Entries Flood in for Brands Caterham Festival

01 October 2004

Next weekend's Caterham Festival at Brands Hatch is set to be the best-supported and most exciting celebration of the world's most-raced car, the Caterham Seven, ever staged.

Organisers have already received in excess of 250 entries for the 9/10 October event and look set to close the books with numbers approaching 300. Drivers from Japan, France, Germany, Switzerland and Ireland will be joining their British counterparts on track for the 18-race extravaganza.

The Festival will see at least six UK Caterham racing championship titles settled, including the £7,000 champion's prize for the Powertrain Caterham R400 Challenge and the prestigious Autosport Caterham Eurocup awards.

"We are delighted to see so many Caterham racers lining up for the Festival, and that there are so many championships going down to the wire," said Caterham Cars managing director Simon Nearn. "This year's Festival is going to be the most exciting yet."

It's the third time that the biennial event has been held at the Kent track, which is close to Caterham's Dartford plant and firm's spiritual home in Surrey. The first Caterham Festival was in 2000, when 250 cars took to the track to celebrate the British marque.

In addition to the track activity there will be displays of historic Sevens and concours Caterhams, plus a chance to see the full range of the manufacturer's road-going models. Some 300 members of the 7 Owners Club are expected also, with their cars, for a club rally.

Adult admission each day is £10; kids go free. Discounted weekend passes are available in advance from MotorSportDirect on 0870 850 5017 or www.motorsportdirect.co.uk

Titles to be decided at the Festival

Powertrain Caterham R400 Challenge in association with Autosport
The fight for the £7,000 champion's prize is between two of the youngest drivers in the championship - 21-year-old Jon Barnes and Luke Stevens, a year his senior. Each driver has taken two race wins in a season which has seen six different drivers on the victory podium. Stevens arrives at Brands with an on-paper 12 point lead over Barnes, although it's narrower when dropped scores are taken into account.

Autosport Caterham Eurocup
Jon Barnes has a 10-point lead over his Euro R400 title rival Clive Richards; Barnes has taken five wins for Team Parker Racing from 10 starts and has yet to finish outside the top three. Richards, 43, has won three times for his own Colards Motorsport team and needs to win both Brands races; even then, should Barnes finish second in either race the crown will go the younger driver's way.

In the Eurocup's Roadsport division, Malcolm Johnstone has a four-point lead over Chris Reynalds, but Chris, the eight-time class victor, is ahead when dropped scores are taken into account and can afford to follow Johnstone home in both races to secure championship victory.

Motorsport News Caterham Roadsport Challenge
Class A - A duel between James Bromley and Graham Fennymore. Bromley - who is looking to add the A title to the Roadsport B crown he won in 2003 - has won four races this year at the wheel of his Autotrader-backed car, including one on the Brands GP circuit earlier in the season. Twenty-nine-year-old Bromley has 184 points to five-race victor Fennymore's 181, but with drop scores taken into account James's advantage is down to just one point. The third man in with a mathematical shout is Bromley's Arrowstar team-mate Chris Nicholas, the only other driver to have races this year.

Inter Class - Stephen Rowden leads the way by a two-point margin, but Doug Clark, eight times the class winner this season, is favourite to claim the title.

Class B - Three drivers are up for the Roadsport B crown - Mike Blackadder, John Aylott and Neil Fletcher - and they are separated by just seven points. The score thus far is four wins apiece to Blackadder and Fletcher, and a hat-trick of victories for Aylott. Between them the trio has scooped 25 top-three trophies out of a possible 33.

evo Caterham Academy
The racing novices of the Academy are in action at Oulton Park this Saturday (2 Oct), with the title fight keenly poised in both groups. Patrick Scharfegger leads the way in Academy Group 1 thanks to a string of second and third placings, with Paul Jepson coming up on the rails following sprint-event wins at Aintree and Castle Combe, and a race win at Snetterton. In Group 2, Harewood hill-climb victor Guy Harrington is on top of the points table - but only just - from Tim Skipper.

The Caterham Festival will also feature the concluding rounds of the three Caterham Graduate championships, which have already been decided in favour of Andy Adshead (Graduate), Malcolm Barnett (Super-Graduate) and Jamie Ellwood (Mega-Graduate), as well as rounds of Germany's Caterham Hankook Masters and the Coupe de France Caterham.

Further information is available at the Caterham websites: www.caterham.co.uk and www.caterhamracing.com

See 2004 series calendar for the R400-supported British GT Championship

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