Masters Historic Festival 2020: Masters Pre-66 Minis

Jeff Smith took the victory in the opening Masters Pre-66 Mini race of the weekend at Brands Hatch Grand Prix Circuit this afternoon, a controlled win from pole position qualifier Tom Bell.

Smith made a rocket-ship start from fifth, catapulting him into a position to challenge Bell immediately at the cambered Paddock Hill Bend right-hander, with Michael Cullen maintaining his grid slot of third.

Taking the lead on lap one, Smith had Bell just 0.2 seconds behind into the second tour but he increased his advantage to over a second the next time around and was never realistically threatened.

By lap seven, Bell had managed to close to within 0.7 seconds but leader Smith responded immediately by setting the fastest lap of 1m48.919 seconds. Former British Touring Car Championship racer Smith ultimately won by 1.1 seconds.

Behind the lead duo, Ian Curley took a lonely third place some seven seconds shy of the battle ahead. Curley was well placed to challenge Bell during the early exchanges, having moved up from fourth on the grid, but after losing some ground on lap five he had an uneventful race thereafter.

The major battle was over fourth, with nothing to separate Cullen and Nick Swift for the bulk of the contest The latter had started the race second on the grid but slipped back to fifth and wasn’t able to overturn Cullen, no matter how hard he tried.

By lap six, just 0.175 seconds separated them and Swift produced a great cut-back out of Druids to momentarily move ahead. Cullen, though, hit back on the GP loop and was able to keep his rival at bay.

Swift certainly deserved marks for effort, trying to pass multiple times at Hawthorn during the closing stages but to no avail. Ollie Streek was a distant sixth ahead of Dave Edgecombe, David Ogden, Nick Paddy and Spencer Wanstall.

Race two of the weekend will get underway at 16.05 this afternoon at Brands Hatch.

Small in stature but huge in terms of action, the Pre-66 Minis provided another fantastic battle for victory in race two of the day at Brands Hatch Grand Prix Circuit with Joe Ferguson taking a great win from Jeff Smith.

Smith, of course, won race one earlier in the afternoon but Ferguson – behind the wheel of the Austin Mini Cooper S taken to second by Tom Bell in the preceding encounter – was able to keep Smith at bay.

Ferguson boldly tried to take the lead at the start around the outside of pole-starter Smith at Paddock Hill Bend, but had to tuck back in to second place. Ferguson hit the front on lap two at Surtees and a titanic battle developed with the two rivals trading the lead time and again.

By lap eight Ferguson’s lead was almost a second, but Smith set the fastest lap of the race – a time of 1m48.756 seconds – to erase the gap. Into lap nine there was nothing between them, but Ferguson managed to see off the threat to ultimately win by 0.6 seconds on lap 11.

The fight for third was equally as entertaining, initially between Ian Curley and Michael Cullen before Nick Swift won through after a fantastic late door-to-door battle with Curley.

Curley held third at the start but Cullen moved through into Surtees on lap one, and the former then had his mirrors filled with fifth placed Swift. Curley turned up the heat on Cullen as the race entered its second half, and Swift closed in as well, but then Cullen’s involvement ended at the conclusion of lap eight with retirement to the pits.

Swift, with a podium there for the taking, made his presence felt more and more behind Curley and on the final lap Swift managed to make the breakthrough to grab the final spot on the rostrum – by just 0.3 seconds.

David Ogden finished a distant fifth from Dave Edgecombe, Ollie Streek was seventh, Jo Polley came through well to finish eighth – having started on row six of the grid – ahead of an impressive Jonathon Page – who started last – and Jonathan Kent.