– King to start last on grid despite qualifying second
By Rawle Toney
in Barbados
It was a day filled with high end drama for Andrew King and Gavin Gayadin at yesterday’s time trial for the second round of this year’s Caribbean Motor Racing championships at Bushy Park circuit in Barbados.
King competes in the Group ‘4’ category which is considered as the marquee event of the championship series since it features all of the Caribbean’s top class drivers and fastest cars.
In actuality, King driving his Tube frame Mazda RX7, finished second for today’s event after clocking 41.864 seconds; the fastest time ever by a two wheel drive car on the island but negligence caused him and top pole finisher Roger Mayers and his ford Focus, (41.064s) to be relegated to the back of the grid.
The two drivers after finishing their respective laps for the time trials, returned to the pits instead of heading straight to the officials weight station for the re-weighting of their cars.
Their laxity made way for Barbados’ Barry Mayers (42.135), defending champion Stuart Maloney (42.400s) and Jamaica’s David Summerbell (42.620s) who were promoted to the top of the grid.
Speaking with Stabroek Sport, King said that he was very angry but blamed himself for what he deemed as slackness on his behalf.
“I think it’s complete brain failure, I have no one but myself to blame so now I would have to start from the back tomorrow (today) and hope that I finish at a good position after the first race. But I think the car is running perfectly but we have a major disadvantage now but I would have to live with that,” King said.
He added that this put a spoke in his wheel as it relates to claiming his first Caribbean championship: “Well, obviously this is going to set me back, but like I said, I will wait and see after my first race (today) because I wouldn’t count myself out, my car is running perfectly.”
Due to the mix up in the group, Guyanese, Kevin Jeffrey, who finished ninth on the grid
(43.894 seconds), has been elevated to sixth position in the 10-car race.
Meanwhile, Gavin Gayadin had the intake manifold of his vehicle blown out during his second lap of his run and will start sixth on grid in the group ‘3B’ since he clocked 50.503 seconds.
“Honestly I’m not very disappointed because when I was running earlier in the day, I actually did faster times than the guys who finished on pole. So I think I’ll be fine today, we already got the problem sorted out, so (today) it would be a good; my car is working perfectly so I’ll be fine, still not that disappointed about the incident,” Gayadin added.
Gavin Gouvia clocked 50.690 seconds in the group 2B class to start today’s race in the group at 7th on the grid.
Over in the super bikes local riders Stephen ‘Valentino Rossi’ Vieira and Maurice Menezes will start today’s race fourth and eight respectively.
Hundreds of spectators turned at yesterday’s time trial which reflected that certainly today would see thousands at the track for what the Barbados Auto racing league (BARL) is dubbing the largest international meet ever on the island.
