1989 Esso RAC British Touring Car Championship - Discussion and results

[Jesper OH]

Regarding Mike Newman and Birmingham, look at the video from about 4:05 and look for the top left hand of the screen:

http://www.motorsportmad.com/view/62...reet-race-1989

You have
1. Tim Harvey
2. Andy Rouse
3. Robb Gravett
4. Laurence Bristow
5. Chris Hodgetts
6. Sean Walker
7. Guy Edwards
and then a gab before a black Sierra, presumably Mike Newman, seems to overshoot the corner and getting nastily close to the armco, leaving room for the white Sierras of Jerry Mahony and Gerrit van Kouwen to go by. Perhaps VIVA GT can fill in the details of Newman's faith?

Autosport seems to have reported the qualifying times and subsequent qualifying positions rather than grid positions. From what I can see the grid positions should be something like this:

Pos.	Cl.	#	Driver	Cl.	Car	Time
1.	1.	21	Robb Gravett	A	Ford	1:35.64
2.	2.	1	Andy Rouse	A	Ford	1:35.87
3.	3.	7	Tim Harvey	A	Ford	1:36.52
4.	4.	6	Laurence Bristow	A	Ford	1:36.80
5.	5.	15	Chris Hodgetts	A	Ford	1:37.31
6.	6.	5	Sean Walker	A	Ford	1:37.35
7.	7.	10	Guy Edwards	A	Ford	1:38.26
8.	8.	3	Mike Newman	A	Ford	1:38.??
9.	9.	2	Jerry Mahony	A	Ford	1:38.59
10.	10.	20	Mike Smith	A	Ford	1:38.75
11.	11.	25	Gerrit van Kouwen	A	Ford	1:38.35?
12.	1.	32	James Weaver	B	BMW	1:40.54
13.	2.	33	Frank Sytner	B	BMW	1:41.71
14.	3.	43	Godfrey Hall	B	BMW	1:43.44
15.	4.	35	Ian Forrest	B	BMW	1:44.67
16.	5.	37	Nettan Lindgren	B	BMW	1:44.??
17.	6.	44	John Llewellyn	B	BMW	1:48.23?
18.	1.	56	John Cleland	C	Vauxhall	1:44.86
19.	7.	31	John Clark	B	BMW	?
20.	1.	75	Ray Armes	D	Honda	1:48.27
21.	2.	58	Louise Aitken-Walker	C	Vauxhall	1:48.34
22.	3.	57	Jeremy Rossiter	C	Vauxhall	1:48.??
23.	2.	70	Phil Dowsett	D	Toyota	1:48.98
?	4.	55	John Morris	C	Volkswagen	?
?	?	85	Les Liddiard	D	Toyota	?
?	?	77	Geoff Kimber-Smith	D	Toyota	1:52.80
27.	5.	81	Tony Dolley	D	Toyota	?
28.	12.	4	Graham Goode	A	Ford	1:39.01

As can be seen there's some questinable times on the list and indeed some missing times too. All in all it seems as if 33 drivers turned up for the Birmingham race.
This is as far as I can work the grid out. As the top-5 in each class likely got an automatic start, the rest of the presumable 28 car grid determined by overall qualifying times except that no class could be larger than 40 % of the 28 cars = maximum of 11 cars from one class.
This would explain why Graham Goode, Karl Jones, Mike O'Brien and Nick May in the Maserati was non-qualifiers in class A.
Alan Minshaw was the only non-qualifier in class B, the bit about a blown engine in his class C Golf being mentioned here.
Mike Jordan should have been on the grid but his gearbox failed just before start which moved Graham Goode to the grid. But if the 40 % rule would have applied this position should have gone to Alan Minshaw, as class B would then have been up to 8 cars!?
Tony Dolley is mentioned as the final non-qualifier in the qualifying report, but think I have spotted all three AE82 Corollas in the race.

Jesper