On Saturday 9th March 2013 Figure Of 8 racing returned to Birmingham Wheels Raceway for the first round of the Figure Of 8 Cross Swords Series sponsored by Racequip.

Unfortunately the car numbers were extremely disappointing with drivers who booked into race not appearing on the night.

We would like to thank all the drivers who made the effort on what was a cold night at Wheels that came and raced and tried to put on the best show they could with only 6 cars attending the meeting.

Towards the end of the 2012 season when the fixture lists were been planned for 2013 the decision was made to take several drivers requests for fixtures into account as in previous years the fixture lists have been released and immediately drivers complain about fixtures for various reasons so this year we aimed at accommodating several drivers ideas of which we still have many to come over the 2013 season i.e. Vans return to Hednesford Hills Raceway on Easter Monday, Ramp Rollover Competitions and the Reliant Robin Mayhem Series which got underway at Grimley Raceway on Sunday 10th March with Round 2 being contested at Birmingham Wheels Raceway on Saturday 16th March.

One of the ideas was to revive Figure Of 8 racing at Incarace and to attempt to bring the form of racing back with a ‘bang’! Instead of doing just 1 meeting we decided to make a 3 round series using all 3 of Incarace’s Figure Of 8 Tracks to add some variety to the racing.

The plan was to put a £500 prize fund on the series and this was sponsored by Racequip after they heard what we were attempting to do and for this we continue to give our thanks to them.

Once the series had been announced Figure Of 8 Legend Mick Reece offered the return of the Cross Swords Championship Title, which he has held for many years to be put back into contention to find a new champion at the end of the series.

It goes without saying that I was very disappointed with the turnout on Saturday at Wheels and the lack of support towards the Figure Of 8 fixture including the Scrapyard Screamers team. The Scrapyard Screamers have supported Incarace over the years at some ‘trial’ meetings i.e. SUV Meetings at Hednesford Hills Raceway and I was extremely happy to see they booked-in to support the Figure Of 8 but was again disappointed when with an hour to go to start time I was informed that none of them were showing up by a member of our staff! Thanks however must also go out to #199 Jacob Roff who went as far as having to change an engine before arriving and even missed the first heat but nevertheless still made the effort to show his support. Out of all the drivers on the booking list the only driver who had shown his support from the early stages of fixture planning but had to cancel his booking on Saturday afternoon was #601 Lee Usha.

As always trying to revive or create new ideas is never easy and is not helped by the ‘keyboard heroes’ who have a negative attitude towards events before the fixture has had a chance to take place.

We heard on the night that the rumour mill had been doing overtime that it would be non-contact, which is not true! We are currently investigating to find out who started this rumour to discover what they were trying to achieve by spreading this nonsense.

The decision over whether we will run the remainder of the series will be decided over the coming weeks with the second round due to be held at Pr1mo International Raceway, Northampton on Saturday 11th May (6.30pm Start Time).

Once again our thanks go out to the 6 drivers who made the effort to support Incarace on Saturday night at wheels!

Adam Leslie
Incarace