Following a number of excellent championship performances that saw the 43 car just fall short of top spot, Paul Wright made amends yesterday as he won the 2L Hot Rod English Championship at Wimbledon Stadium.

Heat One saw 26 cars take to the Plough Lane tarmac. 11 Alex Crane made a good start from pole position and was driving well to keep the other drivers behind as he kept his Nova on the inside line. The race was stopped as 77 Andy Owen had a big impact with the fence on the home straight - the 88 & 543 cars were excluded from the remainder of the race at this time for misdemeanours. Unfortunately for Alex, he couldn't find a gear in the 11 car as the cars finished their rolling lap and he coasted to the infield. Having started the rolling lap in 2nd place it was defending champion 304 Danny Fiske who inherited a lead he was never going to give up as he crossed the line a good few car lengths ahead of Billy Clarke 537 and Dan Smith 565.

Heat Two saw the cars line up in reverse grid order from Heat One. 65 Mark Willis encountered problems prior to the green flag and watched the race from the infield. Once the race settled down it was 29 Duane Peacock in the lead from 7 Collin Moss. The #7 Saxo hunted down the 29 car and Moss took over in the lead. 303 Gavin Botfield's engine blew up quite spectacularly and moments later a big coming together saw the 96 car of Kevin Randell hit the fence. As well as Randell's car being eliminated at this point several other cars retired including the 11, 310 & 565 cars. Moss took a comfortable win to announce his championship potential.

Following two bruising qualifying heats, several cars failed to make the grid for the English Championship. 43 Paul Wright took pole position from defending champion 304 Danny Fiske. Wright made it to turn one first and settled into the lead as the cars behind him fought for position. Fiske's determined defence came to an end as he made contact with the fence which saw him damage his rear wheel. As Wright continued on his way, a great battle between the 7, 8, 72 & 306 cars took place as they battled for position. The battle was joined by the rapid 75 Saxo of Chris Crane and the 43 crossed the line comfortably ahead of this battle which, following a review of the video, saw 8 Damon Wellman take second place and World Champion 306 Will Reed in third. Collin Moss finished 4th (having been docked two places for contact), 72 Gary Goodswen in 4th and Chris Crane 5th in 75 - having also following foul of the Steward and losing two places for contact.

The results are subject to the cars passing post-race scrutineering.

Thanks to Chris Berry for the photos.