Brands Hatch 2025

The Alfa Romeo and Italian Intermarque Championship made its annual trip to Brands Hatch to take part in the popular Festival Italia meeting to contest rounds 7 and 8 of the championship on the usual 1.2 mile Indy circuit. The weather forecast predicted temperatures in the high 20s and so it turned out..

As anticipated, there was an excellent entry comprising 28 cars across all 4 classes with the exciting addition of James Parker’s Ferrari 458 Challenge car alongside the regular Modified cars of Jamie Thwaites’s Giulietta, Barry McMahon’s Giulia, Jack Berry’s 4C, and Andy Page’s 116 Giulietta. Mike Hilton’s 4C was making its first appearance of the season as was Scott Austin’s Integrale engined 156. Ian Woolfenden was making his debut appearance with the familiar 156 Turbo of Barry McMahon whilst Charlie McCarthy had brought the Ford engined Ferrari Dino once again and was racing as an Invitation car with the Modified group.

The Power Trophy cars of Toby Broome, Stacey Dennis, Simon and Chris McFie, and Steve Godfrey, were joined by Daniel Wood in the 164 and John Griffiths in the 156, both making their first appearance of the season.

The Turismo class was made up of the leading 33 of Nathan Bignell, the 156 of Edward Robinson, and the 33 of Rob Hollyman, joined by the 147 Twin Spark of James Powell, making a move from the Twin Spark class.

The Twin Spark class entry comprised the 147s of George Warren, Dave Pickup and Ian Fenwick and the 156s of James and Richard Ford, Mark Sullivan and Andy Winterton, the latter two drivers making their first appearance of the year. Also due to make a welcome return to the championship was Adrian Norman in the 147 but unfortunately he had to withdraw his entry at the very last minute, leaving 27 cars to take to the track for the 20 minute qualifying session.

QUALIFYING

Toby Broome immediately set the early pace in his Revs Italia supported 147 with a 56.795 on lap 2, followed by Barry McMahon with a 55.785 later that lap. Toby was first in the 54s on the next lap with Jamie Thwaites in the 53s on lap 4. Mike Hilton set a quicker time on lap 5 as did Barry on the same lap before Jamie was the first sub 52 second lap on lap 8 as the times edged closer to Neil Smith’s long standing lap record time of 51.113. James Parker had been in touch with steadily improving lap times in the Ferrari and took over provisional pole with 51.658 on lap 13. Jamie was a tenth quicker two laps later before James responded with a succession of fastest laps culminating in a 49.99 on his penultimate lap to take pole by one and a half seconds from Jamie Thwaites with Barry McMahon 3rd, Jack Berry’s 4C 4th and Mike Hilton’s 4C 5th. Andy Page qualified his 116 Giulietta 10th, 6th in class, with Scott Austin’s 156 13th, Charlie McCarthy’s Dino in 24^th and Ian Woolfenden’s 156 in 27^th.

Toby Broome led the Power Trophy class in grid positions 6-9 with a 53.961 followed by Stacey Dennis’s Bianco supported Giulietta with a 55.48, Simon McFie with a 57.189 and Chris McFie on 57.28. Dan Wood was 15^th, 5^th in class with a 57.9 ahead of Steve Godfrey’s GT with a 58.1. John Griffiths completed the Power Trophy qualifiers in 25^th.

The leading Turismo class runner in 11^th was Nathan Bignell in his 33 with a 57.585, just ahead of Richard Ford with a Twin Spark pole time of 57.601. James Ford was 14^th in his Twin Spark with a 57.849 and the socond Turismo class car of James Powell was 17^th with a 58.2. Next up were the 4 Twin Sparks of George Warren, Dave Pickup, Mark Sullivan and Ian Fenwick with times of 58.439-59.312, ahead of Edward Robinson’s 3^rd placed Turismo class 156. The Twin Spark of Andy Winterton was 23^rd with Rob Hollyman’s Turismo class 33 in 26^th.

RACE 1

A total of 27 cars took the grid for the 12:30 scheduled start time with the weather still very warm. As the lights went out, James Parker’s pole position Ferrari initially remained on the grid, causing following cars to take desperate avoiding action which resulted in damage to Mike Hilton’s 4C, Scott Austin’s 156 and the Twin Spark 147 of Dave Pickup. Amazingly, a number of cars managed to somehow thread their way around the unfortunate trio with little or no damage but the incident resulted in the inevitable red flag to allow damaged cars to be cleared. James Parker had sustained a knock on the rear but was able to take the restart. The race time was reduced to 15 minutes and was underway after a twenty minute delay. 

