Tel’s Tales Ty Croes, Anglesey 5th/6th Oct 2019

As has become usual, drivers headed to the Island of Anglesey for the final weekend of the year run by our friends at Longton and District Motor Club. Many of us like to arrive early on the Friday afternoon to beat the traffic and get settled in place with electric hook ups in the paddock. As we had to wait to get into the paddock due to a “private testing event” we were queued and parked up on a part of the old circuit close to Radar bend complex on the straight to the original hairpin and that brought back memories for quite a few of us. The journey to the event took a bit longer than usual as there was a long section of contraflow on the A55 and it was the Rally Wales near Conway. I think Steve Arkley had the longest journey travelling from Elgin, Scotland which is around 485miles each way!

The weekend would finalise who had won what but also threatened some horrible wet and windy weather but luckily most of that was during the night and we had a great weekend of motorsport. As well as the Westfield classes and championship there were the class J2 single seaters battling for points in the British Sprint Championship including Pete Goulding, Steve Broughton, John Loudon and Mark Anson. A bonus was that we could get scrutineered and sign on Friday evening so we all started queuing up. Just you just love it when some plonker thinks the queue is not neede and just pushes in. Well guess what it was. A b….y cateringvan who seemed oblivious to the glares he was getting from the rest of us. Then something even worse happened. Another car tagged along behind him thinking it was a good move but he did get a bit of verbal abuse and ignored it. The sad thing was that it turned out to be one of our own clan by the name of MARK BISHOP. 

Saturday practice (  just 1) started with it being  a cold dry day and poor grip on the track but we all seemed to get round without any damage or embarrassment.. Towards the end of practice a well known Darrian failed on the circuit and deposited a line of oil over about 60 percent of the track so T1 was going to interesting for everyone as we found our way past the long line of cement dust.

The start line all weekend and 64ft times were very poor and most of us were well off the Target Times. T1 stayed mainly dry with a bit of drizzle later on 

In the afternoon there were a few spins after the finish line as people pushed the limits of adhesion on a cold track. As we have seen all season John Hoyle was going very quickly and after 4 timed runs John broke the record and myself , Ian Davenport and Howard Gaskin won our classes on the day.

Heavy rain overnight followed a well attended meal and drinks in the bar which ended late. 

Sunday was the International circuit and P1 was very damp and slippy which always makes a few corners quite interesting at high speed. Today we had Chris Griffiths and Nick Bailey joining us for another great day of competition. Del and Garry were coming into their element with massive power, launch control and traction helping. Troy and Chris were in the garage with them and we saw Stephen and sally Herbert as well as Paul Aspden and Jill wandering around. The British Sprint guys were pushing hard for maximum points at this last event that settled their positions.

Nick Algar’s engine blew up and Pete Goulding was rewarded with a final year end 2ndplace and John Loudon was 12th. Matt Hillam, Steve Broughton and Mark Anson also finished well.

Sunday saw Chris Griffiths blasting round in his Millington Diamond engine car and John Hoyle making us all look slow. Garry Bunn aslo broke the class H record.

In the end we had similar class successes and had a thoroughly entertaining weekend that was run brilliantly by LDMC 

So now we know the results we just you all to  get your tickets for the Awards do on 30thNov 2019. There will be a raffle and auction of some great prizes that are being donated by our sponsors and drivers for the “MAKE A WISH FOUNDATION” which helps critically ill children.

Next year’s Regs are currently being drafted and the list of events compiled and we hope to attract new drivers as well as retain the existing mob!

Terry Everall