Thrills in the Hills at Sonoma!

Sonoma Raceway was the venue for the  second meeting of the RLLMUK Historic trophy Roadsports series, and once again, the series put on a display of the intense close racing that's been its trademark.

After Qualifying, Meatball's Mustang claimed pole, with Kurzheck's second in the Capri, RichXM655 in the Lotus Cortina third, ahead of boozy's Alpine  and Rice Kingford in another Mustang.

In the early phase of the 10-lap race, Meatball eased out a lead in the powerful pony car, while Kurzheck and RichXM655 battled behind in their smaller, more nimble fords. As the race passed mid-distance, Rich in the Cortina finally managed to start bridging the gap across to Meatball and place the big car under some pressure.

That pressure ended up with Meatball running wide off the track in the Carousel - the long, punishing left hander half way through the lap. Both Rich and Kurzheck got past the Mustang, which rejoined in pursuit.

The action wasn't just at the head of the field. Boozy and Rice were engaged throughout the race in a david-and-goliath style battle where Boozy's lightweight Alpine would dominate the turns, and then Rice's big V8 would re-assert itself where the racetrack was straight.

A racing incident saw Meatball push Kurzheck off-track, again at the Carousel, and she breifly dropped back into the clutches of Rice, before being able to recover to 3rd. as the race ended, RichXM655 took the win by 1.4 seconds from meatball, with Kurzheck trailing in 3rd. the action wasn;t over though as Rice took 4th by half a second from boozy, to finish the running.

It was testament to how hard all the drivers had pushed that they all beat their qualifying lap times. a short break followed to allow shattered nerves to be repaired and then the grid formed up for race 2.

Off the line, Race 2 settled fairly quickly into RichXM655 leading, Kurzheck in second, and Meatball in third, while Rice and Boozy scrapped for 4th place again. The top three slowly pulled away from the other two, with the race splitting into two groups.

At the head of the field, no driver really pulled away from any other and there were several attempted overtakes, though none that were made to stick.

That all changed on lap 9, As Kurzheck and Meatball entered the carousel. Meatball got a good run into the corner, but the Capri driver held tight to the inside line and saw off the attacking Mustang. However, at the following corner, the purple car went in way too deep and left the door open for Meatball to pass through.

Meatball's charge wasn't over though and at the same point on the final lap, Rich got a bad exit in the cortina, allowing the pursuing mustang to take the lead through turn 9 with two corners to go. But it wasn't over. Meatball got into a slide through the crucial turn 10, Allowing the tiny white car to counterattack into the hairpin. So, as they crossed the line, Rich took a second win, with Meatball second, and Kurzheck third again.

Results:
Round 1:

1	RichXm655	19:33.055		1:55.483	30
2	Meatball	19:34.415	1.36	1:57.306	25
3	Kurzheck	19:42.262	9.207	1:55.830	20
4	Rice kingford	19:46.505	13.45	1:56.355	16
5	Boozy	19:47.110	14.055	1:56.268	12

Round 2:

1	RichXM655	19:24.595		1:55.084	30
2	Meatball	19:25.836	1.241	1:54.410	25
3	Kurzheck	19:27.848	3.253	1:54.982	20
4	Boozy	19:35.622	11.027	1:55.431	16
5	Rice kingford	19:37.100	12.505	1:55.509	12

Championship Standings

RichXM655	106
Meatball	95
Kurzheck	95
Boozy	64
Rice kingford	28