Chiles in charge after dominant Supersports win

Chris Chiles dominated June’s international Supersports Cup rounds at Donington and the Nurburgring, his March 717 having the legs of the McLaren M8F pack once engine problems, carried over from Silverstone’s opener, were licked by Racing Fabrications’s engineer Ian Jones.

German veteran Peter Hoffmann outdragged Chiles in the first leg at Donington, only to spin his pink McLaren through the Craner Curves. Chiles, nursing a broken rocker, and pursuer Richard Eyre (whose M8F was overheating) cut their pace, but remained clear of ex-GP driver Mike Wilds’s 2-litre Chevron B31/36.

Hoffmann’s charge from the back of the grid to second was the talk of the second rubber, while Wilds and 1995 champion John Burton (whose Chevron B26 had non-started when its fuel pump failed the previous day) ducked past Eyre, busy wrestling with his ill-handling car.

Chiles was invincible in both wet and thy conditions at the Nurburgring’s Jan Wellem Cup event a fortnight later, when another second day blast through the field by Hoffman gave his home supporters plenty to cheer. Chris’s task was made easier the previous day when champion Paul Ingram spun his Chevron B19, having forged it into second place from the start.

Eyre was again Chiles’s closest pursuer, but German Oliver Mathai drove Harm Lagaay’s Chevron-BMW B8 to a superb third on the Saturday. MP