A magnificent seven on last hill of year
THE island’s motor racers waved farewell to Le Val des Terres for another year with a multiple record-breaking bank holiday performance.
Seven class marks fell amid the odd accident, while predictably Nick Saunders claimed the day’s ‘FTD’ with a slick 27.97.
Indeed, Saunders was Mr Consistency and twice ducked under 28sec., albeit by the slenderest of margins.
In the same class Matt Bougourd dipped under 30sec. and by six hundredths and Tim Torode ended his quiet year with his first sub 30.
Jamie Le Page and Lee Poole had plenty of fun contesting top spot in the road going series for production cars up to 2000.
Both men beat Dan Bichard’s class record, Poole first taking the standard with a 36.03 and then bettering it with a 36.01.
But, by the end, long-time rival Jamie Le Page had stolen the title with a 35.89.
John Dunne has spent years chipping away at production car records and in the 2001cc and over class, the stalwart three times surpassed his mark set four years ago, ending the day with a new best of 33.70.
Chris Law wiped a significant amount off his own quads unlimited record with a super 32.17 at the end of the afternoon.
On two wheels the main story was Owen Poynder’s new mark in the 251 to 350cc class.
Pete Le Page’s record had stood at 35.04 for fully a decade, but on the 24-year-old’s second official run he clocked a 34.85 to strip 19 hundredths off.
The 351 to 500cc class was a terrific contest with Colin de Jersey, Anthony Poynder and Leigh Digard fighting it out for the class honours and the latter stealing the win by one hundredth, 34.22 to de Jersey’s 34.23.
Sadly, young Harry Mann ended the day in hospital after his crash on the Harry Knievel Honda CR125 left him with two broken bones in a leg.
The other record-breakers were Nick Mann, Dale Crowsley and Alex Rosamond.
Mann saw off the record-holder Daryl Yeates with two runs inside the old best time for the road going specialist production cars 1801cc and over.
Crowsley was nine hundredths inside his existing best for the sports libre saloon rally cars 1601 and over, while Rosamond stripped 15 hundredths off Dave Bichard's modified specialist production cars 1401-1800 best set eight years ago.
