The 2013 British Nationals 1:8 Buggy season opener kicked off under sunny skies at the HNMC track at Westmill farm north of London, former British Champion Darren Bloomfield set the overall pace during practice however fastest was Pro-Line‘s Lee Martin on X3 Big Blox, with young Mugen driver Jack Embling in 3rd. The five rounds of qualifying witnessed defending Champion, Pro-Line Driver Elliott Boots TQ on Pro-Line X3 compound in Q1, Q2, Q4 with Bloomfield and Lee Martin topping a round each. Elliott Boots would therefore start on pole in Semi A with Lee Martin at the front of Semi B. Bloomfield qualified 3rd, Pro-Line’s Neil Cragg 4th and Jack Embling a very strong 5th overall. The semis saw high profile causalities drop out – top qualifier Elliott Boots suffering flame out problems as well as Neil Cragg – both missing the main final. A disastrous start to Boots’ 2012 BRCA title defense however with four rounds still to come plenty can and will happen.

The  45 min final saw a great battle between Bloomfield and Lee Martin, the latter prevailing after Bloomfield had managed to catch Lee on lap 33 he briefly led before Lee was able to open a gap of around 3-5 sec, the pair were pretty evenly matched for lap time, it wasn’t until lap 50 when Bloomfield was right up Lee Martin’s gearbox like an overeager gearbox mechanic – the pair fought for position and swapped it a couple of times over the course of 5 laps until an error from Bloomfield allowed Lee to edge away, eventually making it round for a victory lap, Simon Willetts would complete the two Mugens on the podium and a 1,2,3 for Novarossi based engines. Graham Alsop taking 4th ahead of Nemo driver Richard Barton and star performance for the up and coming Jack Embling in 6th, capping a great weekend for father & son team and impressing many in the paddock along the way.

Source: NeoBuggy.net

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