Once again Oaklands hosted the mid year 1/24th retro event. A sunny day, combined with some family events, Wimbledon and Live 8 meant that only the dedicated and strictly “available” turned up to play at what has now become a regular event in the retro calendar.

This year we had one additional class which proved to be interesting - THINGIE!
Along with the usual hard and lexan saloon, Formula One / Indy and Sports classes, the entry level made for a relaxed and fun full days racing.

The first class up was Thingie with a number of cars being “rent a drives” from ABS and Ralph. Cucaracha’s seemed to be favoured for the top runners, with Classic Asps etc. Running also. The Classic Stinger in the photo’s didn’t actually make it to the race as it was not possible to stop it bouncing down the straights! - probably a results to to high grip tyres.

In the first Thingie heat, Graham Stephenson, running Ralph’s Cuc took the lead hotly pursued by ABS, again with a Cuc, alas in the last segment ABS’s car decided to cook it’s motor, going slower lap on lap for the last few. This proved the fastest run in this class and saw GS and ABS 1st and second overall. The second heat started with much promise and Ian Fisher managing to work out how to drive ABS’s Dynamic Renegade which was totally ballistic on the straights and suitably twitchy in the turns. Unfortunately for Ian, Victory lane was not to be when the motor detonated towards the end of the first segment.
Chris Stemmen’s Cuc made a good showing & son Will should be congratulated on his run with the Classic Asp. Ralph caused notable amusement with his Gardina Spitfire which sounded like a food mixer and handled slightly worse!

Concours this year was a combined across the classes with just one best presented and one Best period chassis.
Winner of the Best Presented award was Ralph Parker with his real nice Graham Hill Indy Car.
Best Chassis went to Mick Kerr with a chassis he built at the time and has remained in his collection featuring a B can motor and custom made aluminium endbell. A VERY clean piece of kit!

And so - on to the racing!
Classes ran for Hard Body Saloon, Lexan Saloon, F1 / Indy and Sports. With a field of 8-12 racers in each class. In the spirit of the day, the racing focus was more on fun than the overall complete results and writing this report, I note that the only “actual results I have to work on are the top 2 in each class (with the exception of Sports, were I actually have the dirt on all 9 racers!
So race reports are rather brief!

Hard Body Saloon saw a great race with Ian Fisher making a great run through the field, followed by Will Stemmen

Lexan saloon was rather faster with many of the racers doing credible runs and this time the winner was Will Stemmen from Ian Fisher.

Formula One /Indy again saw a mix of performances on the tricky Oaklands circuit and once again Will took the flag followed by Ian.

Sports saw a couple of good heats with Will again taking the flag (125.16) from father Chris (124.88), Adam Radford (120.50) and Mick Kerr bringing up the top 4 on a 119.28

Trophies were awarded for the Winners of each class, + top junior (Will Stemmen), Concours (Ralph Parker) and Best Chassis (Mick Kerr).

All in all a fun days racing with thanks going to Sandy Parker for doing the majority of the race control, Ralph for sorting trophies and Oaklands for hosting the event along with the free tea and coffee!

More Retro racing Coming Soon at a Club near YOU!