The Dave Beck juggernaut in ACU Pro Stock Bike got back on track after blowing a motor to smithereens in the final of the Easter Thunderball. Low qualifier, low ET of the class, and the event win secured when Len Paget’s GSXR shed a chain early in the run. Beck is already on course for yet another national championship, not a bad way to celebrate the birth of daughter Penelope just a few weeks before the meeting.
We’ve mentioned it before, we’ll mention it here, and we’ll no doubt mention it again, the no bar Super Street Bike class is simply the hottest ticket in ACU competition at the moment. Bumper entries and yet more racers dropping into the seven-second zone point to a class in rude health. And yet, despite all this competition, the final round match-up was a repeat of the Easter Thunderball eliminator with Steve Venables and Dave Smith fronting up for the trophy runoff. Venables took the trophy with a 7.413/195 and backing up a semi-final 7.334/197 for a new ET record. The semi-final quartet of Venables, Smith, Graham Balchin and Richard Stubbins having all recorded ETs of 7.6 or below in preceding rounds, the latter clocking a 7.635 on only his third pass on his new Hayabusa.
After his gearbox failed to engage on his way into stage at the Easter final, Dave Peters managed to gain revenge over Phil Leamon in the Summernationals Competition Bike eliminator when they both faced off again. This time there were no drivetrain woes for Peters and he rocketed to a 7.773 that Leamon would have found difficult to cover even if he hadn’t red lit.
