READ IS RALLY CLUB’S 50TH ANNIVERSARY CHAMPION

In the 50th Anniversary season of the Barbados Rally Club (BRC), Josh Read has added his name to the list of distinguished former Champions, including Michael Gill, Sean Gill, Roger Hill and Roger Skeete, by winning the recently-concluded 2007 Virgin Atlantic BRC Driver’s Championship.
Driving the Automotive Art Toyota Starlet, Read claimed an almost perfect score in SuperModified 9, amassing 113 points over the eight events, only four shy of the potential 117; with co-driver Mark Jordan, he lost route bonus points in three of the Championship’s six rallies, once in March to James Betts and three times over the two days of Rally Barbados to Jamaica’s Tarik Minott.
A former co-driver, having sat alongside Kirk Watkins, Read is in only his third season as a driver; once his lowest score was dropped, as Championship rules require, his total for the year was 103. He enjoyed Group victory in every event and wins the Championship by two points, and his Group by a margin of 29.
Second overall, losing out as he did last year by just two points, is Ian Warren (MQI Collision Repair Centre/Subzero Services Ltd/Details Car Valet Inc Peugeot 206), Modified 6 Champion for the fourth time since 2001; with Matthew Staffner his co-driver for the rallies, ‘Wee Wee’ has been playing catch-up since finishing Group fourth in the March Gravel Stages – despite a perfect record since then, he has been unable to claw back that deficit.
At year-end, Warren was tied on points with SM11 winner Jonathan Still (Red Bull/Hitachi Power Tools/Philips Lighting/Crane & Equipment BMW M3), but gets the nod as runner-up to Read, as the tie-break favours the driver in the lower Group; with co-driver Heath Hazell, ‘Stillo’ was another to start the year with a deficit – even so, he claimed his fourth consecutive Group title, following his hat-trick of wins in the now-abandoned Modified Open.
Already proclaimed Texaco BRC Rally Champion, Paul ‘Surfer’ Bourne has added the 2007 M8-WRC title to his collection, winning this Group (formerly known as M9) for the fourth time in five years; with Stuart Maloney on the notes in the BF Goodrich/Plus Subaru Impreza WRC, Bourne has rarely put a foot wrong in 2007, finishing fourth overall for the second year in a row.
Among the most consistent competitors of the recent past has been Neil Barnard (First Caribbean VISA/Shell V-Power/Automotive Art Suzuki Ignis Sport), whose victory in Production 2 is his fifth consecutive Group win in the BRC Driver’s Championship; he has now finished in the top five overall in four of the although diminishing entries in the lower-capacity Production Groups meant he would suffer by being merged up as the season drew to a close.
Barnard’s Simpson Motors team-mate Sean Gill (Suzuki Swift) finished one place behind him, sixth overall and winner of S10, despite missing the Championship’s opening round, then failing to finish the Carnival Warm-Up Rally in April. Outgoing Overall Champion Adrian Linton again won M7, and might have finished higher than seventh in the overall standings, but for he and wife Jackie failing to finish last Sunday’s Texaco BRC Gravel Rally in the Ravensden/Crane & Equipment/Garbage Gobbler/West Coast Garden Centre/Edwin Clarke Furniture Vauxhall Astra GSi.
Runner-up to Overall Champion in S9, Stuart White finished eighth overall in the Flyin’ Fish/Cloudbase Embroidery/Catch Chocolate/Budex Couriers/Crane & Equipment Toyota Starlet; apart from the top five finishers, White was the only driver to score in all eight rounds, a commendable achievement in his new car.
The competitive nature of M7 was emphasised by just one point separating winner Linton from second-placed Freddie Gale (Gale’s Hatcheries/Nassco/Castrol/VP Racing/Barbados Industries Toyota Corolla RunX), who finished ninth overall; but for Linton claiming the bonus point for winning last Sunday’s first route, the result could so easily have gone the other way and the one-point margin was comfortably the closest of the season.
The top 10 overall is completed by Neil Armstrong (Shell Helix/Hankook/Soldier Seal Gunk Mitsubishi Lancer Evo VI), winning Production 4 for the second year in a row, and another who might have finished further up the overall standings but for a DNF last Sunday. The only Group winners to finish outside the top 10 were Kirk Watkins (Abacus Builders Inc/Hankook Mitsubishi Lancer Evo V), who brought Roger Hill’s four-year domination of M8 to an end, and Rhett Watson (M5 Datsun).
The BRC’s 50th Anniversary season concludes with the final round of the BRC Safari Championship (November 11), shortly followed by the Annual Awards Ceremony (November 24).

