Brands Hatch Indy – 17/18th Sept 2022 Race Report, Images and Results

Posted on: September 22nd 2022 • Posted in: Race Results

Rounds 13 & 14 – Brands Hatch Indy – Ford Power Live meeting

The 2022 Locks4Vans Sports 2000 Championship would be completed at the exciting Brands Hatch Indy circuit – a location that the series has raced at many times before, and one that always provides a big challenge. There may only be a handful of corners, but they’re all tough in their own way, and the circuit flows in a manner that requires drivers to nail it every single time. Add the prospect of traffic into the mix after as little as five laps, and you know you’re going to have a busy weekend.

Qualifying

Josh Law would get his final weekend of the season off to a great start, proving that he wasn’t ready to take his foot off the gas. He bagged pole position by just over half a second from Michael Gibbins, who was looking to take second spot in the championship from Richard Johnson. The latter had qualified third though, so was still going to be a threat. David Houghton would line up 4th ahead of Paul Trayhurn, who it was lovely to welcome back. Tim Tudor, Peter Brouwer, Clive Hayes, Colin Peach and Dominic Lesniewski completed the Top 10.

Pinto-wise, it was a down-to-the-wire championship fight between Jon Harmer and Marc Noaro’s Tiga, and Paul Streat’s Lola. Nick Hyett was in fact leading the championship coming into the finale, but ultimately wouldn’t be attending, so it was down to the others to sort out. It was Nick’s brother Charlie that would Qualify quickest, driving Ross’ beautiful silver Lola. Jon Harmer would join him on the front row ahead of Paul Streat and Mike Fry. Mike Dodd would complete the Top 5 in his Tiga, sporting a top-drawer Porsche 917/30 tribute livery.

Race 1

Off the line, Gibbins got a great initial launch, and got the better of Law, but Josh held firm and got the position back after just a few corners, denying Michael of any sort of an easy ride. Paul Trayhurn had been squeezed – nearly into the wall – in the first hundred meters and had to back out of a scary situation, so had lost places, but he was fired up and ready to climb back up the order. One of the benefitting drivers was Dominic Lesniewski – he had jumped up the order from 10th on the grid to 6th!

Charlie Hyett completed a pair of pole-sitters that had nightmare starts. The whole Pinto field had been briefed that a 10-second delay would follow the Duratec start, but as Charlie prepared, checked his dials and other read-outs, the flag had dropped very prematurely, and everyone got the jump on him. He wasn’t the only one though, as a couple of drivers further back expected the same sort of waiting times, and were caught out.

As a result, it was Jon Harmer from Paul Streat with Mike Fry in 3rd place after one lap. Charlie would make it his mission to get right back to the front, using the pace he’d displayed in Qualifying, but it wasn’t going to be easy with Duratec traffic making its way through after just a handful of circulations.

It was Lap 6 before the top Duratec drivers encountered any traffic, and by this point Josh Law had extended his lead to just over 3 seconds from Michael Gibbins. Michael himself had a comfortable almost-four-second gap over Richard Johnson, but it wasn’t exactly ideal when it came to championship points to be exactly one position ahead. Richard was coming under pressure from David Houghton, and Tim Tudor wasn’t far behind, so – whether he knew it or not – Michael would have his fingers crossed that his championship rival lost places.

On Lap 8, we unfortunately lost Joshua Needham from the race – his car had crawled to a halt coming down to Graham Hill Bend. He reported that he’d locked up and had a moment into Druids, but the car had died on him, and subsequent attempts to get it started again results in flames shooting from the air intake, so he decided that discretion was the better part of valour, and did what he could to save the car for Sunday.

Paul Trayhurn was gaining places, engaging in some thrilling combat with Tony Barwell and Clive Hayes along the way. The three of them were side-by-side at many points, having to conceded occasionally for traffic and be careful about picking their moments to attack or defend.

Jon Harmer continued to lead the Pintos but wasn’t disappearing over the horizon from Paul Streat’s perspective – the latter was fully determined to try and steal the title in the final weekend of the season, paying no attention to the numbers that stacked up against him. The gap was consistently less than a second, despite the pair being lapped constantly by Duratecs.

The largest fluctuation in time between two drivers was right at the sharp end – at the end of each lap, Josh Law’s lead could’ve been anywhere from 3 seconds to nearly 7 seconds – traffic playing a big part in extending the unpredictable nature of the race.

After just over 20 laps though, the Safety Car was called. Andrew Butler had come to a halt at Druids and the car was stuck on the inside of the corner, right on the racing line. It would need to be recovered with another vehicle and so the race was neutralised.

