SLEET SHOWERS failed to dampen the action at a bitterly cold season opener at Pr1mo International Raceway Northampton on March 10th, writes Dave Goddard.

The National Hot Rods contested the second leg of their Midlands weekend with World Series England Round 10, the first heat seeing comeback man 42 Shane Bland lead all the way for his first NHR win in 13 years. Behind him 117 Rob McDonald hit the back straight wall and 174 Jason Kew revelled in the damp conditions to fly through the pack for second. Heat two was led by 219 Russell Wilcox until two laps from home when 18 Ben Taylor got through to score his first win of the year.
The third heat was held during a shower and 278 Colin Gomm and 115 Chris Haird had the setup right and powered through the field with Haird taking the win to extend his points lead, while the Final was led by Bland until his tyres went off handing Wilcox the lead, but he had to take to the infield to avoid the spinning 162 Carl Waller-Barratt and Taylor took over to complete his double while three cars crashed out behind him on the final bend.

For the first time the 2 Litre Hot Rods raced as a fully fledged Incarace formula and perhaps fittingly the first winner was former Stock Rod superstar 928 Dave Leech, who passed the lurid-liveried Peugeot of 13 Ian Gould a few laps in and cleared away to take the spoils. Gould spun out of the lead of heat two after clipping 275 Brett Collison and it was 45 Mark Edwards who won but he failed post race tyre checks and it was 75 Chris Crane who inherited victory. 310 Sean O’Leary led the Final but 543 Tommy Miller took over a few laps from home and went on to win.

A slightly disappointing field of BriSCA F2 Stock Cars saw 222 Ayrton Mills lead heat one from flag to flag but he spun in heat two which saw 761 Richard Bowyer pass long time leader 117 Thomas Bailey to win it. The Final was stopped when 154 Steve Green Jnr and 286 Todd Jones crashed out with Bowyer leading the restart until 886 Chris Bradbury launched a last bend lunge with both spinning, Bradbury gathering it up and taking his second Final of the season. 783 James Rygor passed 866 Bob Griffin to take the GN.

The Incarace Bangers raced in reasonable numbers with 621 Alistair Camp passing 23 Barry Staples and 90 Joey Holmes to win heat one and the Trent visitor would make it a double in heat two after taking out leader 471 Trevor Perry. Staples then shrugged off a tangle with 195 Elvis Hopkins to win the Final.