SEAC revs into action at Heywood festival

Heywood’s Wood, Wine and Roses Festival was the venue for the opening round of the South Eastern Automobile Club’s 2024 Khanacross series and had a good entry roll up of 28 competitors for an excellent day’s racing.

Paul Height took on the role of director for this outing and set up some tricky courses to keep the driver thinking all the way to the finish garage.

First course, forward direction, caught out a couple of hard chargers, scoring a track marker penalty along the way for maybe trying a bit too hard, whereas a couple of others were not totally engaged in the look around lap and drove a different track and scored the WD (wrong direction) which carries a large penalty of slowest time plus five seconds.

Aaron Bowering, driving a stock Subaru WRX pulled a two second gap from Daniel Oldaker in a Holden Adventra 4WD wagon, Sam Thomas in his rally prepped Subaru WRX third, Damien Wilson in a Nissan S13 with a new gearbox fourth, Geoff Wilson in the ol’ Magna fifth, Michelle Razum in the family Mitsubishi Lancer sixth, Husband Paul enjoying a little more track 7/100ths behind in seventh, Matt Kirby in his trusty Ford Laser eighth, Nicholas Doll in a Subaru WRX ninth and Connor Cooper putting the Holden Commodore through the ringer, making the Top 10 spread over five seconds from 1 to 10, quite close with a big variation of cars.

Second run at this testing course, Bowering held the fastest time but only a little more than a tenth of a second from Sam Thomas and Oldaker putting in another tidy drive to hold third spot.

Club junior Harrison Bliss made up for the first run error and got home for fourth, Nicholas Doll fifth, Phil Wilson having an outing in the Toyota Soarer next, sixth, Kyle Johnson in the pretty Datsun 1600 seventh, Michelle Razum eighth, Geoff Wilson ninth and a tie for 10th spot, Jason Sims and Denver Herbertson.

The gap from 1 to 10 in this run down to fourseconds.

Same track, driven in the reverse direction caught two drivers out in geographical challenges (WD) and nine others collected a track marker somewhere along the way, costing them five seconds for their effort.

Sam Thomas found the track to his liking and topped the list by half a second from Bowering, Oldaker and Doll both close, Geoff Wilson also having a good go in the Magna, fifth, Jason Sims sixth, Max Viitanen seventh, Denver Herbertson eighth, Justin Devlin ninth and Charlie Evans 10th.

Good to see three of the upcoming club champions in the top ten, junior drivers Viitanen, Herbertson and Evans.

Repeat the last run, Thomas first, Bowering second, Bliss third, Oldaker fourth, Wilson fifth, Doll sixth, Razum seventh, Johnson eighth, Wilson ninth and Herbertson 10th.

Again four seconds in the time gap from 1 to 10.
Short break and the director made some changes to the track layout presented for the next run.

Aaron Bowering had a good look at the conditions on the recce lap and found the quickest way around by 2/10ths, from Sam Thomas, Junior Denver Herbertson also getting a good run, third, Nick Doll fourth, Phil Wilson using the power of the Soarer to advantage fifth, Max Viitanen sixth, Bliss seventh, Johnson eighth, Jason Sims ninth and Wilson 10th.

Same course, second run and Bowering again top of the crop, first, from Oldaker second, Phil Wilson third, Damien Wilson fourth, Sam Thomas fifth after clipping a marker (costing first place), Doll sixth, Jason Sims seventh, Max Viitanen eighth, Herbertson ninth and Johnson 10th.

The gap for this run 1-10 was five seconds, with many of the drivers having too much fun on this course.
Reverse direction and Sam Thomas took this one from Bowering second, Oldaker third, Doll fourth, Wilson fifth, Sims sixth, Herbertson seventh, Bliss eighth, Wilson ninth and Razum 10th.

Reverse no.2, seven of the drivers clipped a track marker, trying to get a quicker run home and a further two managed to find a totally different track to run around.

