The incredible booking list for Stock Rods at Hednesford on Bank Holiday Monday has prompted us to think carefully how to run the races to try and suit all drivers.

The solution has given priority to ensuring that all drivers have the opportunity of three races throughout the day, so no one can feel they have had a wasted journey.

You may already have seen that we are splitting the cars into two heats. These heats will be started in graded order, with Incarace registered drivers starting at the front of each grade, exactly the same as we do week in week out with our pre-published grids.

So, with 53 cars booked to race there will be 27 cars in Heat 1 and 26 cars in Heat 2.

The first 12 cars in each heat will qualify direct to the Final and the remaining cars will then race in the consolation event – this will therefore have a maximum of 29 cars, based on a 53-car entry. The first 12 cars from the consolation will then qualify for the Final.

Keeping in line with the current way of lining the cars up for the final, we will be gridding cars based on their results in the heat or consolation.

The first 12 cars from each heat will literally line up on rows 1 – 12. The two heat winners will draw for inside or outside after the two heats, and the cars will then be lined up behind them from 2nd to 12th place in a herringbone fashion, inside/outside. The successful consolation drivers will then line up behind them. We will pack the cars in groups of eight.

The Allcomers Grand National will be open to all drivers with the exceptions of the 12 drivers that qualified for the final from the consolation, as those drivers will have already taken part in three races.

The Allcomers Grand National, will therefore have 41 eligible drivers, but it is highly unlikely that all of those 41 cars will still be running at that time – let’s be honest, there will be a few drivers / cars that fall by the wayside at some stage of the day.

We are all looking forward to a fabulous day of racing, with a good field of Classic Hot Rods, Lightning Rods and the return of the Fiesta Frenzy Back to Basic Bangers.