2001 WORLD FINAL at HEDNESFORD HILLS RACEWAY on SATURDAY 15TH SEPTEMBER

With 391 Andy Smith, 515 Junior Wainman and 318 Rob Speak on the first two rows this race was always going to be eventful and even the grey, overcast conditions couldn't ruin the anticipation.

After three laps, the red flags came out as 335 Mark Woodhull appeared to be suffering from concussion in the middle of a melee of cars on the West bend. Before the stoppage, Speak had nerfed Junior Wainman aside and forced an error from Smith; Junior Wainman had eased Smith into the armco and Andy had retaliated by sending him into parked cars. As the race was halted and a complete restart ordered, Speak had pulled out a lead over Smith and 247 Gary Castell.

A considerable delay ensued while Mark was cut from his car and there followed the disconcerting sight of an Air Ambulance helicoptor flying in to land trackside and transport him quickly to hospital for a precautionary brain scan. (I'm delighted to say he went on to make an excellent recovery).

The track lights illuminated the restart and added to the already highly charged atmosphere. Andy Smith led the pack away but moisture on the track slowed him up sufficiently for Junior Wainman to seize his opportunity and nail him on the West bend, but in doing so he lost adhesion and made contact with the wall in turn two. It was all Rob Speak needed. He shot into a lead that he held for the remainder of the race, skilfully negotiating his way past slower cars.

Andy Smith, who was racing with a damaged front axle and a bent steering wheel, got past Junior Wainman only to feel the full force of the Wainman bumper again; Junior going on to finish 2nd with Andy 3rd, 2 Paul Harrison 4th and 247 Gary Castell 5th.

The defending champion, 53 John Lund came from row 17 to finish 6th.

Out of the first six cars, only 515 and 247 had big block Chevy power. The others were all powered by the small block version.

318 Rob Speak became only the second driver to have won both the BriSCA F1 and F2 World Titles, the other being, of course, the incomparable 252 Dave Chisholm.

The Rob Speak car was an Elite built by Terry George and Cecil Sayers for 464 Jamie Davidson (hence the two different numbers on the car.)

Here is a picture of my model of Rob's World winning car:

Rob, Andy and Junior continued to slug it out on track for the remainder of the season with Frankie topping the National Points with a meeting average of 30.8 from 56 meetings, followed by Rob in 2nd place with an average of 29.8 from 49 meetings and Andy in 3rd place with an average of 29.5 from 37 meetings.