2022 World Final
2022 World Championship :: Charlie Sworder crowned at Ipswich
Looking back 10 months to the 2022 world championship race, it is up there with the best in the modern era. Cambridgeshire’s Charlie Sworder emerged the victor after a 25 lap battle royale.
The race took place at Foxhall Stadium, Ipswich back in September 2022. A year on from the last update and now the 2022 world championship album is ready. It’s taken a while due to the working from home culture that came in during Covid Lockdown. For the past few years, any spare time has been taken up keeping things ticking over. I’ve now retired on 30 June after 50 years and will now be able to devote time to getting the site back on track.
Stage 1
From the rolling lap, Paul Hines took the early lead with Frankie Wainman tight on his back bumper. The high speed train was forced on a wide line through turns 1 into the turn 2 fence. Meanwhile, on turn 4 a coming together of Bobby Griffin and Mark Tesselaar was joined by others including Neil Scriven, Tyrone Evans, Mark Sargent, Shaun Webster and Luke Davidson.
The reds came out for the clear up and fence repairs.
Stage 2
On the restart, the exchange of bumpers continued at the front. Frankie Wainman managed to move Wesley Schaap and Tom Harris aside for 1st, while Paul Hines fell back.
Charlie Sworder was a man on a mission and forced his way past 2nd & 3rd in his chase for the lead. Frankie Wainman still held that place. An oil spillage caught out a number of drivers, including the first place man. This gave Charlie Sworder the chance to take over the lead before the reds came out again.
Stage 3
Keeping a cool head, Charlie Sworder maintained his lead ahead of Tom Harris and 4th row starter Bobby Griffin. Frankie took advantage of Bobby Griffin putting a hit on ‘The Hitman’ Harris to move back up to 2nd, only to lose out in final lap clashes,
A classic World Final. Too many cars on too small a track provided action all the way through the field. It’s something of a rarity for the gold roof race, a stock car race rather than stock cars racing.