Seale's Thruxton Ton

The date clash with the Coys Festival at Silverstone and the major Club presence there made it inevitable that entries would be a little down for Round 9 at the ultra-quick Thruxton circuit. Nevertheless, 18 Ferraris turned up, including all the major runners in each of the three classes.

Qualifying was notable for the first-ever 100 mph lap by a Ferrari and it was John Seale who took pole in his 355/Ch almost one second ahead of Alan Cosby (F512M) and the second 355/Ch of Graham Reeder. Ian Hetherington (F50) lurked in fourth place, with Nick May (Testarossa) in fifth.

Gary Culver (F355) was easily the quickest of the "O" class cars, but his nearest class rival, David Ashburn, was hampered by some rear tyres that were beyond their sell-by date. Pirelli quickly conjured up another pair prior to the race.

On the formation lap prior to the start, Reeder's 355/Ch had one of its periodic electrical glitches and as the lights turned green he fell right to the back of the field.

Alan Cosby shot into the lead from Seale but the latter was back in the lead by the time the cars came round at the completion of their first lap. Nick May had powered his way into third but was unable to maintain the pace of the two leaders.

Seale looked to have everything safely under control at the front and the main point of interest became Graham Reeder, whose car had reverted back to 8 cylinders and was working its way up through the field to get as high as sixth overall as the chequered flag came out.

Seale won the race just a length or two ahead of Cosby and over 20 seconds in arrears were May and the 308GT4 of Peter Lowe. John Avery was fifth in his 355/Ch, with Reeder just getting ahead of the first "O" class car, that of Gary Culver in seventh place overall. And where was Ian Hetherington? His F50 seemed fairly gutless off the start and it turned out to be clutch problems that were hampering the large and powerful car, which was retired on lap 6.

The "O" class battle was short-lived because David Ashburn (355GTS), having made a stunning start, had a major accident on lap 1 which left his car looking very dented against the barriers. This put Shaun Powell (F355) into second place with Andy Duncan (348tb) in an excellent third in class.

The positions at the top of the three championship tables were not particularly affected by this result. Amongst the "O"s Gary Culver continues to lead but the very consistent Shaun Powell has now overtaken David Ashburn for second place. In Category "S" Ian Hetherington still leads but cannot affort many more retirements, being only 16 points in front of the on-form Alan Cosby. Amongst the Challenge cars Graham Reeder continues to enjoy a handsome lead ahead of John Avery and John Seale.

The tenth round of the championship takes place at Snetterton on the weekend of 5th/6th August.