25th May Champion of Oulton Round

After Dave Billington had missed the Anglesey rounds of the North West Formula Ford Championship due to a prior commitment (he was in fact attending the Spanish Grand Prix), we regrouped for the next round held at Oulton on 25th May. Although we were unable to test the previous day, Dave was confident of repeating his pace from the first two rounds. The day dawned bright & sunny and looked as though we were in for a warm day. Unfortunately, pushing hard on cold tyres, Dave was unlucky to spin on the exit of Lodge corner and collided with the barrier damaging the rear suspension. Having got the car back to the paddock, we set about repairing the car. We owe our fellow competitors a huge thanks as we were able to borrow all the parts we needed. Fortunately, we had enough time to rebuild the car and have it set up before the race later that afternoon.  Having not set a time in the morning’s practice, Dave started on the back row of the grid. Once the lights had gone out, Dave was making great progress and passed several cars, but on lap 7 Dave spun on the now slippery surface (due to oil being dropped from another car) and was really unlucky to be collected by a following car that failed to avoid him. Both cars were blocking the track & brought the red flags out. A disappointing day, but with a month before the next round plenty of time to fix the car. That’s motor racing as they say !!