Sponsors of the Auto-Italia Championship 2000 - 2003

Round 12 - Snetterton  7 September 2003

Class A leader Ted Reddick was outpaced by 3.2s in qualifying, his Ferrari 355 unable to match the pace of Terence Coleman's 360 which powered to an easy pole position with a 1:15.7s lap. The race would be close however because Ted's 355 was capable of similar lap times. Tim Lewis did enough to take class B top slot followed by the Thompson Minari. Fifth quickest was class C runner Ian Stapleton, his Alfetta GTV now pulling well over 8000rpm and eclipsing Neil Smiths 156 by nearly two seconds. Westley Evan's Alfa 156 assumed it's customary class D pole, but he was pushed hard by the sixteen valve 33 of Paul Lund. Roger Donnan was well clear of Charles Cozens in class E. Trevor Nicosia had spotted that he still had a good chance of taking third position in the class B championship and entered using a borrowed Alfasud sprint, his Y10 turbo still in build. Keith Fawdington made a rare appearance but suffered a nightmare weekend, the big V8 in his De Tomaso Pantera sounded most unhappy and expired in clouds of smoke after just a handful of qualifying laps.

Championship positions are beginning to be clarified, and Tim Lewis, Ian Stapleton and Charles Cozens elected to play their jokers. It was Stapleton who made the early running and took the lead on the first lap. He was soon engulfed by the Ferrari storm which saw Reddick shadow Coleman whilst Tim Lewis tried to stay in touch. On lap six Neil Smith fluffed a gearshift and his engine cried enough, sending a rod through the block. The ensuing oil slick on the exit to Coram gave most a big moment, including race leader Terence Coleman, Ted pounced and put some space between them. Another two laps passed and with cars still spinning on the oil the race was red flagged during lap nine. On the track Ted Reddick was clearly the winner, however the race result was declared as the running order one lap previous to the number of full laps completed by the race leader. This meant that the race result was declared as the order across the line after seven laps, handing a debut win to Terence.

Class B went to Lewis from Thompson whilst class C was the preserve of Stapleton. Westley Evans scored another full house of points in class D, as did Roger Donnan in class E.

News
Roger Donnan heads the championship with 352 points, but Tim Lewis (322 points) in second place has now played his joker. At the conclusion Tim only needs to drop two points compared to Roger's 22, this leaves Tim with a 2 point advantage into the final round at Oulton. In the event of a tie it would be resolved according to J 3.4 of the current MSA yearbook (number of class wins - Roger is on 8 and Tim is on 9).

Westley Evans is still third (with 280 points and none to drop) whilst fourth placed man Andy Thompson (266 points, 6 to drop) will play his joker in the final round.

Class A is now wrapped up by Ted Reddick and Lindsay Ward will be second. Trevor Nicosia or Phil Burton could still overhaul John Rutter for third.

Class B will go to Tim Lewis with Andy Thompson second and Trevor Nicosia a distant third.

Class C has livened up, Ian Stapleton now looks favourite from Ron Davidson and Neil Smith. Westley Evans is well clear of Peter Woodard and Graham Scott in class D, but Paul Lund could just snatch 3rd spot from Graham if he scores in the final round. Roger Donnan has sewn up class E but Emma Karwacki is now just a few points shy of Bryn Griffiths for the runners up position.

Oulton Park (October 11th) will be the final round of the Le Mans AutoItalia championship in it's current form. Plans are still being finalised for the look of the championship in 2004 and as previously notified it will broaden it's horizons to accommodate non Italian cars. It would be nice to go out with a bang (figuratively of course) with a full grid.

RESULTS

Fastest Laps