Wilson

After a delay of almost 7 months, the annual trip to the Lake District was on. The delay, due to the dreaded F&M was over the original route from March. The organizers had done a brilliant job to get the event to run, but with the help of DEFRA everything was go.

Three stages in the Northern Lakes (Comb, Wythop and Hobcarton) a trip down to Grizedale for 2 stages and then a repeat of the Northern stages, was the menu for the day. The entry was not quite up to BTRDA capacity, but never the less was a very competitive field.

With the South Swedish Service Crew from EJM in attendance, and visiting sponsors from Arena Know How (trust you enjoyed the weekend folks) hopes were high for a good run. Nik finally got the hang of a quick start, being second fastest in A7 over the Comb stage (Noted for its mighty drops into Bassenthwaite, and one of the few MSA !!! bends in the country). Very short road sections were a feature of this group of stages, and Slippy does really not do then justice. However, the usual Maxsport Soft rubber was doing a good job.

After a brief service it was off on the 50 min run down to Grizedale for 19 miles of stages, with just a 4 min gap in between. The SEAT was going well, the class proving to be very tight, but the Soft rubber was taking a hammering on these longer and dryer stages. The result was two good stage times, but a completely shot pair of front tyres (Like Bald!).

A repeat 60 min road section back to service lead to a repeat of the morning stages. Nik was really trying now, managing 2nd in A7 on the last stage - with a time 13 secs quicker than the morning.

The final results showed that the whole A7 class was covered by 1 min 59 Secs (After over an hour of stages that Is Tight) with Nik in 4th. But still that was worth 17 more points and moves him to 2nd in Championship Class, to add to the 2nd in Welsh Championship class at present.

Howard Cooper