Six laps later we would get back under way for a final, two-lap sprint to the end. The only problem for Michael Gibbins was that Josh Law had two cars – Mike Turner and Clive Steeper – acting as a buffer between them. Mike and his team later joked that they would’ve been happy for the race to finish early while they were running 2nd on the road behind Josh!

Josh Law would hold on with two clean laps to take another excellent win. Despite losing the lead at the start, he kept his head in the game and got right back on that Horse! Michael Gibbins helped his championship runner-up hopes with 2nd place with Richard Johnson in 3rd. The latter managed to use the traffic to his advantage and eek out a 2-second gap to David Houghton by the time the flag dropped. Paul Trayhurn completed a great recovery drive to round out the Top 5.

Behind them in the Top 10 was Tim Tudor, Dominic Lesniewski, Tony Barwell, Clive Hayes and Colin Peach.

Jon Harmer secured the win in the Pintos, putting one hand (or one each) on the trophy for himself and Marc Noaro, who would be driving the car for Race 2 on Sunday. Paul Streat gave everything he could and came away with 2nd place, while Nicholas Johnson completed the podium. Charlie Hyett had been handed a time penalty for exceeding track limits on his very exciting comeback, which mean that Mike Fry and Mike Dodd were classified ahead of him on the final results sheets.

Going into the final race of the year, 2nd place in the Duratecs and the overall Pinto Championships were what everyone was focused on. Michael Gibbins would need to win with Richard Johnson no better than 3rd, while Marc Noaro would only need to score minimal points – finish the race, basically – to clinch the Pinto championship with Jon Harmer.

Race 2

Everyone was in high spirits and carrying great anticipation for the final race of the 2022 season – Josh Law would once again start on pole position alongside Michael Gibbins, as the pair looked to do battle once more. Richard Johnson and David Houghton were hoping to re-ignite their Race 1 fight, too. The Sunday of Ford Power Live was much busier than Saturday, and the entire paddock wanted to provide as much entertainment as possible – oh boy were they not messing about.

Marc Noaro knew he could take it quite easy in the second race to bag the Pinto championship, while Paul Streat knew that he had to win and tick all the boxes, making sure he’d done all he could at his end.

Josh Needham and Andrew Butler were both back on the grid to take part in the final hurrah as well, after both retiring from Race 1.

As the lights went out, it was Gibbins again with a great start, while Josh Law didn’t get an ideal launch. This propelled Gibbins into the top spot, while Josh dropped down behind Johnson and Houhgton. It was an exciting prospect to see the newly-crowned champion have to battle it out with some of the series big guns around such a short, narrow circuit.

Paul Streat had grabbed the lead early on in the Pintos and started to run away with it, with Nicholas Johnson 2nd ahead of Marc Noaro. Marc had a lot of heat on him from Fry, Steeper and Dodd behind, but he wasn’t going to let it phase him as he got into a rhythm. Charlie Hyett had dropped a few spots since the start after an excursion through the gravel, so once again was a driver with a comeback drive ahead of him.

Josh Law made it back up into 2nd place, overtaking Houghton, then Johnson. If the race were to finish like this, Michael Gibbins would steal 2nd in the championship from Johnson right at the death – it was all very tense. Josh’s pace was quicker than Michael’s, but the traffic would soon start to affect things and make the lap times a whole lot less consistent.

After just 4 laps, Peter Brouwer retired from the race – his Lola coming to a halt with a technical issue. Peter is often one of the feistiest and most exciting drivers on the track, so it was a shame to lose him so early on. By this point Paul Streat had a near-5-second lead in the Pintos from Nicholas Johnson, with his fingers surely crossed that traffic would further improve the situation.

Mike Fry was leading a fantastic battling quartet made up of himself, Marc Noaro, Clive Steeper and Mike Dodd. The four of them didn’t change positions very often, but the racing between them was very close, and at all points very clean – as is always the way in Sports 2000.

Paul Trayhurn was on a mission again after showing great pace in the first race, pressuring Houghton and in turn, keeping Johnson at ease (or as much “at ease” as you can be at these speeds). He was very much in with a shout of an overall podium to finish what had been a character-building 2022 campaign.

A train of cars had established itself well in the middle of the pack – John Iley – who had been battling food poisoning all weekend – was ahead of Nick Bates, Andy Chittenden, Mike Turner and Josh Needham, all of whom were separated by less than 2 seconds after 10 laps. There were moments where you wouldn’t envy being the guys in the middle – looking to make a lunge down the inside, while thinking about what the driver behind is doing, as well as looking out for traffic and working out how to safely navigate past it – it was all very intense.

