The SEGTO Championship reached its second round at Arena Essex on Saturday night, being added to the usual Rolling Thunder Show programme, which meant that a very long and busy night looked in store, with potentially up to 44 races on the programme! Amalgamation of some SEGTO classes, and putting the big field of Euro Rods all out in one heat, reduced this to 36 races and despite one or two incidents along the way, the meeting flowed quickly from a 5.45 pm start, to getting the last race under way on the dot of 10.30. The chilly, but dry, conditions were a welcome respite from the monsoon of the Easter meeting!

Once more the SEGTO entry showed that the championship’s struggling this year; with Tongham now being the only track running the full range of SEGTO classes, many of SEGTO’s regular racers seem not to be inclined to tackle the series, with four out of six rounds on hard surfaced tracks. There was still some excellent racing for those who attended, but perhaps not what the traditional SEGTO racers are used to.

The lack of support was surprisingly most obvious in the JUNIORS where only two of the three drivers who’d raced at Angmering turned up. With Archie Terrell having his first outing in a smart new Corsa, Levi Oughton’s AX won both heats but the final turned into an ultra-tight race with Archie holding off Levi all the way.

PRODUCTION A had a respectable 10 car entry but had to race with the four PROD Bs and it was the only RWD car in Prod B, Stuart Orford’s Starlet, that dominated all three combined races. Peter Tilley fought through the traffic to win all three Prod A races, chased over the line in the final by Rob Wakelin. Newcomer Ben Blythe went well all night in his K11 Micra, topping it off with third in the final, chased by round one winner Jason Woodgate, Jason Cornell, Ryan Povah in the Simmons family Mini, Mark Davis, Kyle Williams, James Simmons and Josh Simmons. Among the Prod Bs Kelly Adamson made up for her unlucky Angmering outing with two good second places in her Fiesta before Laura Chappell’s Tigra claimed second from Kelly in the final, with Trev Ashton-Jones in fourth.

The three MOD Cs and one STOCK HATCH raced with the four 1450 HOT RODS. The 1450s were dominated by RTS champ Chris Constable, who nearly put a lap on the field in both heats with his Corsa. In the final he started behind the three regular SEGTO bike-engined contenders and had to fight to pass Mick Browne’s Fireblade Imp. Once past, Chris pulled away to win – it will be interesting to see if the SEGTO regulars can turn the tables on Chris when he makes his dirt debut at Tongham next month! Mick held second ahead of Ashley Lock’s 205-Yamaha and Mick Worrell’s Mini-Suzuki. The Mod Cs and Jim Hazelgrove’s MG Stock Hatch were all evenly matched. Stuart Orford, once more tackling two classes with the Starlet, won heat one; Jim just beat Stuart in heat two and then Stuart spun out of the lead on the last lap of the final with what looked like a broken diff.  Rob Salter’s Peugeot held off Barney Hayhoe and Jim to take the trophies.

The SUPER SALOONS fielded ten cars; in a sign of the times six of them were Outlaw type Hot Rods.  Jamie Faulkner’s unique Mini-Vauxhall ran away with the first heat but finished with diff problems that kept him out for the rest of the night. Chris Carter, more often seen in a 1450 or Special, had his first outing in an Outlaw Hot Rod and despite dropping onto three cylinders for much of the time, held off Graeme Taylor for second, before fending off Graeme for the win in the second heat and final. Mike Stocker’s 2-litre Hot Rod came in third from Arena regular Mick Day’s Pinto-powered Fiesta and Laurence Connor’s ex-Mark Cooke 205, while Andi Wood was going well in his mid-engined Toyota MR2; an imaginative effort to make a standard car competitive with the Super Saloon field. The two FWD contenders, Lee Birch’s AX and Ian Staff’s 205, both dropped out and Chris Perry’s new Outlaw didn’t appear for the final.

Four SPECIALS turned up although it took until the final for Dave Simmons to get to grips with the ex-John Smith “Class 9” DRD-Vauxhall. Bradley Lock won the first heat, just failed to catch Mark Stephens’ ARD-Hayabusa in the second heat and then ran away with the final, Dave Simmons kept going for second while Ryan Stafford held off Mark Stephens for third.

After the first two rounds in quick succession, the SEGTO contenders now have a month to prepare for the first of the dirt-surface rounds, at Tongham on 15 May.