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Mondello Park
April 12th
Historic Class Race 1
By Gary Fox
Jackie Cochrane established that he is the driver to beat in this year’s Historic class with another flawless performance to record his second victory of the season. Clear blue skies and warm spring sunshine greeted race fans who arrived early at Mondello Park on Easter Sunday for the first race in the Historic class.
A wide variety of cars lined up for this the second day of the season with the invitational Minis ensuring a large grid of 21 cars lined up on circuit. The Mondello circuit was in pristine condition for the Bank Holiday weekend meeting organised by the Leinster Motor Club. Due to their invitational status, the Mini class were not competing for Championship points and started at the back of the grid.
A number of Minis ran on slicks which ensured some extremely quick times and competitive racing. Cochrane in the Tiger Sunbeam was again the man to catch in qualifying and he took pole position followed by Alan Kessie in the Gryphon with David Kelly in the Elan back in third. Stephen Doyle who produced an outstanding performance to record an unlikely but well deserved race victory on the opening day of the season was absent from the Mondello circuit but is expected back for the next date on the racing calendar.
Cochrane started on pole but saw his lead snatched by the determined Kessie who blazed off the grid and led down into turn one. The Gryphon opened up a marginal lead after one lap, allowing him to remain out of the reach of the incredibly quick Sunbeam. Pamela Cochrane and Clive Brandon duelled in the opening laps, but Cochrane held off the emerging threat from the Lotus Europa. The sheer pace of the Tiger proved too much for Kessie on lap three as he was unable to hold off the raw power of 4700cc Tiger compared to his 1700cc Gryphon. The straight line speed advantage of the Tiger allowed Cochrane to blitz down the long main straight and reclaim the lead. Despite the difference in engine size, Kessie, with a deft display of driving skill, remained in touch with Cochrane, pushing the Tiger to its maximum.
The fight with Kessie almost saw Cochrane break through the magic minute lap time in Mondello, running just 0.86 over the minute. The frantic pace of the leading pair meant they began encountering traffic as early as the fifth lap with the battle for top spot becoming more intense. David Kelly in the Lotus Elan was unable to stay with the Kessie and Cochrane battle and he slipped back to 11 seconds off the pace by lap five. At the halfway point, Kessie continued to make life extremely difficult for Cochrane and just when it appeared that the pressure was becoming too much for the leader, disaster struck for the Gryphon with Kessie forced to retire with a broken gearbox.
David Kelly was 17 seconds down on the Tiger by this stage and was unable to bridge the yearning gap and provide any challenge to Cochrane as he romped to victory unchallenged with his characteristic headlights blazing through the warm haze created by the searing sunshine at the Kildare circuit. Back down the field, the race for third spot was developing into a titanic battle between Simon Doyle’s TVR Tuscan and Clive Brandon. Doyle’s race was to come to a premature end however, when he came to an abrupt halt on lap 11 with a visit to the gravel trap at Honda corner
The Mini of Albert O’Donnell and Vinny O’Reilly in the Austin Healy both went into the gravel at Dunlop corner, narrowly avoiding major impact. Earlier in the race, O’Donnell had been setting the pace for the Mini group but collected O’Reilly on his way off the track as he just pushed marginally too hard in his attempt to edge out O’Reilly. In the end it was once again Jackie Cochrane from Armagh taking overall race victory and the honours in Group A with David Kelly in second spot in race classification. Clive Brandon in the Lotus Europa enjoyed victory in Group B. Back in Group C, Niño Forte took the honours. With Group D going to David Moloney
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