Encouraging number sign up for a promising season.

557 drivers have signed up for this year’s series, emphasising its healthy status after last year’s revival.
While numbers last year weren’t disappointing, there was always scope for improvement; with all rounds this year being open to all comers, there’s the potential for even greater turnouts, but with numbers still low enough to allow a decent amount of laps/track time for drivers, and therefore greater potential for good racing for the spectators. Of course, it’s a fact that some of those who’ve signed up have done so to allow themselves to score points at selected rounds only, depending on location; those who simply want an enjoyable weekend’s racing at whichever BAS or UKAC venue is closest round by round.
With five excellent clubs to visit this season – remember Simon Bentley’s words: “these are the best venues we’ve had for years” – we are clearly in for a great series, with each club a known quantity and all venues, bar the new track at Stroud, familiar to most competitors.
On the strength of a great closing round last season, there are few better ways to be starting the season than at Scunthorpe; with its flat track and hard standing pit areas, the Blyton venue is one of the more resilient and weatherproof, and you can guarantee that the club will work hard to maintain its quality over the weekend. Cwmdu and South Wales are circuits that have been visited many times for the BAS, and the excellent Thornborough location in the Yorkshire Dales has been the scene of many a classic Nationals. The Stroud club have had a year out, and have relaid the track on the Javelin Park grass, creating a smaller circuit than the massive oval it used to be. That the first round of the UKAC is being held there will give us all a clue as to what to expect for the third round of the BAS, but the hugely adept club will doubtless produce the kind of excellent meeting we expect the others to be.