The Formula Ford Festival has taken place each Autumn on the short Indy circuit at Brands Hatch for over 40 years. Many a famous driver has competed and some have won after two days of fast and furious action.

This year’s event commemorated Gerrit van Kouwen’s win in 1984 – seen below courtesy of Glyn Parham. The Dutchman sadly passed away earlier this year but his family and fellow racers were present to mark the anniversary.

For many years, I was only able to read the reports in Autosport the Thursday after the race to discover which rising star had won. In recent years, however, it has been a more regular date in the diary – here’s some 2018, 2019, 2021 and 2022 action.

These days the numbers entering the Festival are somewhat reduced, perhaps reflecting the decline in popularity of this class of racing – however, a good Formula Ford race is entertaining in a way that wings and slicks processions are not.

I arrived in time for the semi-finals – with a promise of drizzle for the next few hours …. The first semi-final started off damp – then got wet – as these photos at Druids show.

The second semi-final at least had the dubious advantage of running on a consistently wet track. I continued to use the Nikkor 500mm f/5.6E PF ED VR prime lens with a rain cover.

I use a Think Tank emergency rain cover which seems to work well although I prefer not to look through the transparent plastic section. Generally that works OK; whilst the D850 is weather sealed, I prefer not to get it too wet. Again, these shots are around the outside of Druids.

There is a reverse angle shot with no fence impeding the view as the cars leave Druids with some neat spray off the open wheels

There was time to dry out, before swapping to the Nikkor 70-200mm f2.8 zoom on the inside of Druids. I try to get a shot as the drivers brake (or try to out-brake the competition) at Druids. It can be the scene of drama.

There’s also armco and one of MSV’s red bins to try to avoid, so I tend to use the step to get a higher angle to minimise the impact.

The “repecharge” format means that there is a last chance race to allow those affected by mechanical woes, other competitor’s mis-judgements or their own over optimism can have a final chance to get to the Grand Final.

It was back to the 500mm prime shooting from the outside of Clearways looking back towards Surtees beyond the end of the fence.

For the Grand Final, I moved further round to Clark Curve to look back to Clearways. It’s a “through the fence” shot and may take some moving around to get a clean shot without the fence shadow on images.

The 500mm gets a great close up; these shots have minimal cropping, but you can sometimes miss drivers on a different line through the corner. The MSV red bins make their presence known here …

Of course, you can make the red bins go away by one simple edit …

For the final laps of the final I moved back towards Clearways. Still through the fence but closer than at Clark. The rain is still in evidence …

Some days it just doesn’t work out. Joey Foster ran wide and collected a fellow competitor as he tried to rejoin the track putting both of them out on the spot.

In the finish, it was the tightest of margins with the first three covered by less than a second after 25 laps with Josh Smith taking the spoils. Fittingly, he was running #200 the same number as Gerrit van Kouwen when he won in 1984.

Full results can be found here - BRSCC Formula Ford Festival and the BRSCC video of the event below, it will run after the advert timer counts down.

The second big weekend of the Formula Ford year is the Walter Hayes Trophy at Silverstone at the beginning of November. The racing should be just as competitive, although the fences will be more of a challenge for the spectator snapper …