Quickest off the line was the Alfa Workshop 4C of Jack Berry from James Parker’s Ferrari, Barry McMahon’s Giulia, Jamie Thwaites’s TCR Giulietta and the four Power Trophy cars, Toby Broome’s 147, Stacey Dennis’s Giulietta and Simon and Chris McFie in their Fiat Punto Abarths. That was the order as the cars completed lap 1 with Nathan Bignell’s 33 in 9^th and Richard Ford’s TS in 10^th. Andy Page was next in his Modified 116 Giulietta followed by the second TS of James Ford and the second Turismo of James Powell. George Warren’s 147 was next followed by the Power Trophy cars of Dan Wood and Steve Godfrey, then the Twin Sparks of Mark Sullivan, Ian Fenwick and Andy Winterton. John Griffiths was 20^th, Charlie McCarthy’s Dino 21^st, Rob Hollyman’s 33, Ian Woolfenden’s 156 and Edward Robinson’s 156.

The order remained the same on lap 2 except for Rob Hollyman making a pass on Charlie’s Dino and the 156 cars of Richard Ford and Edward Robinson both pulling into the pits at the end of the lap. Richard’s leading Twin Spark had developed a misfire and was to take no further part in the race whilst the Turismo 156 of Edward had electrical problems and also retired. Rob Hollyman was concerned about rising engine temperatures and he also retired his 33 at the end of the next lap.

Jack’s 4C was still leading as the cars completed lap 4 but the gap at the top had been closed to just over a tenth by the hard charging Ferrari, closely followed by Jamie’s equally hard charging Giulietta that had passed Barry’s Giulia on lap 3 and was also close to the leading pair. By the end of lap 5, both had passed the 4C and were engaged in a race long battle for the top spot with Jack’s 4C still in the frame.

Meanwhile, James Ford had taken the Twin Spark lead closely followed by George Warren’s 147. However, as the cars entered the Cooper Straight on lap 5 the 156 faltered causing James to pull over at the side of the track with no power and resulting in a safety car situation in order to recover the 156. As the remaining cars circulated and closed up behind the safety car, James Parker was leading the field from Jamie Thwaites’s Giulietta and Jack Berry’s 4C, Toby Broome was leading the Power Trophy class from Stacey Dennis and the McFie brothers’ Punto Abarths, Nathan Bignell led the Turismo class with James Powell right behind and George Warren led the Twin Sparks from Mark Sullivan and Ian Fenwick.

The safety car pulled in with over 5 minutes left of the scheduled 15 and the cars headed off on to lap 9 with James Parker’s Ferrari leading the way. On lap 10, Andy Page passed Stacey Dennis to move into 6^th whilst Chris and Simon McFie, rarely far apart from each other, exchanged places and John Griffiths got ahead of the Twin Spark of Andy Winterton. Jamie Thwaites continued to keep the pressure on the leader, setting a new lap record of 50.426 in the process on the final lap. Jack Berry had been slightly off the pace of the leading pair following the restart but was still in a comfortable 3^rd ahead of Barry McMahon’s Giulia. Toby Broome’s 147 GTA finished 5^th and first in the Power Trophy, setting a new lap record of 53.621 in the process.^, Next up was the Modified car of Andy Page with Stacey Dennis the runner up Power Trophy car ahead of Chris and Simon McFie. Nathan Bignell took the Turismo class win with a five second cushion to James Powell in the 147. George Warren took the Twin Spark class win ahead of the 5^th placed Power Trophy 164 of Dan Wood. Mark Sullivan finished 14^th overall and 2^nd Twin Spark ahead of the Power Trophy cars of Steve Godfrey and John Griffiths, whilst Ian Fenwick picked up the third podium award in the Twin Spark Cup. Andy Winterton was 4^th in the 156 Twin Spark whilst Charlie McCarthy brought the Ferrari Dino home in 19^th spot, ahead of Ian Woolfenden’s 156. Dave Pickup continued to work on the 147 after the start line incident put him out of race 1 and would successfully complete the necessary repairs to enable it to line up for race 2. Richard and James Ford both managed to sort out their respective problems as did Edward Robinson and Rob Hollyman and were able to line up along with Dave Pickup at the rear of the grid for race 2.

