AMOC Castle Donnington 12^th October 2003 Round 10 FJ Championship

An early practice/qualifying session was scheduled for the final round of the FJ championship, the start time of 9.40am slipped a little when the second session was stopped a few minutes before it was due to end, so our session was held up for about twenty minutes with the 29 Junior cars all held in the assembly area.

When the action got under way it was soon obvious the pace setters were Edwin Jowsey Lotus 22 and Mike Hibberd Lotus 27, these two were really looking and sounding very quick, Edwin Jowsey took pole with a time of 1.20.373, with Mike Hibberd close on 1.20.536, these sort of lap times, as far as I know, had never been approached before at this circuit with an FJ car, Robin Longdon Lola 5A was third with a 1.22.108, Simon Ham Brabham BT2 fourth on 1.23.216, Steve Smith Cooper T59 also on 1.23 was fifth, Derek Walker Terrier Mk 4 1.25.774 a fine sixth on the grid and fastest front engined runner, Kevin Musson Lotus 18 was fastest J1R qualifier with 1.29.779, James Culver Cooper Mk10 was the quicker of the two F3 500 cars running with a lap in 1.34.377.

Reg Hargrave had his Brabham BT6 lapping steadily after some early season engine traumas, Michael Waller was circulating carefully having recently cured the transmission problems in his Elva 100.

Between qualifying and the race a drivers meeting was called, the discussion was whether silencers should be fitted (or not) to all the cars for the race, there was not a lot of enthusiasm for this amongst the drivers, and it was left optional, during the break while doing the pre race checks a broken rear suspension pick up was found on the Mike Hibberd Lotus 27, all that could be done was to load the 27 in the lorry ready for home.

Edwin Jowsey in his 22 had the front row to himself and led from the start into Redgate, Robin Longdon's Lola was right in behind him and trying for a way past and this dice continued through the early laps, it was resolved after about eight laps when Robin Had his car alongside briefly ahead only to lose it when he outbraked himself and entered the pit straight backwards, Edwin seized the advantage and wasn't challenged again to the flag, Steve Smith T59 and Simon Ham BT2 were engaged in a close tussle for third, which ended rather abruptly at on the sixth lap when the BT2 didn't slow into Redgate and ploughed straight on until arrested by the gravel, Paul Smeeth's 22 took over fourth spot and held it to the end, Reg Hargrave was having a reliable run in the BT6 to finish in fifth, Derek Walker had his Terrier back in sixth having been passed briefly by Andrew Hibberd's 22 who lost out while lapping slower cars finishing seventh, Kevin Musson in his Lotus 18 was eight and best of the J1R runners, Bob Culver had the F3 honours in his Cooper Mark 8 ahead of the James Culver Cooper Mark 10, which recorded the faster lap time in both practice and the race.

After the race there was a nice end of season party, with the Championship trophy being awarded to Edwin Jowsey for his outstanding performance right through the season, eight wins out of a possible ten events, a credit to Clifford Jowsey whose Lotus 22 carried Edwin so reliably through the season, as regularly happens in FJ racing these days the standard has been raised yet again.

After the days awards had been handed out by Miar Rabagliati, Sue Longdon produced a large birthday size bunch of flowers, Miar then cut her birthday cake to a spirited rendering of happy birthday from a pretty large crowd at this party to celebrate another memorable FJ racing season.

Stan Hibberd 13.11.2003