The final two rounds of the 2018 Reprise IT Tiedeman Trophy Championship were held at Anglesey Circuit on Sunday 18th November. The event attracted a good entry of seventeen cars, with a number of people still in the fight for the championship. Will Cox was leading on points with Terry Clark trailing by 5. But with the bigger class, Terry could have taken the championship win by winning his class in both races.
Qualifying saw Neil Harrison take pole in his Dallara F302 ahead of Zachary Anderton in his M1000 class Jedi. Terry Clark took third overall and first in the 2000 class, with Alistair Bell not far behind. Chris Lord qualified third which was first for the 1800 class. Marcus Sheard had a dramatic start to his day, having a spin on his third lap of qualifying on the final corner. He came to a stop on the grass before catching fire. Luckily his team were able to fit a new fire extinguisher and air filter so that he could start from the back of the grid for the first race.
As the cars went out for their two green flag laps to warm their cars up in the chilly temperatures, Alistair Bell pulled off with clutch problems, causing a delayed start. Rachel Lovett pulled into the pits on the green flag laps but made it back out 1 lap down. A misfire then caused her to retire from the race one lap from the end. Nigel Davers retired after one lap of the race with a broken gear linkage, having qualified seventh.
Neil Harrison led the race from start to finish, with Zach Anderton staying close to him for the duration and eventually finishing second. Bryn Tootell had a brilliant first lap of the race; having had a problem in qualifying, he started ninth but was third by the end of the first lap. He then held this position until the end.
There was a fierce battle between Terry Clark and Chris Lord for fourth overall which lasted the entirety of the race. They swapped and changed a number of times, with Chris holding the position for the longest time, but Terry took the position on lap ten and held Chris off to the end. Although Chris lost out on track position, he still won the 1800 class ahead of Phil Davis, who finished in sixth overall. Robert Smith finished 0.8 seconds behind Phil, having been within a second of him for the entire race. Marcus Sheard, Jonathan Baggott and Will Cox rounded out the rest of the grid.
Zachary Anderton decided not to take part in race two due to concerns about his engine and not wanting to risk it. This meant that Terry Clark lined up second next to Neil Harrison who was again on pole. Neil had another good race, leading start to finish and lapping everybody else. Terry Clark had a poor start and dropped to fourth, losing places to Chris Lord and Marcus Sheard, who had also passed Robert Smith on the start. He fought his way back up to second over the following few laps and maintained this position until having a very dramatic exit to the race when his rear stub axle snapped on one of the fastest sections of the circuit. His left rear wheel, having parted company with the car, hit the barrier so hard that they had to use a JCB to remove it!
Terry retiring from the race promoted Chris Lord up to second place but a lap later he had his own dramatic moment as he spun on the back straight, dug some turf up and then rejoined the race in fifth place. This then put Robert Smith into second place going into the final lap of the race. Robert also decided that he didn’t want the position, had his own spin and dropped down to sixth. Marcus Sheard then managed to buck the trend and stay the right way round long enough to take “A Real Podium!!” in his Classic class Reynard 883. Chris Lord gained from Robert’s spin and then overtook Phil Davis to take third place overall. Martin Wright took fifth place overall, having started thirteenth, earning him the driver of the day accolade.
Bryn Tootell gave his car to Alistair Bell for the second race of the day after Alistair’s car had let him down in race one. As Bryn said, he’d done plenty of racing all year and was happy to forgo the final race of the season to let his friend, who had flown over from Hong Kong especially for the meeting, get out on track. Alistair started from the back of the grid in fourteenth and gained lots of places over the course of the race to eventually finish in seventh, just ahead of Nigel Davers. Will Cox and Jonathan Baggott swapped positions a number of times during the race with Will eventually finishing in front.
Position on track was of little consequence to Will Cox though as he was in the fight for the championship which was far more important. He did well to keep out of trouble – especially with cars spinning in front of him – and he successfully managed to finish both races and gain enough points to take the championship victory. Terry Clark, despite not finishing the second race, managed to hold on to second in the championship. Terry was equal on points with Phil Davis, but beat him based on more class wins over the course of the championship. This therefore meant that Phil Davis finished the championship in third position.
