Head to head for the Formula Ford title with nine races remainingScottish racer Clay Mitchell joins JTR squad for its home-track race
As the Dunlop MSA Formula Ford Championship accelerates towards its season finale, the action steps up a gear this weekend at the Rockingham speedway in Northamptonshire where title rivals Harrison Scott and Jayde Kruger will once more bid to gain a decisive advantage.
South African Kruger scored two wins in his JTR EcoBoost Mygale a fortnight ago at Knockhill to close down Scott’s championship advantage to just six points. It has been nip and tuck between Kruger and Falcon Motorsport driver Scott (Althorne) all season; they have exchanged the championship lead seven times already and, while Jayde has scored more race wins – eight compared with Harrison’s three – it is Scott who has proved the more consistent podium finisher with 17 trips on to the rostrum versus Kruger’s 11.
Including Rockingham’s triple-header, there are nine races remaining in which to determine who will succeed Dan Cammish as Formula Ford champion…
After his high-speed crash at Knockhill, MBM Motorsport’s Ashley Sutton will return to the fray at Rockingham, bidding to add further victories to the four he has scored in the last eight races, but the 20-year-old from Bishops Stortford will have to contend with being at the wheel of a loaned Mygale, his regular chassis still being under repair. Promising newcomer Michael O’Brien (Silverstone) returns to the MBM team as his running mate.
For the Pavenham-based JTR squad Rockingham is very much a home match, as it is for Kruger’s team-mate Max Marshall (North Kilworth). They will be joined at the speedway by a new team-mate: 17-year-old Glaswegian Clay Mitchell, who will be enjoying his first taste of modern-era Formula Ford. Clay has extensive karting experience and has also raced in the Knockhill-based Scottish Formula Ford Championship.
“Clay is planning to do the last three meetings of the year with JTR,” said his father, Bradley Mitchell. “We met several teams when the championship visited Knockhill and JTR impressed me – Jayde Kruger was very helpful and very clear as to why he is with them. Obviously the EcoBoost car is a lot quicker and a lot different to what Clay is used to, so it will be interesting to see how he gets on.”
Clay will join the burgeoning Scholarship class, which is led by Sutton currently with an 87-point advantage, and contested also by Falcon team-mates Ricky Collard (Eversley) and Chris Mealin (Isle of Man), as well as by O’Brien and Richardson Racing’s Louise Richardson (Grantham).
Rockingham’s talent-filled grid is completed by Radical Motorsport pairing Juan Rosso (Argentina) and James Abbott (Thurlby), and by SWB Sinter driver Greg Holloway, the Australian bidding to cement his top-10 championship position.
