Let’s make tracks [Part 2]

How would you describe your role at Bolwextric, are you the owner, director, or manager …?

I’m the owner of the club, but I’ve stepped back from the everyday running of it a bit. The site, here in Clanfield, is the home to two different club nights. Wednesdays is for the old Liphook club, Home Farm, run by Steve Skinner, one of the founder members. Geoff, my father-in-law, still makes the occasional appearance.

Thursday nights is for Jim Moyes who is very well known in Slot Car circles. His club [No Name Racing Club] runs with a different set of racers, classes and rules.

I hadn’t realised that clubs were run differently, I assumed that there was a generally accepted set of rules etc.

No, each club can be run however the members feel it suits them. For example, the Wednesday night club, Steve Skinner’s group, has a cut-off start time of 7:30. Whoever has arrived by then gets to take part in the racing. Let’s say ten people turn up, we put 10 playing cards face down on the table with face values of 1 to 10. The prospective racers take it in turn to turn over a card. If you turn over a 1,2, 3, 4 or 5, you get to pick one of the five different racing ‘Classes’ for the evening. It might be DTM’s or Audi A4 cars for example, whichever class has been chosen. They then select an appropriate car from the library. The cars are all colour-coded and each colour corresponds to a specific track lane. For the duration of the evening, the cars stay in the associated lane, but the competitors move round after each race. So everyone gets to race each car. They use the club cars [mine] to race with, but they have their own controllers.

But Thursday night is different?

Jim’s club only runs four classes per evening, but the races are over 10 laps rather than 7. Each quarter the club runs two six-week sets of four classes. On the fourth night of a six week series there is “picking night”. Using the previous night’s ‘Lotto’ numbers to find four winners, the successful racers choose a class they would like to run for the coming quarter. This gives a driver the potential to cover 60 laps per class instead of 42.

The classes are based on most types of real motor sport, GT, Touring, F1, even rallying and historic racing. The brand can add variety too, with, for example, Ninco DTMs, or Scalextric GT and those choices run constantly for six weeks. As the track direction can be reversed, alternate weeks are run in the other direction to add variety.

Not only that, they race with their own cars. So they can tune their car to improve performance, just like in the real world of motor racing. Every quarter tends to have a thirteenth week so they have a non-championship night that can be a Goodwood night, or a handicap or team endurance night.

How do you tune a Slot Car?

It’s like any racing car and it’s what we call ‘blueprinting’. Make sure the motors are lubricated, that the tyres are completely true and that everything is in the best condition that it can be.

What are the different Slot Car classes?

It varies from club to club. In the Bolwextric Wednesday group we typically have five or six classes which are chosen on the night from the club’s large collection of cars.

So it depends on the club’s rules. It’s not a nationally, or internationally, agreed definition?

That’s right, and they can follow real-world racing or make it up as they go along.

When I was researching Slot Cars, I stopped counting at 58 brands, what are the main UK brands?

The big names here are Scalextric, Ninco, SCX, Fly, Carrera, Slot It and NSR. You’ll find all of those brands in the Gaugemaster model shop in Arundel [West Sussex]. They’re actually celebrating their 50th anniversary this year.

Are Slot Cars more popular than model trains?

No, model railways still have the biggest share of the market.

How many club members do you have?

I think there’s probably a nucleus of twenty-five members over the two nights.

On Wednesdays …?

If everyone turned up there would be about about fourteen members

Do you have other clubs racing here?

We haven’t done it for a while, but we used to have nine and twelve-hour endurance racing between teams and that would involve other clubs such as Gosport, Worthing or Farnham. Wednesday nights, it’s a bit more low-key because we race with club cars [mine]. If people want to get into the sport, that’s the night they come to. Jim’s night is by invitation only because the assumption is that you’re not a beginner, you have invested in your own car[s] and are a bit more serious about the sport. It’s still a fun night with a group of racers enjoying themselves, but they are more committed.

Is there a club subscription fee?

No, you just pay £10 on the night.

Do you own the building?

No, I rent it. Have done for the twenty-two years that we’ve been here. I don’t know where you were twenty-two years ago, 4th September 2002, but this club nearly shut down before it opened. There was a massive hay barn fire that happened just as I was fitting out the club and this building nearly burnt down. We were very lucky, the fire crews managed to get it all under control just in time.

What size are your cars?

We race either 1:32 or 1:24 scale. If you buy Scalextric branded cars in a shop, it will probably be 1:32. It is possible to buy 1:24 scale slot cars, but they’re not as popular for home use.

Both 1:24 & 1:32 run on the same track?

Yes, the spacing is a fixed width, off the top of my head I think it’s around 91mm. I’ve built a few tracks for customers in Italy, Ireland, Wales and Manchester.

Thanks very much for your time Tony, what’s the best way for potential members to get in touch with the club?