Double-Top at Oulton for Barnes and Stevens in Caterham Masters

24 July 2005

Luke Stevens and Jon Barnes are back on top of the Cosworth Caterham Masters thanks to twin wins at Oulton Park in the fifth and six rounds.

The youngsters guided their Acre Jean-backed Hyperion Motorsport CSR 260 to a relatively easy win in the first of the day's one-hour endurance events after their chief opposition fell by the wayside. But they had to work very hard indeed in race two to secure victory by less than two-tenths of a second from the car of Richard Hay and Clive Richards.

Race two was stopped a lap early by an accident, with the results counted back - it was more by luck than judgment that the Stevens/Barnes car was ahead at that moment, so close had the battle been. "We were in the right place at the right time," said Luke. "It's about time we got some good luck."

Newmarket-based Stevens and his co-driver Barnes, from Lee-on-Solent, were in strong form throughout the day. They annexed pole position by a margin of one-tenth, with the cars of Hay/Richards and Natasha and Philip Gladman lining up behind them.

Race one provided a fantastic battle all the way to the mandatory stops, with less than a second covering the top four - Richards, Barnes, Phil Gladman and Loïc Martinez. West Sussex driver Richards was the first to make for the pits, stopping on his 18th tour to hand over his Colards Motorsport car to Worcestershire's Hay.

Barnes stopped a lap later and Stevens jumped in the hot seat, emerging from the pits fractionally ahead of Hay. But alas the expected fight to the flag never materialised; a lap after its stop, Hay's car slewed to a halt with suspension problems and Stevens found himself with a 15-second lead over Martinez.

The Frenchman tried everything to reel Stevens in, but to no avail: Luke crossed the line 7.4 seconds clear of Loïc to record his team's second race victory of the season. "Everything went according to plan - for the first time this year," said a jubilant Barnes.

A distant third was the Hyperion car shared by Daniel Mitchell (Essex) and championship debutant Kevin Williams (Suffolk), the latter overhauling the sister car of Altrincham's David Dyson and 18-year-old Guy Harrington (Belper) a couple of laps after the pit stops.

Neither Dyson nor Harrington, the reigning evo Caterham Academy champion, had sampled CSR power before and did well to claim fourth ahead of Nürburgring and Valencia race victor François Desprez.

Alexis Delb took sixth ahead of the Gladman car (Natasha's late-race pace hobbled by oil pressure problems), Gilles Charpentier, Nigel Bent/Nick Phillips and Serge Cazzani. Among the retirees were rapid young Frenchman Damien Toulemonde, who spun into the gravel at one-third distance, and Philip Derby and Philippe Soulan, who came together on the seventh lap at Cascades.

Race two provided drama not just up to the pit-stop window but all the way to the end of the race, chiefly provided by Hay/Richards and Barnes/Stevens but with between two and five other cars joining them at the sharp end. Less than two seconds covered the top seven - Barnes, Hay, Martinez, Dyson, Philip Gladman, Toulemonde and Desprez - at the one-third mark, with the lead having already changed at least five times.

Toulemonde was the first of the leading group to peel into the pits, but the 20-year-old from Normandy arrived several seconds before the official opening of the pit-stop window and was waved on his way again by his team. He had to stop again two laps later and the time lost by the bungle cost him any hopes of a top-three finish.

Hay went for the pits on the 14th lap, Richards taking over at the wheel and joining comfortably ahead of the other cars which had already stopped. Barnes waited a further five laps before stopping, and set a blistering pace on the track while his chief rivals were stationary. It was a tactic which paid off, for when Stevens emerged he was marginally ahead of Richards.

There ensued a titanic battle to the end, Clive and Luke dicing all the way and swapping the lead several times a lap as each tried to gain the advantage. Alas a last-lap shoot-out was denied spectators, red flags coming out to bring proceedings to a premature halt.

The cause was an accident involving Williams, who was disputing third with Martinez. Loïc edged past on lap 32 and then firmly closed the door on Kevin into Old Hall as he tried to repass. Williams was forced to back off sharply and, his car unsettled, he ran wide on to the trackside 'marbles' and lost control, slamming backwards into the barriers. He was shaken but otherwise unhurt by the crash.

As is procedure in such cases, race officials declared the results at the lap prior to the incident, when the Stevens/Barnes car was a fraction ahead of that of Hay/Richards. Clive was philosophical in defeat: "It was a cracking race and I thoroughly enjoyed it. To be so close together at the end of a one-hour race was just magic." Stevens agreed: "It was awesome. We were lucky to have won; it could easily have gone the other way."

With Williams' strong performance brought to such an abrupt end, Martinez claimed third and Toulemonde - doubtless wondering what might have been - fourth. Dyson and Harrington claimed fifth ahead of Olivier Guerin, Desprez, the Gladmans, Charpentier and Bent/Phillips.

With the Cosworth Caterham Masters at the half-way stage, Barnes and Stevens have a two-point overall lead over Desprez, with Hay and Richards a further seven points adrift. The remarkably consistent motorsport journalist Nick Phillips moves into sixth overall.

The Cosworth Caterham Masters in association with Autosport - which is additionally backed by Comma and by Avon - is back in action in a fortnight at Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium.

See series calendars for all 2005 Caterham Championships

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