Third Round of the Porsche Club Speed Championship

2025 Championship Round 3 Mallory Park with NINEMEISTER

I think I was about seventeen when I first rode my motorcycle to Mallory Park to watch motorcycling race heroes such as Bary Sheene and Kenny Roberts battle it out in the Transatlantic series, a competition between the British and US riders.

Some (ok, many!) years later I was able to enjoy the circuit myself on two wheels but as I watched our Championship cars line up for the third event of the season I was more than a little envious of them being able to drive a quick car around the hugely entertaining little track.

We were there as guests of the Bentley Drivers Club who had a number of classic Bentleys being driven alongside a good number of other vintage and classic completion cars. The paddock was a feast for the eyes (and ears) of any genuine petrol head and those old cars showed they were not there to be cosseted and kept safe, no they were there to be driven much like our highly competitive Porsche Speed Championship group.

The sun was out, it was warm and clear and we had a great group of cars straining at their leashes to get going, this was going to be a fun watch!

We had another strong entry with no less than 20 Championship drivers entered. The briefing revealed the track layout had a tricky chicane arriving after the fast Gerards corner, named after the driver who first lapped the circuit at its opening in the 1950's.



Practice
The drivers had 2 practice runs to get to know the circuit and squeeze the cars through that first chicane. In the top power class, P1 (360Hp+) we had 6 drivers.  David Dyson in the GT4RS was as expected very quick and set a high bar with a best practice of 57.99 seconds after a 2% penalty applied for PDK Transmission use (see footnote). However Tim Barber in the 996 GT3 he shares with David Hilton was clearly a man on a mission and was just a couple of seconds slower. Tim and David are getting used to their car being run on road tyres as against the slicks they have used for numerous years and so both being so quick from the off suggested David Dyson wouldn't have it all his own way!

Wayne Eason, the modified Boxster continuing to impress, was third quickest in practice in a 61 second time, although signs of a problem had started to show in the form of smoke as he launched.

Nigel Watkins was a very new driver to the championship having just done one event, but then as he won the class in that in his fast 996 we perhaps shouldn't have been too surprised when he was extremely quick from the off here again. Nigel managed a practice best of 61 seconds, around three seconds quicker that the rest of the  P2 (280-360Hp) class runners. Karl Lupton was second quickest in his supercharged 944 in a best of 64.25 seconds with Ian Wadsworth just a few hundredths slower in his 911 3.0SCRS in third place at the end of practice.

A number of the drivers had taken the opportunity of doing a track day at Mallory before the date of the sprint. Such a track day does give invaluable knowledge of the layout and the speeds involved, but  they couldn't have known that the organisers would add an awkward chicane to negotiate before fastest part of the circuit.

That said Jon Baldock in his Boxster was still able to record a brilliant best practice time of 61.20 seconds to go into the lunch
period quickest of the P3 (220-280Hp) cars. Long time championship stalwart Geraint Evans in the Carrera 3.0 was second quickest in P3 practice in a time of 63.09 seconds. Chris Milne again showed his mastery of the road going Boxster to be third quickest in practice just 0.3 seconds slower than Geraint.

During practice the drivers had reported a number of "moments" going into the first chicane with lock ups and near spins being common place. Jake Cartwright wagged the tail of his P4 (up to 220Hp) class Boxster in practice to a third best time of 65.25 seconds. Martin Leach in the 911E was again doing is best to apply pressure to Stephen Jory but with two 62 second runs the 944S2 P4 car was the quickest car in the class after the second practice run.



Scoring Timed Runs
The lunch break was not just an opportunity for the drivers to grab a bite to eat, it was also a chance to reflect on the earlier runs and to plan changes to make to improve the all important points scoring times. 

So, with decisions made, the championship drivers headed out for their two scoring runs with hazy sunshine and warm air and track temperatures adding to the grip levels and the tension!  The P1 battle for third in class went to David Hilton in the 993 GT3 he shares with Tim barber. David's second scoring run was over a second quicker than his first at 60.65 seconds, a great performance in his first event of the season.

I was interested in how well Tim Barber would adapt to driving the 993 GT3 on road tyres and how he and his car might challenge the prodigiously fast GT4RS of David Dyson.

In the first scoring run the two were just 0.8 seconds apart and in the second David Dyson was a little less tidy potentially leaving the door open for Tim to take full advantage. It was then the gods of motorsport intervened and Tim's time was not recorded, a run time he felt confident had been his best. Despite a number of approaches to the stewards the time was lost and Tim had to go our on a re-run and try again, but now on colder tyres. The ex Champion was up to the task of course and put in his best time of the day at 57.93 seconds, almost but not quite enough to grasp the win from David Dyson who took the P1 class win with a brilliant second run time of 57.69 seconds.

Nigel Watkins was consistently super quick in both his scoring runs in the P2 class. With just 0.04 seconds difference between the two runs his quickest in just 60.94 seconds was a little over a second ahead of Ian Wadsworth's best runtime of 62.05 thus giving Nigel the P2 class win with Ian in second and Karl Luton just a tenth of second behind Ian in his supercharged 944 in third in class for the day. Deserving a mention in the class was Russell Lloyd who is rapidly getting used to the speed format. Russell was fourth in P2 just a tad ahead of Simon Carr in his Cayman who is another quick driver mixing it with the more modified cars.

Our five P3 runners included new driver Eian Card. Eoin seems to have taken to the sport like the proverbial duck to water and managed all of his runs in the day to be within 1.45 seconds, his best being a very credible 63.35 seconds. That time earned Eoin fifth place just 0.13 seconds shy of fourth placed Boxster driver Chris Milne.  Both were driving road going cars on road tyres and its become quite clear that a well setup and driven road legal car can put in times not hugely shy of the more modified cars. 

Ending the event in third place in P3 with times just 0.04 apart and best of 62.51 seconds was Graham Rose in his potent supercharged 924s. Close margins being the order of the day Geraint Evans in the Carrera 3.0 completed the scoring runs in second place in P3 with a 62.28 second best. The winner of the P3 class was Jon Baldock. Jon was quickest in every run from Practice to the final scoring times and his best of 60.88 was a great effort in the modified Boxster.

We really appreciate the fact that some of our drivers cover significant distances to take part in our events. Hannes Tanzer is one such driver. Hannes improved his time on every run in his road legal Boxster to end the day fourth in P4 just a few tenths behind Jake Cartwright whose best of 64.23 seconds earned him third in class.

The P4 win went to Stephen Jory in the 944. Stephen drove consistently quick to a time of 61.73 seconds .Martin Leach in his 911E was never very far off Stephens time taking second in class and will look forward to the Hills where the 911 is perhaps at its best.

I often comment on how close the times are, close between drivers , close between the classes and cars of different types. To make the point I did some rough statistics from Mallory Park. The average time of all the cars was just over 62 seconds. Yes clearly a number of drivers were a few seconds or more below that, but given the wide range of cars and the power outputs the championship results do seem to point to a formula that is working at providing great competition for cars of all types be they road going or modified. 

So the Speed Championship appears to be in rude health and with more great venues to follow such as the Hillclimbs at Loton Park on May 17&18th we can expect many more close battles....see you there?

Footnote
PDK Penalty
Cars that use the PDK transmission system, or another true sequential system have a 2% addition to times. This is there to balance the advantage the system can give. 

Mallory Park Results Here

Championship Points Here

Simon Wilson 
Championship Coordinator 
Porsche Club GB
simonwilson@porscheclubgb.com