PIRELLI MARANELLO FERRARI CHALLENGE
RACE REPORT : ROUND 4 : DONINGTON : 18/19 MAY 2002

One could be excused for thinking that at any time Steve McQueen would ride his motorbike out of the woods as one approached the Donington gates. The DTM organisers had taken over the entire organisation of the circuit, including bringing some none too friendly Germanic gate attendants.

When one had finally made it past the guards and found the Ferraris in the tightly squashed paddock quite an impressive field had assembled. Proving wrong those pundits who had predicted this could never happen, nearly all the tipos were either 360s or 355s. There was only one 328 and one 348. How the world has moved on!

Qualifying on the Saturday began with a wet track but it dried sufficiently for most people to pull into the pits and fit slicks. Oliver Morley (360/Ch) was back for his second PMFC race and took a very decisive pole position some 1.7 seconds ahead of the 355/Ch of Robin Ward, the quickest "C" class driver. Gary Culver, still in discomfort from his back problems, was third in his 360/Ch ahead of the similar tipo of Richard Smeeton. Richard Stevens came next, second quickest in the "C" class, ahead of Jim McWhirter (360/Ch) and, in his best grid position yet, Duncan McKay's 355/Ch.

Amongst the small "O" class entry John Taylor was by far the quickest in his 360 Modena, ahead of David Back (355) and Mike Furness (328GTB).

Race time on Sunday afternoon brought darkening skies with a forecast of showers. There was even the occasional dither about whether to take wet tyres to the pits but in the event it was a completely dry race.

At the start the front row, Morley and Ward, pulled away evenly, with Ward trying to squeeze Morley on to the grass as they approached Redgate. The latter, however, held his position and he emerged in front and pulled out a lead of several car lengths by the time they got to the far side of the circuit. There, just trying too hard, Morley spun but fortunately did not hit anything and continued half way down the field.

As they streamed past the pits on the first lap both Culver and Smeeton had taken their 360s past Ward but just behind them was Alan Cosby (F512M), already up from ninth on the grid, Stevens and another quick starter, Ted Reddick (355/Ch), who had pulled up to sixth place from 11th on the grid. Morley at this stage had recovered to eighth position and was clearly in determined mood to recover from his faux pas.

On the next lap, while continuing his catch up, Morley made heavy contact with the rear of Reddick's car, resulting in drastic cosmetic damage to the front of the 360 but fortunately there was no mechanical damage and both cars continued.

Whilst Culver and Smeeton stretched out their lead at the front Morley continued to make furious progress. On the fourth lap he passed Cosby for fourth place, a lap later he passed Ward for third and rapidly began to close up on second-placed man, Smeeton.

On the seventh lap, however, there was a drama as the engine in Reddick's 355 blew exiting Redgate and he dropped the entire contents of the sump all the way to the top of the Craner Curves. The flag marshals were particularly tardy and the following drivers had no warning of the oil slick ahead of them. Smeeton was the first one to spin, followed by Cosby, Catt, David Ward and various others. Miraculously no-one made contact and it was only after much shouting and gesticulating from spectators that the marshals lamely hung out an oil flag. By this time, however, it was too late and the drivers had passed the scene several times and were, in any case, aware of the problem.

At the front Culver continued his solitary race and the gap back to Morley, who had taken over second when Smeeton spun, was just too much for Morley to bridge. The latter, in turn, had pulled out a 13 second gap from Smeeton by the time the chequered flag came out. Robin Ward finished in an equally lonely fourth place and easily won the "C" class ahead of Richard Stevens. Jim McWhirter finished next up, ahead of the 355/Ch of Alan Newton who had driven a very good first PMFC race.

However, behind that lot who generally had very lonely races, there was a fantastic dice which ebbed and flowed all the way. It included Chris Catt, Mike Reeder, Duncan McKay, Alex Mortimer and Les Charneca, all in 355/Chs. At times they were three abreast coming into Redgate and they finished just a few seconds apart, with Charneca just squeezing to the finish ahead of Mortimer.

The "O" class was never going to be in much doubt and John Taylor held an easy lead throughout to finish the race in 13th place, ahead of Furness in 18th and Back in 20th.

Morley's first lap spin, as well as Cosby's spin on the oil, had robbed the race of much interest at the front. It would have been great to have seen Culver and Morley go head to head as they had done at the Castle Combe round. As it was, the frenetic mid-field dice made up for at least some of this.

For his deceptively quick drive in the ex-Nuttall 355/Ch Alan Newton was nominated Wilkinson Driver of the Meeting.

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The front row get close at the start

....and later, Morley has to squeeze by again

Culver drove serenely to his fourth straight win

Alan Newton got Driver of the Meeting

Reeder and McKay finished this far apart

The O-class win went to John Taylor

Catt defends into Redgate

Jim McWhirter in the Ferrari UK team 360

Great midfield dice went all the way

Les Charneca finally led the 5-car train home

A blown engine was Reddick's only reward

Smeeton had a lonely but effective race into third

Boni, Back and Furness fight not to be at the rear

pics by Paul/Fotografia Corse