Duncan Tappy Extends His Lead at Formula Renault UK With Michelin Championship
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Apr 23, 2007
Duncan Tappy (West Ewell) extended his lead at the top of the Formula Renault UK with Michelin Championship to 15 points with a narrow win in round three at Rockingham on Sunday, 22nd April. The Fortec Motorsport driver beat his team-mate Dean Smith (Wolverhampton) by 2.597s, with Apotex Scorpio Motorsport’s Will Bratt (Banbury) clinching his first podium of the season in third.
Smith led the field away from pole position with fellow front row starter Tappy slotting in behind him. Bratt made a lightning start from fifth on the grid to pass both Riki Christodoulou (Sutton Coldfield) and AKA Cobra’s Jeremy Metcalfe (Fleet). Christodoulou was forced to the outside of the circuit and after the tight Deene hairpin, found himself down to 11th place at the end of lap one from third on the grid.
AKA Cobra’s Nathan Caratti (London) and Manor Competition’s Alexander Sims (Peterborough) both gained three places on the opening lap. But Sims’ team-mate Kris Loane (Kesh, Co Fermanagh) failed to complete the opening lap after a strong qualifying session saw him start the race from 10th.
Eucatex’ Adriano Buzaid (Oxford) regained one of the two places he lost at the start of the race by passing Manor Competition’s Richard Singleton (Conwy) on lap three. On the following lap, Borthwick Motorsport’s Ryan Borthwick slid wide at Gracelands bend allowing Eurotek Motorsport’s Jordan Oakes (Hopton) to gain momentum and pass him at Tarzan hairpin.
Oakes then dropped two places after a small mistake allowed both Borthwick and Fortec’s Ryuji Yamamoto (Northampton) to overtake. Meanwhile, Tappy and Smith had built a lead of around two seconds to third-placed Bratt, who was one second clear of Metcalfe.
On lap six, AKA Cobra’s Adam Christodoulou overtook Sims for fifth place at Deene hairpin and soon proved to have the quicker race pace by opening a significant gap to the Manor car. However, he was too far behind Metcalfe to make a bid for fourth.
The second retirement of the race came on lap nine when Caratti ran wide exiting Brook chicane and clipped the outside wall with his right rear tyre. His team-mate, Chris Holmes (Akeley) closed the gap to Sims who was heading a train of four cars including Buzaid and Singleton.
That group became three cars when Buzaid out-braked himself into the left-hand corner at Pif Paf and ended his race in the gravel trap. He had been attempting to pass Holmes who, remarkably, had completed much of the race without a front wing after contact earlier in the race.
The decisive moment in the race came on lap 11 when Smith locked his brakes on the entry to Deene hairpin. He later found his brake bias to have been set to heavily to the rear brakes but the error allowed Tappy to seize the lead of the race. The 22-year-old had little trouble holding off his team-mate over the closing four laps to clinch his second win from three races.
On the penultimate lap, Oakes passed Apotex Scorpio Motorsport’s new signing Richard Keen (Amersham) for 12th place and he then passed Holmes on the final lap to finish 11th. Yamamoto made up one place on the last lap by passing team-mate Riki Christodoulou.
