They say it’s been a “good year for the roses” and in sporting terms for those living beyond the northern Suffolk border it has also been a good year for both the “canaries and their racers”, with the Norfolk Banger drivers emulating the success of their footballers in yet another one-sided contest, writes Kevin Wegg.

Earlier in the season the “local Banger derby” saw Norfolk rip the record book apart by recording a first-ever win on Suffolk tarmac then last Saturday it was the turn of Yarmouth to rule the roost in a multi-team event with Ipswich only actually able to field one car! To be fair this was a hastily re-arranged fixture with snow and ice forcing a postponement the week previously, thus several drivers had prior commitments. Five other teams joined in the fun on a very slippery surface representing all the Spedeworth tracks, with Arlington the only team able to field a full posse of fifteen cars. Simon Berry was the lonely Ipswich competitor and despite only completing one lap in race one went down fighting! Michael Allard signalled the intentions of the Norfolk team early with a monster hit on the experienced Gordon Coull from the Arlington team.

Despite their numerical advantage, turn three soon became an Arlington graveyard, although they still managed six finishers to take an early points lead, despite Robert Knight claiming the win. Race two was particularly lively with Arlington and Yarmouth slugging it out on lap one. Simon Berry was out again and once more waved the blue flag briefly to take it up after bursting past Alex Giuniti only to be spun out by Norfolkman Titch Mancini for an important race win which meant they were only seven points behind Arlington going in to the double points final. Several pile-ups early on quickly whittled down the field with Norfolk’s Nigel Walker leading the way but the telling blow came when Pete Osborne, the last Arlington driver still mobile, decided to go down fighting and eventually wiped himself out in the process! Yarmouth duly claimed the event by a mere two points from Arlington, which co-incidentally was the total scored by Team Ipswich/Berry all afternoon!

With challenging track conditions the top men in the 2.0 Hot Rods found it difficult to come through from the back yet a race win still had to be earned. Formula debutant Paul Frost(Woodbridge) made three superb starts in each race but subsequently struggled badly for traction. Sean O’Leary took a comfortable win in the first where the pivotal action centred around the battle for second place. With less than two laps to go fourth-placed William Reed roared in to turn three which at first appeared to set off a domino-effect as Dale Atkins clipped second-placed Mick Jowers who promptly spun. The all-important Race Steward was quite happy though and Atkins - former Lightning Rod Champion - never looked back, taking race two in some style whilst Reed this time got on the wrong side of the Steward and was dropped two places for contact. Atkins was really in the groove now and quickly took up the running in the final. The rapid Damon Wellman seemed to take an age to get past second-placed O’Leary and by the time he did so Atkins had long since rode off in to the setting sun to win by half a lap.

An entertaining Destruction Derby spectacularly concluded proceedings and even though it was an individual event, just like last time, Norfolk took that as well with Walker wiping out the field in some style – what price a Norfolk hat-trick next year?!