The third round of the BMKR 2025 championships were held at Bayford Meadows last weekend.

The annual Easter Egg hunt proved a must for the younger drivers on Saturday, with an estimated 100 eggs planted around the circuit to be found.

The Easter break appeared to hit the entries a little for this month, with the Rotax Cadet & Inter classes not being run.

 Also held on Saturday were the races for Bambino class drivers, where some of the closest racing that has been seen at the circuit took place. Jenson Drummond and Lenny Barton enjoyed a great race for the lead which went to Jenson by just 0.22s after 8 hard fought laps. Cooper Galloway finished in 3rd place just beating Alfie Bi to the last podium position. Racing closely to 5th and 6th were William Boswell and Tyrone Pecak. The fastest lap of the race went to Jenson on lap 4 at 1:01.85s.

Honda Cadet  200.

Sunday’s finals began with the Honda Cadet class lining up on the grid. Jack Cope has been in imperious form this year, flinging his red & black kart around the twisty circuit in an impressive manner and with complete confidence in his abilities.

He lined up on pole position and then escaped to an early lead going on to take an eventual victory by a margin of 5.81s, also picking up the fastest lap of the race at 52.16s. Marcus Cooper, who started alongside Cope on the front row finished runner up, he had lost touch with the leader on the first lap, after George Pickett (third on the grid) had a scary moment, which forced Pickett into retirement.

Jenson Fathers battled his way up from 6th on the grid to finish a delighted 3rd ahead of Milo Taylor in 4th. George Lilly had made a great start from 5th to run 3rd early on until he slipped down the order after the 3rd lap, eventually finishing a disappointing 6th. Ollie Spooner-Green took 5th having passed Alexander Robertson over the opening laps. Robertson (7th) couldn’t hold onto 6th after a recovering Lilly passed him towards the end of the race. Alexander Mercer was the last of the finishers in 8th place.

Senior Max.

The Senior qualifying races had proven typically combative, with the morning Heat race proving the point after driving standards penalties were handed out to two drivers. Ciaron Edgson meanwhile had disappeared up the road to take a comfortable win from Josh Pullen and Connor Tubby. Notable retirements were for Rory Burke, Joe Gethen and Joshua Pattrick which would give this trio a lot of work to do over the remainder of the day.

Edgson once again took the Pre Final win from Pullen as Tubby retired from 3rd with just one lap to go. Burke put in an outstanding drive to climb up from 15th to 3rd at the finish. Both Pattrick and Gethen also starred by taking 4th & 5th from their lowly starting positions. Felix Dymant, Caitlin May and Mollie Griffiths finished 6th, 7th & 8th, these 8 drivers completing the first four rows of the grid.

The start of the Final took several attempts before the starter was happy with the formation and as all headed down towards the bottom hairpin Edgson held the lead over Pullen, Burke, Gethen and Pattrick, although the latter was soon ahead of Gethen. Indeed Pattrick was on a charge and soon headed Burke, with Gethen also following him through.

It was soon clear that Edgson couldn’t match the pace that he had in the earlier races as Pullen was ahead after 4 laps, with Pattrick soon dropping Edgson a further place back to 3rd, with Gethen 4th and Burke in 5th. Whilst leading Pullen had looked comfortable, however as the race entered its final phase Pattrick was soon in touching distance, bringing those behind with him too.

On the 11th lap of 13 Pattrick pulled a good pass on Pullen to take the lead, meanwhile Gethen (who was now running with a defective radiator bracket) moved ahead of Edgson, he then pulled off a pass on Pullen for 2nd, which left Pullen off line, letting Edgson and Burke through too.

With all this going on Pattrick established a lead that he wasn’t going to lose as he weaved across the finish line celebrating what was a hard fought win. Gethen was out at the end of lap 11, his damaged radiator having been noticed by race control causing a technical retirement. Burke found a way past Edgson as Gethen pulled into the pits as he went onto take 2nd place 2.45s behind the winner.

Pullen managed to squeeze past Edgson on the last lap to take 3rd, Tubby recovered from starting 15th to 5th behind Edgson at the finish, an impressive drive. May had finished ahead of Tubby but was handed a penalty post race dropping her down to 14th. Dymant too had been ahead of Tubby until he was dumped off the circuit over the closing lap, dropping down a place to 6th. Griffiths took 7th, Matthew Angel 8th, Hollie Bonner 9th and Kyle Dickens 10th. Pattrick’s 7th lap proved to be the fastest of the race at 45.03s.

