Round 4 Report 2010 - Ultimate Street Car

The fourth and final round of the Euro Sports Compact drag series took place at the monster modified car festival, Ultimate Street Car. Much like USC itself, the ESC drag series has been populated by a fantastic variety of serious and silly machines, and variety has once again been the spice of the series. But every single car entered has brought something different to the table and each has impressed in its own way.

The final round was all set to be a straightforward affair for Andy Waite to wrap up the title once again. Provided he set an OK qualifying time, it should have been plain sailing for Mr Waite and his Mk1 Golf. The real race was on for the runner-up slot in the championship, where James Hodson and Andy Nicholls had it all to play for. With so many cars in the series this year, there was bound to be a few upsets and many gruelling rounds of eliminations for the winners to rise to the top.

However, James Hodson was pleased to note that his main rival for the runner-up slot, Andy Nicholls failed to attend qualifying, making second-place in the championship look a lot easier to achieve, but with no less than six 10-second cars in qualifying, it was not going to be a walk in the park.

Andy Waite anchored himself onto his customary top-slot in qualifying, but it was all-change in the places below him, with Mark Gunns, Karl Ellis, Paul Jordan and Sam Bolton all beating Hodson into 6th place. Robert Johnston wasn’t far behind, but a gap of around one second separated the rest of the field.

1st Round

Andy Waite had earned himself a bye run in round 1 from his qualifying top spot. But as usual, he wasn’t hanging around and put in a brilliant 10.1 second run to the delight of the crowd.

Robert Johnston beat Dan Olorenshaw on the lights, pulling out a fractionally quicker reaction that just allowed him to pip his opponent to the post, despite Dan’s quicker ET. Close racing!

Paul Jordon dispatched Paul Bargate with a convincing victory of over a second.

Sam Bolton ran an excellent 10-second run in round one, putting him well ahead of Chris Green, who suffered from a problem that saw him crawl across the line.

Mark Gunns had an easy ride against Ben Dalgleish, who’s broken Corsa failed to make it to the start-line.

Karl Ellis took out Sam Lukac by less than a second, displaying a big MPH that suggests the car has plenty of power that is yet to find grip.

James Hodson had no such traction problems, making all his power stick to convincingly dispatch Sam Cox.

Quarter Finals

Andy Waite had to work a bit harder in round 2, as Robert Johnston was capable of giving him a real scare, but luckily for Andy, everything went to plan allowing another smooth progression to the next round.

Paul Jordan pulled an amazing 9-second run out of nowhere to shock Sam Bolton in their second-round pairing! A huge mph confirmed Paul Jordan’s time was no fluke, and despite an excellent 10-second pass by Sam, there were no tools in the box capable of fixing that race!

Mark Gunns was able to take a nice drive in the country after earning himself a bye-run.

James Hodson’s superior reaction times and race experience saved the day in his pairing against Karl Ellis. Karl pulled out a better ET, but James had won himself a vital 0.2 second head-start on the lights which was just enough to see him over the line first. Great racing!

Semi Finals

In the semi finals, the two 9-second cars of Andy Waite and Paul Jordan were paired up and all set to go for an epic race. Could this be the first side-by-side 9 in ESC? The short answer is “no”… both cars leapt off the line with decent reaction times, but neither ran to their full potential. Both drivers clocked a respectable 10-second run, and it was a very close race, but Andy Waite held the lead from start to finish. However, his superiority had been seriously questioned by Paul Jordan.

Mark Gunns and James Hodson were another well-matched pair in the semis, and both were capable of serious 10’s and excellent reaction times. A good race was inevitable, and Mark Gunns got off the line with an amazing 0.0 second reaction time. James had a catch-up job on his hands, which he only just succeeded in achieving. The terminal speeds show that Mark was on his way to turning the race around once again! Another great race.

Finals

In the finals, the newly crowned champion met the newly crowned series runner-up. It was a fitting end to the days racing, and the season’s racing too!

James would have dearly loved to beat Andy in the finals, and murmurs in the race control tower were that at least one driver would pull a red-light. But both racers were calm and collected, and got off to good starts. James was hoping for a missed-gear or some sort of sign that Andy had got it wrong, but it was not to be, and the white streak of Andy’s white Mk1 Golf was frustratingly out of James’ reach.

The Round 4 points and championship tables can be found on the 2010 Points page.