Opening Round of the 2026 Porsche Club Speed Championship

Round 1 Cadwell Park Report

28th March was the first round of the year. March Hares is the saying, although on the day the Hares needed warm overcoats because while it was sunny much of the time, the cold wind blowing across the paddock was truly cutting.

Regardless of the temperature the Cadwell circuit always presents drivers with a challenge. With its wooded section and numerous elevation changes, the first laps need to be a balance between the process of looking for where it’s ok to press on and yet not overdoing it.

Twenty cars lined up for the event, all resplendent with their new and returning Sponsor logos. The Championship is again brilliantly sponsored by NINEMEISTER and this year welcomes a new sponsor, 64 Tailored Performance with their TRACTIVE brand also featured. Leading Edge Graphics are providing the championship decals again which is a huge help.
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Practice
In P4 (>220hp) Stephen Jory (944) and Martin Leach (911E) were soon up to speed with Stephen quickest. Jake Cartwright was well in touch in third position with his Boxster after a winter weight loss diet and a new suspension setup.

2026 Champion and P3 (220-280hp) Boxster driver Jon Baldock was predictably rapid in practice ending the run around three seconds clear of the field. That said Ian Wadsworth in the 911SC/RS wasn't far away despite a mild off the day before and new Championship contender Sadek Malik threw himself into the fray in his 996 ending practice just a couple of seconds behind several of his experienced P3 classmates.

David Dyson is a Time Attack specialist and in a sprint at a circuit like Cadwell where carrying speed is all important, he was always going to be hard to beat. His practice time of just 91.27 seconds in his 991.2t was over seven seconds clear of other cars in the P2 class (280-360hp). Amongst those cars were several more new members of the speed family, George Harris in his tidy Cayman R and John Yates driving the achingly pretty IROC replica 3ltr 911RS. Both put in great first run times.

We had yet another new driver in the P1 class (360+hp). Justin Dooling was driving his 992 GT3 and ended practice well in touch with the established Championship pair of Karl Lupton (944 Supercharged) and Wayne Helme (718GT4). Karl was the quickest in the class at this early stage in the day with a lead of a little under a second.
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Timed runs
With the first perhaps more tentative practice run of the day out of the way the drivers could get their heads down and go for that important early scoring banker time as the weather remained unpredictable for the rest of the day. In P4 all the drivers made improvements, Hannes Tanzer in his Cayman finding nine seconds no less! The class order remained as in practice with Stephen Jory leading Martin Leach by a healthy 1.59 second margin going into the lunch break.

In P3 Jon Baldock and the Boxster maintained their lead over the rest of the cars in the class. Ian Wadsworth was again the closest to him at 99.73 seconds and Sadek Malik was in a close contest with regulars Eoin Card (Cayman) and Chris Milne (Boxster). Seasoned past Champion Geraint Evans found around six seconds in his 911 Carrera to remain in the mix in what looks like being a very busy and competitive class this year.

Andy Fagan has made a welcome return to the Championship in his very rapid 3.4 Boxster. After a quick P2 practice time of 99.15 seconds we had high hopes that Andy was going to be one of the class front runners. However, the 'gods of the gears' were not with him on Saturday and his box failed ending his challenge. Nigel Watkins was the closest car to David Dyson after the first scoring run, he and his 996 GT3 recording a 97.84 second time. As good as that was it was still some way behind David who managed a small improvement on his earlier practice time to record an epic 90.76 second run!

The three P1 runners became quite close as Justin Dooling was a handful of seconds quicker than his practice and ran a great 102.31 time, just over a second behind the always tidy Wayne Helme and in touch with Karl Lupton who despite a fender bender the day before was in brilliant form and produced the class leading first run time of 99.01 seconds in the 944, the supercharger sounding suitably angry as he left the line in front of the Cadwell cafe and gathered spectators.

During the lunch break a few large dark clouds appeared and skirted the edges of the circuit but, with no significant rain falling, the runs started again in still cold temperatures but everyone hoped some slight improvement on the horizon.

Over the next two runs, and with temperatures rising and falling as the clouds rolled and the sun did its best to add just a few degrees of track temperature times overall remained fairly constant.
The P1 class battle was eventually won by Karl Lupton who, with a great final run of 97.84 seconds, ended the day several seconds ahead of new driver Justin Dooling and Wayne Helme.

In P2 David Dyson's blistering first timed run time remained the standard for the class and he was never beaten for win. John Yates in the IROC replica 911 was runner up with a very credible 95.04 second best time and Nigel Watkins, still getting used to a new car, was third with a P1 beating time of 97.04 seconds.

It was clear from the outset that a very on form Jon Baldock was the wise bet for the P3 class win. Jon's winning final run time of 95.62 seconds was hugely impressive. Ian Wadsworth, driving on road tyres this year, having used slicks previously, was second in class with a 99.35 second run. That was still a quick P3 time given the conditions. Graham Rose was third just a few tenths behind Ian with a 99.80 second best time in his Supercharged 924s. Geraint Evans was again peerless on the 64 feet launch time stats ending the day fastest launching Porsche.

And finally on to our P4 class. As is now so often the case the times of Stephen Jory and Martin Leach were close run after run. On this occasion Martin timed his best effort to perfection shaving 0.12 seconds (yes just 0.12!) off Stephen's best time to take the P4 class win in the 911E on his last run. Jake Cartwright was third in his much-changed Boxster with a best of 99.19 seconds, a great first outing in the car after a winter of development and a sign of more to come!

So the first round was over already! I great day of sport (albeit painfully chilly at times) and an object lesson in driving fast cars on cold tyres and even colder tracks!

Well done to all our drivers new and old and we look forward to seeing everyone at our next two rounds on April 18&19th at the very quick Anglesey race circuit.

See you there??

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

First round of 2026 at Cadwell Park

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