Virgin Atlantic BRC Driver’s Championship
Final positions

Overall - total after lowest score has been dropped
1st Josh Read (SM9 Automotive Art Toyota Starlet), 103 points
2nd Ian Warren (M6 MQI Collision Repair Centre/Subzero Services Ltd/Details Car Valet Inc Peugeot 206), 101pts
3rd Jonathan Still (SM11 Red Bull/Hitachi Power Tools/Philips Lighting/Crane & Equipment BMW M3), 101pts
4th Paul Bourne (M8-WRC BF Goodrich/Plus Subaru Impreza WRC), 99pts
5th Neil Barnard (P2 First Caribbean VISA/Shell V-Power/Automotive Art Suzuki Ignis Sport), 93pts
6th Sean Gill (SM10 First Caribbean VISA/Shell V-Power/Automotive Art Suzuki Swift), 76pts
7th Adrian Linton (M7 Ravensden/Crane & Equipment/Garbage Gobbler/West Coast Garden Centre/Edwin Clarke Furniture Vauxhall Astra GSi), 74pts
8th Stuart White (SM9 Flyin’ Fish/Cloudbase Embroidery/Catch Chocolate/Budex Couriers/Crane & Equipment Toyota Starlet), 74pts
9th Freddie Gale (M7 Gale’s Hatcheries/Nassco/Castrol/VP Racing/Barbados Industries Toyota Corolla RunX), 73pts
10th Neil Armstrong (P4 Shell Helix/Hankook/Soldier Seal Gunk Mitsubishi Lancer Evo VI), 70pts
etc

Groups
Modified 8-WRC 1st Bourne, 99pts; 2nd John Powell - JAM (Stag/Intercontinental Shipping/Trinidad Mooring and Launch Services Toyota Corolla WRC), 55pts; 3rd Roger Skeete (Havoline/Michelin/FB Batteries Ford Escort WRC), 50pts; etc
M8-A 1st Kirk Watkins (M8-A Abacus Builders Inc/Hankook Mitsubishi Lancer Evo V), 63pts; 2nd Barry Gale (Simpson Motors/Dentyne Ice/VP Racing/Nitrous Formula/Automotive Art Mitsubishi Lancer Evo VI), 54pts; 3rd Roger Hill (Mobil 1/Nassco/Motormac Toyota Celica GT4), 47pts
Production 4 1st Armstrong, 70pts; 2nd Geoffrey Noel (Ezone/Globe Finance/Weisers/Café Blue/Sign Stop/Summa Graphix/Essco/Autozone/Automotive Art/Sunbeach/Sentry Insurance Mitsubishi Lancer Evo IX), 62pts; 3rd Harold Morley (Warrens Motors Subaru Impreza), 16pts; etc
SuperModified 11 1st Still, 101pts; 2nd Andrew Jones (A P Jones Pharmacy/McEnearney Quality Inc Ford Escort MkII), 48pts; 3rd Calvin Briggs (Ford Escort MkII), 42pts; etc
SM10 1st Gill, 76pts; 2nd Mark Hamilton (Consolidated Finance/McEnearney Quality Inc Ford Escort MkII), 58pts; 3rd Ralph White (Island Safari/Going Places/Drive-a-Matic Toyota Starlet), 28pts; etc
SM9 1st Read, 103pts; 2nd White, 74pts; 3rd David Williams (Bacassa/Caribpak/Castrol/Ibox/SRG/Roxy Supermarket/Dynamic Limo Toyota Starlet), 53pts; etc
M7 1st Linton, 74pts; 2nd Gale, 73pts; 3rd Roger Marshall (Photofinish/One Hour Photo Hyundai Accent), 51pts; etc
M6 1st Warren, 101pts; 2nd Josh Delmas (Weetabix/Go Motorsport Toyota Corolla GTi), 63pts; 3rd Daryl Clarke (Mom’s Pasta Products/246 Tuning/Area 5 Auto Works Mitsubishi Mirage), 49pts; etc
M5 1st Rhett Watson (Datsun), 6pts
P2 1st Barnard, 93pts; 2nd Ryan Corbin (Caribtrans/Suntraders Peugeot 106), 13pts

For further information, robin@bradfax.com