By Dave Govier | Pictures by Dave Govier
It’s September and we are back at Park Farm for our annual visit. This site is situated just south of Stratford upon Avon near to Halford. It is a lovely venue with plenty of scope. The weather up to the event had been mostly dry and after arriving on site Saturday afternoon I am soon joined by the landowner Jeff. He was checking that it was me setting out and nobody else messing about!
After exchanging a few pleasantries with Jeff, it was time to start setting out the sections. I was going to be joined slightly later in the afternoon by Steve Burrows who was coming along to help me with the sections as usual.
The ground was incredibly dry and it was going to be difficult trying to stop everybody from being on all clears, but when setting up the sections you have to be mindful that we have to be safe for a novice to drive and this is something that we always do – so if it means we sometimes have a few drivers on low scores, so be it. A safe day definitely takes priority. The most important thing is everybody goes home with a smile on the face and they’ve all had a nice day.
Setting out went well and Steve and I managed to find a few bits of land that we hadn’t used before – which is always a good thing, as it helps to keep it fresh. Although the venue isn’t overly large, it still has plenty of options as to what we can do regarding the sections. We started setting around 2 pm and by 6:30 pm we have set out eight sessions with a view of running two sections in the reverse direction to give us 10 in total. We were happy with what we set out, and it was nice that after Hatton to see that Steve had got his Suzuki’s four-wheel-drive system working properly and he was able to try it on the sections that were set out.
Sunday morning and I arrive at the site at 9 am to find all the drivers are there except for Dave and Ethan Lewis. On their arrival, Dave handed me a bag of cakes and said it was his youngest son Adam’s birthday, so he bought some cakes for everybody to have a lunchtime. What a nice gesture. After scrutineering and signing on it was time for the drivers briefing and then off to the first section.
Well, it’s always nice to start the first section with a clear and I’m pleased to say that every driver cleared the first section. So definitely a good start to the day. The second section did have a couple of points on it first being Dave Lewis picking up a very un-characteristic two points when he flattened the cane that was on the driver side! Blythe unfortunately missed the left turn and picked up a 4.
Section 3 saw everybody on all clears. On section 4 only Blythe picked up four points. Section 5 Mark Howell picked up and uncharacteristic 4 points as well. It’s worth saying that Dave Burns, Ben Lawton, Adam Lewis, Ryan Vince plus Ethan Lewis were all driving excellent and were enjoying clear scores by lunchtime.
After six sections, it was time for lunch and break out the cakes, thanks Dave and a very happy birthday to Adam. No, we didn’t sing happy birthday or give him the bumps!
We did four sections after lunch, two sections that we ran in reverse order were section C, which became J and section D which section I. Sections G and I were cleared by everybody but section H managed to get the most scores on of the day with four drivers picking up some points. On this section Dave Lewis made a bit of a schoolboy error and drove past the one gate to do a U-turn so either Ethan or Adam could drive next. This resulted in him getting 1 point. He was very honest in admitting his error. Mark Howell got stuck on the number three gate and Blythe picked up one point by getting cross axled. It was also on section H that Ryan Vince picked up is only score of the day when he went from gate 6 to gate 3 meaning that he scored five points. It’s unusual for Ryan to make such an error.
The final section of the day section J also collected some points with both Ethan and Blythe picking up six points on this section. So after 10 sections, we had three drivers on all clears – those drivers were Dave Burns, Ben Lawton and Adam Lewis.
Out of the 10 sections driven during the day, only 4 of them were cleared by all the drivers. Everybody was really happy with the sections, which always makes me and Steve pleased.
We did say at prize giving that it was very gracious of Dave & Ethan to let Adam win the Lewis inter family battle on his birthday!
Thank you to all the drivers who came along and took part, we look forward to seeing you all at our next event which is Hatton Park in October.