At the sharp end, Josh Law had closed up to the back of Michael Gibbins’ number 76 MCR and was starting to show intentions of grabbing the lead. For the next 9 laps the gap between them wouldn’t exceed 2 tenths of a second. It became a masterpiece in defensive driving by Michael Gibbins – putting the car exactly where he needed to, lap after lap.

Josh would try to open up Paddock Hill Bend by braking to the outside of Michael, hoping for a cutback down the hill, and a safe, simple pass down the inside into Druids, but Michael placed the car beautifully. It was spectacular entertainment, as everyone was hoping for, and the best bit of all was that everyone trackside knew that the pair of them would be grinning from ear-to-ear, thriving in the thrill of battle.

There was one scary moment, it must be said, where the pair came flying past the aforementioned Fry, Noaro, Steeper and Dodd quartet. As the latter was battling away, he made a move over to the right from behind another car, and Josh Law had barely a car’s width to squeeze through under immense closing speed. There must have been mere inches between himself and the encroaching wall, but luckily he got by and nobody was involved in an incident.

As they came to lap Josh’s brother Ash, there was a moment where it seemed he’d slowed down more than expected to maybe hinder Michael and help his brother out, but it turns out that the car had a gearbox issue, and coming out of Druids, for lack of a better phrase, had nothing. He managed to crawl the car back into the pit lane though, without pulling over and causing a Safety Car.

Unfortunately tough, despite this effort, the epic battling was then subdued temporarily due to a late Safety Car period. While battling, the trio of Mike Turner, Nick Bates and Andy Chittenden had come up on some lapped traffic, namely Mike Fry’s Tiga. Three into one didn’t go around Druids and sadly it was the Pinto that came off worst, stuck in the gravel on the outside of the corner. Much like Andrew Butler’s MCR on Saturday, it couldn’t be left in harm’s way, so would need an extraction under Safety Car conditions.

This left us with only a few more laps to go. Laps in which Michael Gibbins would have to defend harder than ever before, and laps that Marc Noaro could safely enjoy before he and Jon Harmer would be crowned champions in the Pinto category.

As we went back to green-flag racing, there were thousandths of a second between Josh and Michael at all times – Josh even got alongside at one point and the cars became one, with Law’s wheels grasing the outside grass on the way into Surtees corner, but Gibbins held firm and took a very well deserved victory, he and Josh treating us to one of the best battles (and races) that the championship had ever seen. Josh Law later commented that it was his favourite race of the year, and he hadn’t even won it!

Richard Johnson completed the podium but unfortunately for him, would be classified 3rd in the overall championship standings thanks to Michael’s victory. He was still very happy though after so long out from full-time competition. Paul Trayhurn would triumph over David Houghton by the time the race ended, grabbing a well-deserved 4th place. Tim Tudor, Tony Barwell, Colin Peach, Dominic Lesniewski and Peter Williams rounded out the Top 10.

Breaking the fourth wall for a second here – it has to be said that amongst all of the amazing racing, it was hard to know where to look at times, so a lot of drivers may have had some amazing moments on track, but flew under the radar to those outside of the cockpit, as is the nature of Brands Hatch Indy, but it goes without saying that their efforts are of course, always appreciated, regardless of whether they appear in these race reports or not. – Chaz

In the Pintos it was Paul Streat who took the race victory, throwing absolutely everything at the final outing, as Charlie Hyett drove well to get 2nd position at the end. Nicholas Johnson completed the podium ahead of Mike Dodd, with Clive Steeper, Marc Noaro and Richard Cooke finishing the order.

This confirmed Marc Noaro and Jon Harmer as very deserving Pinto Champions, and the 2022 season was complete.

The whole meeting was a bag of high spirits, but of course, will be forever remembered for the beautiful and heart-warming way in which the entire venue observed the two minutes silence for her majesty Queen Elizabeth II. Our championship was in pride of place, lined up on the grid as the clock struck, and there was not a single sound in the air, to the point where the sound of flags waving in the breeze seemed almost deafening.

It’s been another incredible championship, with high points and low points for many involved, but we all know that that’s just motorsport sometimes, and it’s why we continue to – and always will – love it. It’s unpredictable, exciting, heartbreaking and entertaining. Congratulations to all of our championship across the multiple classes and categories on their success, and commiserations to those that just missed out.

We now look forward to our annual dinner and dance celebration in January, and of course what lies ahead in the 2023 season.

Many thanks to Chaz Draycott for these reports.

Results are available via the Results Page. Here