| BOYD
ON TOP AGAIN AT BRANDS HATCH
4 May, 2008:
Wayne Boyd accelerated further into the overall lead of the
British Formula Ford Championship this weekend at Brands Hatch,
scoring a brace of impressive race wins at the Kent circuit in
front of a huge audience of spectators gathered for the final
rounds of A1GP.
Boyd overcame a
strong challenge from Westley Barber to clinch Saturday's race and
then led all the way on Sunday, once more ahead of Barber's
Comtec, to increase his points lead to 45.
Boyd's Saturday
race win was the hardest-fought of his short British Formula Ford
career. First the 17-year-old had to overcome the disadvantage of
starting from 'only' second on the grid rather than his customary
pole position, and then Wayne had to find a way past the
much-improved Comtec of former champion Barber, nine years and
many races his senior.
Barber was in
devastating form in practice, claiming the pole with the first
(and so far only) sub-90 second qualifying lap of the Brands Grand
Prix circuit; he was four-tenths of a second quicker than the
Mygale of Boyd. Westley made a superb start to the race also,
leading into Paddock Hill Bend with Boyd tucked in behind and
battling to keep ahead of Adrian Campfield's Spectrum.
While Boyd was
forced to defend second he had no opportunity to try to find a way
past Barber. Wayne's lucky break came on the second lap through
Stirling's Bend, when Chris Maliepaard's Mygale touched the back
of Campfield's car and Adrian exited stage left. His pursuer
delayed, Boyd was given the breathing space he needed to launch an
attack on the lead, and he duly found his way around Barber at
Paddock at the start of the next lap.
Campfield's
excitements were not over: he held the spin and regained the track
just in front of Victor Correa's Jamun Mygale; the Brazilian
swerved to avoid the Spectrum and slid off himself, clouting the
barriers and bumping through a gravel trap before he made it back
on to the tarmac. Campfield found himself 10th and Correa 18th.
Once in clean air
Boyd got his head down and went for it, banging in a succession of
fastest race laps as he tried, unsuccessfully at first, to
distance himself from the pursuing Barber. It was not until the
ninth lap (of 12) that Wayne finally managed to put a bit of space
between them. At the chequered flag he was only two seconds ahead.
"Westley was
very quick today," said Wayne. "I'm really still
learning this circuit, learning the quick lines, so things have
gone pretty well. I made a couple of mistakes in the early laps
but once I got into the lead I just kept my head down."
As the battle for
the lead faded so the duel for third intensified. Maliepaard fell
from the fray after his brush with Campfield and his Getem Racing
team-mate Linton Stuteley took up the charge, pursued for all he
was worth by Australian Champion Tim Blanchard. The Jamun driver
tried everything he knew to find a way to squeeze his 2008-model
Mygale past Stuteley's '06 example, but Linton had an answer for
his every move.
Marco Sorensen
charged up from ninth on the grid, past his Fluid Van Diemen
team-mate David Brown and Maliepaard, who was suffering with
gearbox problems towards the end, to take fifth. Campfield staged
a brilliant recovery from his second-lap off, and drove around the
disadvantage of a bent rear wishbone, to take seventh behind
Maliepaard. Brown placed eighth ahead of the Mygales of Philippe
Layac and James Cole.
Garry Findlay's
Mygale overhauled Chrissy Palmer's Ray three laps from home to
take 11th overall and the Scholarship class win. Dutch driver
Rogier de Wit placed 12th and Correa recovered to 14th, behind
Palmer.
With Saturday's win
and a further 12 laps of circuit knowledge under his belt, Boyd
was on devastating form for Sunday's race. Restored to his
accustomed position, on pole, Wayne made a superb start to lead
into Paddock Hill Bend and begin the charge to his 10th victory of
the season. He extended his lead with every lap, set the fastest
lap of the race on his fourth tour and cruised to a relatively
easy six-second win. "I got a good start," he said,
"and just got my head down. I was able to back off a little
towards the end."
Campfield, fired up
for a good race after his disappointment on Saturday, made the
best start of all, from third on the grid firing past Barber to
latch on to Boyd's tail through Paddock. Adrian held on in front
of Barber until Westfield on the third lap. "It took me
quite a time to get past Adrian," said Barber, "and once
I did I just didn't have the pace to catch Wayne."
Campfield slipped
back to fourth towards the end when Blanchard nipped past, but
Adrian was in no mood to be denied and regained third with three
laps to go, then held Blanchard to the line to score his maiden
championship podium. Less than three-tenths of a second covered
the cars of Campfield, Blanchard and their pursuers in fifth and
sixth, Matt Hamilton and Maliepaard, at the line.
Brown took seventh
ahead of his team-mate Sorensen, with Correa ninth from de Wit and
Findlay, who once again took Scholarship Class honours, leading
Palmer all the way. |