Over the bank holiday weekend, the MSA British Rallycross Championship headed to Pembrey racetrack in Wales, for both rounds three and four consecutively. Looking to pull away in first place in his class – Aiden Hills.
Round 3 débuted a new format for rallycross, where the race was run in reverse around the circuit. But, despite the attempt to produce some quick racing, the British weather had other ideas, with torrential rain starting in the first practice, and continuing until the very end of the day. This made for some dangerous racing conditions, with having heats being stopped becoming the common theme for the day.
Despite the weather, Hills persevered and started his weekend with a first and a second overall in Qualifying 1 and 2 respectively. But, weather conditions and time being lost caused the organisers to make the decision to skip qualifying 3 and move straight into the semi-finals. Due to his stellar performances in the first two heats, Hills sat in pole position, and made an excellent start until the first corner, where he carried too much speed, and this, mixed with awful track conditions resulted in him rolling his car, ending his day.
Because of this, it didn’t look as though Hills would make it out for round 4, but his family support team put in a huge amount of effort to get the car out for the Monday. Determined to not let the work of his father and grandfather go to waste, and so, consequently, he managed to achieve second place in all three heats, and also recorded the fastest lap of the day – 1:03:704. The semi-finals also saw Hills come home in second, which subsequently earned him third place in the final.
He made an excellent get away, but unfortunately, got caught up in an incident at the first corner, meaning that he was pushed down to sixth place, but, through driving hard, managed to get back up into third, where he finished. Hills displayed some mature racing and scored some valuable points for the championship. He now sits in third place overall, with the fifth round taking place in Maasmechlen in Belgium on the 16/17 July.
Hills commented that, “I was totally gutted on Sunday night, thinking that I had thrown a chance at the championship away, and Monday was very much a damage limitation race, I was just hoping to make the Final, so to come 3rd was very surprising but all the hard work paid off! I can’t thank dad and grandad enough for the hard work they put in to get the car ready for Monday.”