BRCA R3 Boughton – 2wd Qualifying Round 2

The racing is hotting up here at Boughton – Round 3 of the 2022 BRCA 1/10th Offroad Nationals. Just to remind you that Neil Cragg took round 1 of 2wd qualifing and that each drivers best two scores from four qualifiers will count towards their final position. And although the racing is hotting up, the weather is cooling down. A persistant wind coupled with overcast periods is leading to an inconsistent track.

Lower heats

The first man onto the lead lap in 2wd qualifying round 2 was Thomas Phipps in heat 5. Thomas having a reasonable run and showing moments of brilliants here and there. Phipps was sandwiched by Alex Carter and Jim Dixon from heat 7 also making it onto 11 laps along with Jimmy Whitehall from heat 6. I wasn’t until heat 9 before we would see any major improvements on these times.

2022 BRCA 1/10th Offroad National Championships

Round 3 – Boughton – 11/12 June 2022

Top heat plus 1

All eyes were on heat 9 for Michal Orlowski’s TQ challenge. He had had a nibble in round 1, but ultimately was pushed down the ranking by Neil Cragg and Josh Holdsworth. This time he got off to a very quick start, initially indicating a 12 lap run. The sun came out and this may have resulted in the track becoming harder to negociate. Midway though the run, Michal had a bobble and half span coming off the table top leaving him facing the wrong way out of the corner. This dropped him off a 12 laps run, but he still managed to secure TQ. You can watch Michal’s run below – remember to Subscribe and Like etc. (or don’t – suit yourself ). Orlowski’s time was 11/303.61

So the benchmark had been cast by Orlowski in an early heat – everybody knew what they had to do. But the clouds shifted and the sun was out for heat 10 – would the track allow that sort of time again?

There were no TQ challenges from heat 10 – Phil Sleigh putting in a very respectable 11/312 ahead of Ben Jemison. Heat 11 was a bit hotter. Tommy Hall, Ben Smith and Luke Holdsworth all traded positions a couple of times with bobbles and errors – Tommy puttin in a 11/307.51 with a fast consistent run.

Now attention turned to heat 12 with curiousity centred around whether Neil Cragg could set a second TQ and line himself up well for overall pole position. Cragg put a smooth and consistent run with quiet a bit of traffic towards the end as he lapped the slower cars in the heat. He finished the race without incident on a 11/313.60 – only 0.09 behind Orlowsk’s time going 2nd in round.

2wd qualifying round 2 top 10

Overall points