Photos by Rose Hughes and Ivan Sansom
5/8/06
Just up the road, the Royal Shakespeare Company have embarked on a mammoth project to put on all of the works of Stratford upon Avon's most famous son over the next 12 months. This headline news in the local press was, however, of little interest to the UK Sportsman racers at Shakespeare County Raceway as they were hoping to complete eliminations for the first time in three attempts at the start of the National Championship. With the weather gods smiling on the track during a virtually uninterrupted day of qualifying, many entrants were wondering if they had fallen into a Midsummer Night's Dream and, with the failure of the forecast Tempest to appear on eliminations day, the racers were able for the first time in 2006 to feel that All's well that ends well (that's enough of that!).
Some major changes in the management of the Stratford track are in the offing, with Lee Child and Wendy Talbot stepping down as Event Promoter and Club Secretary respectively just prior to the event. Rumors were rife around the pits about the future direction of the track, hopefully some long term security can be put in place by what will be the third promotion team in four years for the rest of the season and beyond. UK drag racing needs two championship quality tracks in order to build on the recent notable expansion in sportsman participation.
Kev Perkins was was one of a number of racers to sweep the board in their class. Perkins outqualified and then simply out ran the rest of the Super Modified field in Graham Ellis' Cutlass. A 7.547 best was reserved for the final round against Andy Kirk's Camaro who hit severe tireshake off the line.