Griffiths and Stiles Win at Plymouth BRCA 1:12 National
Round four of the BRCA 1:12 Nationals took place in Plymouth last weekend. In the Stock class on Saturday, Team Associated/Reedy/LRP factory driver Olly Jefferies continued his dominant qualifying form by taking his fifth consecutive TQ of the season. Reigning British Champion Andy Griffiths joined Olly on the front row of the A final grid with his Nosram-powered V-Dezign car while former World Champion David Spashett lined up third.
In the A final, Olly led Andy and the pair enjoyed a very close race for more than seven and a half minutes of the race, until a small error just three laps from home allowed Andy through into the lead. Chris Kerswell came from fifth on the grid to finish second for Serpent/LRP ahead of Spashett, while Olly could only manage fourth place following another error whilst trying to regain the lead from Andy on the penultimate lap.
In Modified on Sunday, Mark Stiles made some alterations to the set-up of his LRP-powered Serpent car for the morning practice session after struggling to find pace on the previous day. These improved his car somewhat and he spent the first two qualifying runs further refining the handling. His efforts were rewarded in the last two qualifiers where he set the fastest time, thus giving him the overall TQ ahead of Olly Jefferies and Andy Griffiths. This was the first time this season that a driver other than Olly had TQ’d a BRCA 1:12 National.
Mark led away the A final field closely followed by Olly and these two immediately pulled a large gap to the chasing pack. In the early stages, Olly was applying pressure at the front, but a mistake coming onto the straight sent his car flying off the track one minute into the race. This allowed Mark to relax and settle into a comfortable rhythm and he wasn’t challenged for the remaining seven minutes. At the end he had a comfortable lead of more than six seconds and lapped every other car in the final except former World Champion David Spashett who finished in second place. Olly recovered from his early crash to finish third.
A video of the Stock A final can be seen below:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auys6vU-eTA
Action from the Modified A final:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvMk8AqM7bA
With two events remaining, Olly looks to be favourite for both titles and a good result at the next round may be good enough to secure him overall honours. Full results and updated championship positions will be available here shortly.
The organising club would like to thank Horizon Hobby UK, CML Distribution, HPI Europe and Corally UK for donating a selection of prizes that were handed out to a number of young drivers and new competitors in the class.