Race 1 Results

RACE 2

As the lights went out to signal the start of race 2, it was once again the Alfa Workshop 4C that led the field around Paddock Hill Bend from the Ferrari of James Parker, the TCR car of Jamie Thwaites and the 147 GTA of Toby Broome. Barry McMahon had to retire the Giulia after the green flag lap with an engine fire so it was the 116 Giulietta of Andy Page then the Giulietta of Stacey Dennis in 5^th and 6^th places as the cars completed lap 1. Chris McFie was 7^th ahead of Nathan Bignell in the 33, Simon McFie in the 2^nd Punto and James Powell’s 147 completing the top ten. Eleventh was Dan Wood’s 164 ahead of the leading Twin Spark car of George Warren, the 2^nd placed Twin Spark of Mark Sullivan and the PT 156 of John Griffiths. James Ford had made up 6 places on the first lap to sit 3^rd in the Twin Spark class, then came Steve Godfrey, Ian Fenwick and Rob Hollyman. Richard Ford had also made up a number of places to 19^th ahead of Charlie McCarthy, Andy Winterton, Dave Pickup, who had also made up a couple of places, Edward Robinson and Ian Woolfenden.

Jack Berry’s 4C was under pressure from James Parker’s Ferrari from the outset, finally losing the place on lap 4. Jamie Thwaites was keeping the pressure on them both, getting through into second on lap 6 and setting about closing the small gap to the leading Ferrari. Meanwhile, George Warren pulled off the circuit on the Cooper Straight on lap 2 with what turned out to be a clutch problem and Simon McFie retired the second of the Fiat Puntos on the same lap. Rob Hollyman’s woes continued and the rise in engine temperatures once again forced his retirement at the end of lap 3. Richard Ford had passed the ailing 33 on lap 2 and now had Ian Fenwick’s 147 between his 156 and the similar car of brother James. On lap 3, both cars passed the 156 of John Griffiths and Richard managed to get in front of Ian and start to close the gap to James and the leading Twin Spark car of Mark Sullivan. Dave Pickup had also been making progress from his starting position at the rear, up to 18^th after 2 laps, 16^th after 3 laps and 15^th after 4 laps with less than 4 seconds now covering the top 5 Twin Spark cars. James and Richard both moved up a place on the next lap to lead the TS group with Mark 3^rd ahead of Dave and Ian.

In the Turismo class, Nathan Bignell had pulled out a 2 second lead over James Powell and was maintaining the gap over the next few laps. With Rob Hollyman’s retirement, the remaining Turismo class runner was Edward Robinson in his 156, but he was seemingly unable to close the gap to the front two.

In the Power Trophy class Toby Broome had extended his lead to just over 12 seconds from the Giulietta of Stacey Dennis by the end of lap 7 and as the cars continued on lap 8, Stacey unfortunately suffered a flat tyre which resulted in the car going off the circuit and bringing out the safety car to enable its recovery. This put Chris McFie and Dan Wood into the remaining podium positions for the class.

The Safety Car pulled in at the end of lap 14 leaving around four and a half minutes of race time remaining on the clock. James Parker once again led the field closely followed by Jamie Thwaites with the 4C of Jack Berry keeping a watching brief. Jamie kept on pushing right to the end setting a number of quick times and his fastest lap was once again made on his final lap, this time just short of his own record set earlier in the day. Jack’s 4C finished 3^rd with Toby Broome taking 4^th overall and the Power Trophy class win with Andy Page 5^th overall and 4^th Modified class car. Charlie McCarthy’s Invitation Modified entry finished 5^th with Ian Wolfenden 6^th. Chris McFie finished 2^nd in the Power Trophy with Dan Wood 3^rd, John Griffiths 4^th and Steve Godfrey 5^th. Nathan Bignell finished 7^th overall and leading Turismo class car after a fine drive, with James Powell 2^nd from Edward Robinson 3^rd.

James Ford led the Twin Spark field through the safety car period and racing was resumed with the cars closely following, with Richard in second, Mark Sullivan third and Dave Pickup putting in his fastest two laps of the race in his bid to secure a podium position. On lap 16 with all cars pushing hard, Mark ran wide at Clearways, costing 6 seconds and enabling Dave to move into 3^rd with Ian Fenwick 4^th, Andy Winterton 5th and Mark unfortunately finishing in 6^th spot. James took the chequered flag to take the class win with Richard second, having set the fastest lap in his effort to challenge for the lead, which was just outside the lap record. Dave Pickup had experienced a difficult weekend, but kept at it and took the final podium spot in third, also picking up the Driver of the Day award in recognition of his efforts .

In the championship, Toby Broome leads Jack Berry by 28 points with Nathan Bignell in third. Jack also leads the Modified class by 25 points with Jamie Thwaites second and Andy Page third. Toby leads the Power Trophy by 46 points from Chris McFie with Stacey Dennis third. Nathan Bignell leads the Turismo class by 60 points from Ben Robinson with James Powell third, and in the Twin Spark Cup class, George Warren leads Richard Ford by 8 points with James Ford third. Next races are at Silverstone National circuit on 11 and 12 October.

Race 2 Results