Paul Merson takes narrow Hardy win

Woolbridge had strong local support for their Classic Trial, including a Four Wheel Drive class running at the back of the field. The event was a mixture of traditional lanes supplemented by some grassy venues familiar to competitors who go to the clubs single venue events. These of course require a very different driving technique to the rocky lanes. Either trickle or blast, there is no in-between!

The results were dominated by Class 7 and 8 cars, only Matt Facey (BMW) and Keith Sanders (Reliant Scimitar) getting close to their scores. Keith was running in the Clubmans category winning that overall. With the impending change in licence requirements that arbitrary split shouldn’t be necessary in 2020 although it could still be used to create a less demanding sub-event for this who prefer it.

In the National B category, qualifying for ACTC points, there was a day long battle between Paul Merson and Ray Ferguson in their respective Shopland Mk11 Special and Liege. They swapped two’s on Knowle Lane and Meerhay and were level on marks lost when they came to the grassy bank of Tim’s 1, the penultimate section. They both spun to a stop just before section ends but Ray didn’t quite pass the two marker so Paul took the overall win by one mark.

There were a few notable breakages. Barry Redmayne snapped a ball joint early on. Roger Ashby put the fan through the radiator of his glorious special after hitting a rock on Meerhay and Stuart Highwood had a half shaft fail on Knowle Lane in his Scimitar.

Jon Rutherford was best Solo and Martin Keswick best Outfit

• Full Provisional Results
• Hardy Trial on the Classic Trials FB Group

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