wright following in fourth.

There were four different leaders in the first four laps of the finale, with William Antrobus, Langford and Kalsi each briefly having turns out front, before Wang went clear to win again. With Antrobus off at the Old Hairpin, Kalsi claimed second, while Parrans-Smith and Langford rounded out the top four, until the latter was penalised for track-limits offences.

Chris Roberts’ BMW M4 had a fairly dominant win in the first CNC Heads Sports/Saloon race, with Deri Davies’ Darrian a race-long second, while Mark Primett’s MG Midget finally claimed third, after a duel with Roddie Paterson’s Caterham.

However, Roberts spent most of his second race in third as Paterson and Primett were out in front. But Primett made the decisive move at McLeans two laps from home, after Paterson burst his radiator following contact with a backmarker. The top three held station with Paul Rankin’s Westfield fourth, while fifth-placed Garry Wardle had a huge crash in the wall after taking the flag in his Audi A3.

All three Mazda MX-5 Championship races for Mk1 versions of the sportscar featured tremendous scraps that went down to the wire. Adam Sparrow just held off Paul Simard and Neil Chisnall in race one, while track-limits penalties cost Chisnall the win in race two. Instead, the spoils once again went to Sparrow, from Steve Foden and Michael Taylor.

Foden won the third bout, though, surviving a last-lap attack from Simard, while Sparrow completed the podium.

Mike Williamson’s Mitsubishi Lancer E4 won the first Northern Saloon & Sports Car race, with the closing Scott Hubel’s Peugeot 205 retaining second despite a late off. Hubel got his reward in race two, with a comfortable win over Williamson.

In contrast, it was almost a dead heat in the Modified Fords opener, as James Allen’s Focus RS left the move until the final lap to pip Lloyd Jamieson’s Escort Cosworth by just 0.045s. However, Jason Davies’ Sapphire Cosworth beat them both in race two.

Davies and Allen shared the Modified Fords spoils

Photo by: Steve Jones

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