Thomas trimmed a couple of seconds off his previous run and held the top spot on the time sheet, with Bowering unable to match the power, settling for second.

Justin Devlin, enjoying one of his best days at the wheel of the shared Commodore, took the third spot from Nick Doll’s Subaru WRX fourth, Paul Razum made it to fifth, Wilson sixth, Herbertson next home seventh, Henry Sims eighth, Michelle Razum ninth and Oldaker 10th with a cone penalty dropping him back seven spots.

Another rest break for the officials, the director again went all out to find more ways to keep the driver occupied and succeeded, including some bits that would cause more than one car to get a bit of air if the approach angle or speed could have been better chosen.

Daniel Oldaker put the ‘Dore Wagon through the jumpy bits and stole the top spot from Bowering second, Doll third, Matt Kirby fourth, Phil Wilson fifth, Denver Herbertson sixth, Connor Cooper seventh, Geoff Wilson eighth, Jason Sims ninth and Devlin 10th.

Three drivers had a different way home (WDs) and six found a course marker on the way to home.

Course 3, forward direction, Thomas had a clear run this time and made it to the top of the list, Bowering exactly one second behind in second from Phil Wilson third, Oldaker fourth, Sims fifth, Doll sixth, Wilson seventh, Charlie Evans driving his Hyundai Excel and enjoying a run, eighth, Kirby ninth and Razum 10th.

Reverse direction on this long, rough course for the final runs of the day, Oldaker enjoyed the layout and made it to fastest time of the day.

Nick Doll, having a reasonable outing in the Suby, next home in second fastest, Paul Razum third, Damien Wilson fourth, Geoff Wilson having a bit of trouble keeping the Magna on the ground, fifth, Henry Sims sixth, Kyle Johnson seventh, Kirby eighth, Max Viitanen ninth and Cohen Hamilton 10th.

As has been most of the day, the time gap from 1 to 10 is about five seconds, very close all day.
Last run and Oldaker made fastest time of the day again from Bowering on this round second, Phil Wilson third, Sims fourth, Denver Herbertson again steering the family Lancer very well, fifth, Nick Doll sixth, Paul Razum seventh, Damien Wilson eighth on equal time with Harrison Bliss eighth and Kyle Johnson getting home in the Pulsar 10th.

The gap from 1 to 10 on the final run was three seconds, reflecting how tight the competition had been all day.

Final placings:
1 Aaron Bowering      Class F 10:52.01
(Pictured above)
2 Daniel Oldaker Class F 11:12.57
3 Nicholas Doll Class F 11:26.46
4 Sam Thomas Class F 11:37.29
5 Paul Razum Class B 11:46.98
6 Jason Sims Class A 11:48.18
(Pictured bottom left)
7 Denver Herbertson Junior 11:49.80
8 Phil Wilson Class C 11:51.15
9 Damien Wilson Class B 11:53.46
10 Justin Devlin Class C 11:55.18
11 Max Viitanen Junior 11:57.45
12 Connor Cooper Class C 12:00.40
13 Geoff Wilson Class C 12:02.06
14 Kyle Johnson Class B 12:09.56
15 Henry Sims Junior 12:18.08
16 Matt Kirby Class B 12:23.20
(Pictured top left)
17 Dylan Bowering      Junior 12:24.55
18 Harrison Bliss Junior 12:25.55
19 Michelle Razum Class B (L) 12:29.13
20 Bruno Vadori Class C 12:42.01
21 Bruce Hamilton     Class C 12:42.26
22 Charlie Evans Junior 12:47.05
23 Josh Munn Class B 12:54.01
24 Kim Barclay Class C 13:26.59
25 Cohen Hamilton Class C 13:31.07
26 Liam Johnson Junior 13:34.52
27 Angus Barclay Junior 13:59.58
28 Shania Whitehead Junior 18:11.50

PHOTOS COURTESY OF KARL THOMSON