As usual for the Finals meeting, the action got under way with Friday testing.
Several Juniors were out on the early damp circuit; respectable lap times gave way in the later dry sessions to really fast laps in the low 65secs from Jon Milicevic’s Cooper and Mike Hibberd’s Lotus 27. As the day continued
Andrew Hibberd Lotus and James Murray Lola joined in with 66sec laps. At times you could have been watching the FJ race as the juniors diced round as if wanting to settle it all on Friday.

Saturday was dry and sunny with a bit of autumn chill in the air, no wind to worry the drivers, perfect racing conditions.
Qualifying was under way right on time and it was soon pretty obvious that the pacesetters were Jon Milicevic Cooper T59 and Mike Hibberd Lotus 27, with the times similar to the 65’s seen in testing earlier. Disaster struck again for Mark Woodhouse and his Lotus 20/22 when the Elva 100 driven by Mark Witherspoon “got away from him” creating a situation where Mark Woodhouse had nowhere to go but off, causing severe damage to his Lotus and, worse, a very painful leg injury to Mark. The Elva finally collected by its driver continued unscathed.  Andrew Hibberd Lotus 22 was early into the pit lane with engine oil feed problems, and tellingly the Milicevic Cooper cut short his session also with similar oil problems.
Chris Drake’s Elva 300 was the quickest of the Class D runners, adding to his chance of taking the overall UK championship.
Crispian Besley Elva 100 was Class B pacesetter with an eye firmly on his mirrors to see what his Class challenger Jack Woodhouse was up to in his similar Elva 100.
Newcomer to F J racing Anthony Goddard driving the ex-Mark Green Tojeiro managed 13 laps in the session.
Best in Class C was the Kieft of Peter Mullen.
Sole runner in Class A was the Childe-Freeman Volpini.

Pole position was taken by Jon Milicevic Cooper T59 in 1.05.214 second was Mike Hibberd Lotus 27 1.05.876 and third Sam Wilson Cooper T59 1.06.424.

Rudolf Ernst Lotus 22 was shown in the programme and results as class C2 but was running in Class E.
Sir John Chisholm Gemini 3A failed to Qualify due to brake problems, in what was really a test session before shipping to New Zealand for the Tasman Formula Junior Series.
Crispian Besley’s Elva had a noisy diff changed in time for the race.
Andrew Hibberd Lotus 22 was to be a non starter in the race due to engine failure.

Race Two for Formula Junior was quickly underway as the cars ran the green flag lap straight from the assembly area.
At the end of lap one, as expected, it was poleman Milicevic in the lead but very close behind were the Hibberd Lotus 27 and the Cooper T59 of Sam Wilson in third.
This order was maintained but the pace was relentless, Mike Hibberd was keeping his nosecone right on the gearbox of the T59 and the pair of them were set to continue in this fashion for twelve laps, then disaster: the T59s engine cried enough and Milicevic could only coast along the pit straight into retirement. Sam Wilson was now up to second but some 8 seconds adrift at this stage.
The battle for third place was fierce with Simon Diffey in his Lotus locked in close combat with Simon Ham‘s Brabham  and James Murray Lola until Murray’s tyres slowed him. Diffey’s Lotus had a spin at Brooklands from which he quickly recovered only later to clip the apex on Brooklands and take out a marker. 
Perhaps the best scrap of the race was between Chris Drake in the Elva 300, (which was suffering with locking brakes as the race progressed) and Stuart Roach in the Jackson T56 Cooper. Stuart, who hadn’t driven a rear engined Junior before, took to it instantly, so much so that he passed Drake’s Elva to lead the class but eased and let Chris back into the class lead as he didn’t want to compromise the championship positions, although in the event, Chris was the winner in any event.  Peter Jackson was so excited by all this he wanted Stuart named Driver of the day; in my book he was certainly Sportsman of the day.
In the hotly contested Class B contest Andrew Tart in the Bond was leading from Crispian Besley’s Elva who was ahead of Jack Woodhouse with whom he was jousting for the class B championship. Jack was driving very sensibly with his eye on championship points rather than race position, to his credit for one so young he got it exactly right.
As the race neared its climax Simon Hamilton had a phenomenal avoidance when his Lotus 18 executed two 360 degrees spins at the start of the pit straight, probably on oil from the Milicevic Cooper’s engine. Simon just managed to hold on ahead of another of another fabulous battle between a recovered Justin Fleming, now in Elva 100/42, Paul Dixon’s Gemini II Ford and John Dowson’s rejuvenated Elva 200.

So after a dramatic and exciting race to watch, it was Mike Hibberd Lotus27 who led the field to the chequered flag. Sam Wilson Cooper T59 second and Simon Ham Brabham a deserving third, this after a race long battle with Simon Diffey’s Lotus.

Everyone’s heart went out to Jon Milicevic who drove a Champion’s season only to have the final win he needed snatched away two laps from the end of the race when the CooperT59s engine ran out of oil. Nonetheless, every credit to Chris Drake (and to Malcolm Davis for the preparation of the Elva 300) for his equally fantastic number of class wins, as well of course, as finishing 2nd in Class in this year’s FIA Lurani Trophy in the same car.  Congratulations, too, to the Hutchison family, and to John for his splendid run of Class C wins and places.

Results

Winner and first in Class E                  Mike Hibberd              Lotus 27
Second in race and Class E                 Sam Wilson                Cooper T59
Third in Race and in Class E                Simon Ham                Brabham BT2

Stan Hibberd/Peter Jackson 20-10-2009