Barwell drivers lose out in Donington carnage.

Both Barwell Motorsport drivers, Aaron Slight and Tom Chilton, had their race weekends ruined through the end-of-season driving standards of their rivals in the final BTCC event at Donington Park last weekend.

Slight's challenge for the Independents Cup title was completely ruined after he was knocked out of both races on the first lap, and Chilton lost out on a potential overall podium finish in both races after being punted into a spin from behind.

The highpoint of the weekend, however, was the absolutely miraculous job that the Barwell crew did in repairing the massive damage to the rear of Slight's car between the races, after it had effectively been 'written off' in the Sprint encounter. This typified the incredible team effort and spirit that has been a feature of Barwell's 2002 season.

During Saturday's official qualifying sessions, Chilton turned around his recent poor patch with a brilliant effort that had him challenging for the top eight spots on both grids. In the Sprint race session he had seventh in the bag right up until the dying moments when he was pipped by 5/100ths of a second by the factory Honda of Alan Morrison.

Slight, meanwhile, couldn't get the brake bias balance to his liking in the Sprint session and fell down the order before making an excellent recovery in the Feature battle. He held sixth place before going out for his final run, and his dashboard timer was showing that this final lap would be even better when the red flags came out to stop the session because of an accident. In the end he was bumped down to ninth but still only 1/10th of a second from fifth spot!

Slight's Sprint race, and his Independent championship lead, was destroyed within two corners of the start, along with the complete rear end of his Barwell Astra. Two cars immediately in front of him had collided and one of them snagged the front of our car, pushing him wide at the same time as he was whacked up the rear by one of the Peugeots. This final impact sent him hurtling into the wall on the outside of the track and completely squashed the back of the car, so that the rear boot line was actually level with the rear wheels!

Chilton, meanwhile, had made a great start and was running in seventh overall and leading Indie Cup car when he was smacked from behind by one of the Atomic Kitten MGs and sent into a spin. He did a great job to keep it out of the barriers but he had been pushed down to 12th overall behind the Atomic Kitten MG of Colin Turkington. Despite his tyres being ruined when he spun, Chilton caught Turkington and launched a major last lap effort into getting past and taking second in the Indie division. He got alongside at the hairpin but Turkington had the better momentum into the final corner and just held on.

It looked to the general observer that Aaron Slight's challenge was over for the weekend and the year, as his car was in such a bad state. However, Barwell certainly weren't prepared to admit defeat, and it was all hands on deck in the team garage as the mechanics set about rebuilding the entire rear end. Luckily for Barwell, the local bodyshop manager was up for day to support the team, and he was very quickly given some Barwell overalls as he set about the task of pulling out the boot! With just on two hours to perform this magic trick, the odds were stacked against the team. However, with the aid of about ?1000 worth of 'tank tape' and some ratchet straps, somehow Barwell managed to pull the rabbit out of the hat and a fully functioning if not very pretty Barwell Astra made it onto the grid in time for the Feature race!

With Slight now three points behind the Peugeot 406 of Dan Eaves in the Indie Cup battle, the race for the title was back on. Tragically, however, his Feature race lasted little longer than the Sprint as the works Proton of David Leslie smashed into the front wheel of our Astra as they braked for the Esses, breaking the upright and causing enough damage to force Slight to retire.

Moments later Barwell endured further cruel fortune as Chilton was fouled by the Peugeot 406 of Carl Breeze, who punted him off the track on the exit of the last hairpin and into the wall. Although it was of little compensation to Barwell, Breeze later received a licence endorsement and fine for his actions.