Kerswell was 5th in qualifying, in yet another rain affected race in the UK.
In the finals Kerswell could take 2nd place with Serpent 411 in BRCA Nats.
Report:
The final round of the 2011 BRCA national championship took place at Mendip. As with most of the UK nationals this year, rain would play a big part of the meeting!
The first round of qualifying was a mainly dry affair with Chris Kerswell continuing to show the pace of the Serpent S411, qualifying 2nd in round despite a mistake which cost him the TQ. After this the rain came and the qualifying order was shaken up with the top heat getting the slowest track conditions for rounds 2 and 3. Despite this Chris lined up 4th overnight, which, considering that the current and previous national champions were in the C final, was impressive!
Rounds 4 and 5 were once again wet and some more top 10 times secured Chris 5th on the grid. In the first wet final Chris fought his way through to 2nd but was unable to catch the leader before the end of the race. Conditions started to dry and by the last final the track was completely dry. The S411 was once again class of the field and Chris battled through to win the leg comfortably with some very close action as he made his way to the front. This left him tied on points with Matt White who won the final on tie break.
The Associated team had a strong finish to their 2011 campaign at the fast Mendip track near Weston Super Mare.
Once again the weather dominated qualifying and the mixed conditions saw some big names slip by the wayside in qualifying. In the super touring class Olly Jefferies qualified 2nd on the grid for the A final behind Schumacher’s Matt White, a third in leg one and a win in leg two saw Olly bring his TC6 home third overall, also making the A final was Johnny Aird and Alan Bickerstaff, Johnny would end up sixth with Alan eighth. Matt White took the win ahead of Chris Kerswell and Olly.
In the 10.5 stock class Chris Slater mimicked Olly’s performance putting his TC6 second on the grid for the A final, after the three leg finals Chris finished just off the podium in fourth place.
Andy Murray left it to the last race of the year to put in his best performance of 2011, starting from eight on the grid Andy put in a strong performance to net second on the day behind newly crowned nation stock champion Ayrton Anderson.
Elsewhere Zak Smith convincingly won the B final, frustratingly for Zak his times in the B final would have put him right up there with the A final times but problems in qualifying prevented him making the A.
Last weekend the BRCA Touring Car National season came to a close with a fantastic win for long time Schumacher driver Matt White in the modified class.
Once again conditions were against the drivers with the track changing seemingly every 5 minutes, making qualifying difficult for many. However Matt managed some stella qualifying runs to take the TQ spot with his Mi4CX ahead of Olly Jefferies and Tom Watts. Schumacher’s Tim Langdell and Chris Ashton also made it into the main. Notable for their absence were Chris Grainger, Andy Moore and Elliot Harper all down the field unable to put sufficient runs together throughout the weekend.
In the Pro Stock class the results conformed a little more to the norm with championship winner Ayrton Anderson continuing his domination taking TQ and the win ahead of Schumacher’s James Hart with his Mi4CX and Andy Murray.
A flag to flag victory for Matt in the wet in the first leg of the finals gave him a great chance to take the overall win. A slight blip in the second leg saw Matt well down the field but a second place in the now dry conditions of the third leg saw him take his first Touring Car National win!! A fantastic achievement for a guy who has been a loyal servant to the Schumacher brand since 1997!!
Chris Kerswell was second and Olly Jefferies third. Schumacher’s Chris Ashton made fourth from the 7 spot and Tim Langdell 9th.
Congratulations to Matt on a great win and all the team for a great performance over the year!