Junior Max Rookies.

18 drivers made up the grid for the Junior Rookies whos’ Final followed on from the Senior Max drivers. Jacob Smith took the Pre Final win after Jacob Jarman had won the morning’s Heat, these two would head the grid for the Final. On row 2 sat Oliver Peters and Finlay Strang, next up on row 3 were Eden Salvidge and Bailey Doughty. Harrison Page and Alfie Clark made up row 4 ahead of Rhys Rutland and Brandon Swanwick on row 5.

There was initial drama as the karts drove out from the dummy grid, as Jarman’s kart refused to run cleanly, eventually stopping on the circuit, he was out on the spot. Also in trouble was kart 40 of Ashan Iqbal, he too did not make the start.

After plenty of drama in the earlier two races the Final was a settled affair, even with a mid race sprinkling of rain, as Smith continued his winning ways by taking a 0.49s victory over Peters. Strang overcame an early challenge from BM plate holder Salvidge to finish 3rd with Salvidge in 4th. Rutland overtook Page for 5th on the 4th lap and then held the position until the end.

Page crossed the line in 6th with Harrison McNealey enjoying the step up from the Inters class to take 7th. Doughty was the next across the finish until a subsequent nose drop penalty dropped him down to 10th, behind Daniel Thomson and Aston Tabb in 8th & 9th. Fastest lap went to Thomson on the 12th lap with a lap time of 46.51s.

Senior Max 177s.

Finley Cross continued his remarkable start to the 2025 season with yet another comfortable win in the Senior 177 class. An exciting race for 2nd place eventually went to Lewis Deacon, after he had patiently sat behind Jayden Miles for 9 of the 13 laps, before pulling off a clean pass to take a strong 2nd place and just under 1 second behind the winner at the finish. Miles was clear of Reece Anscombe in 4th and Vito Dacres in 5th.

Mark Goodwin put in a solid drive to take 6th and top of the closely fought Masters category, as Doug Thomson took 7th, Gerry Poore 8th and David Ives 9th all finishing within 2s of each other. Andy Locke had run behind Goodwin until a late race spin dropped him down to 10th at the finish. Cross was beaten to the fastest lap of the race by Deacon, who set a 47.26s lap on the 12th tour.

Junior Max.

The last race of the day was for the Junior Max class. Qualifying was topped by the on form Jack Pullen, who headed Kieron Hammond, Callum Sims and Freddie Wall. The Heat win went the way of Pullen who withheld some strong pressure from Sims to take the win, with Ayda Sexton and Hammond taking 3rd & 4th. The Pre Final was a more comfortable victory for Pullen as Sims was embroiled in a fight for 2nd, which he eventually came out on top of from Freddies’ Leppenwell and Wall in 3rd and 4th.

Pullen racing in honour of his Granddad who had recently passed away, got away well at the start with Leppenwell on his bumper into turn 1. Sims on the outside had a sluggish start and ended up tangling with Hammond at turn 1 dropping both out of immediate contention. Leppenwell and Wall then had a great fight over 2nd which each shared up until lap 5 when Wall was forced out wide and out of 2nd place .

A mid race kerfuffle which featured several drivers fighting over 3rd – Dexter Collins, Leon Knight and Ayda Sexton eventually had Sexton up to 3rd before a recovering Sims usurped her on lap 8, he then set off after Leppenwell’s tenure of 2nd place. Pullen was well clear of everyone else out at the front, he eventually cruised to a 2.73s win after 13 laps.

Sims managed to recover to 2nd on the 10th lap, no doubt left wondering ‘what if?’ at the finish. Sexton also managed to pass Leppenwell to take 3rd, Leppenwell was later hit with a 5s nose fairing penalty dropping him to 9th in the standings. Knight came 4th managing to stay out of trouble throughout, ahead of Collins who was 5th on the road until an ‘gaining an unfair advantage’ penalty dropped him back to 10th.

This lifted Wall up and into 5th, although he felt that he deserved so much more after running 2nd early on. Louis Bishop and Fletcher Growns took 6th & 7th ahead of Hammond in 8th, who had spent the whole race trying to catch up after his first corner contretemps with Sims. A 45.99s lap proved to be the fastest of the race for runner up Sims.

Full results from the event can be found here – https://results.alphatiming.co.uk/bmkr/e/273614

Round 4 of the 2025 championships will be held over the 17/18th May.