Rockingham Motor Speedway. The home of oval racing in the UK, and what an event the BMW Power Festival. On the line-up were Formula BMW the very nippy single seaters, our big brother series the BMWRDC Kumho Championship supported by some top toys BMW bought along, namely: The BMW WilliamsF1 Team car, the BMW V12 LMR that won the Le Mans 24 Hour race, and the BMW 320i World Touring Car Championship car, all driven by the stunningly quick Andy Priaul.
For idle entertainment Fifth Gear also ran a 5th Gear Challenge between Tiff Needell and Vicki Butler-Henderson, Tiff was squeezed into the F1 BMW and Vicki in one of the very quick BMW M5 monsters.
Saturday qualifying was wet, very wet! Everyone tip-toed around trying to find grip and get some power down. Lakes were starting to develop around the track, and driving at any kind of speed became a lottery, after a small spin early in 1st qualifying I took it fairly easy and qualified 13th out of 25, very much middle of the field stuff.
Second qualifying was equally wet, however the rain had reduced but the volume of standing water on the track was worse. I was determined to try and ignore the water and put the power down and get a better grid position, this turned out to be a bad idea and resulted in a huge wipe-out at high speed towards the solid concrete walls of the oval part of the track. Luckily the car stopped a few feet short after doing 2 full rotations and after a change of underwear and I engaged gear and took off again. The shock of spinning at near 100mph near a concrete wall somewhat subdued my remaining qualifying as I sensibly decided life was worth hanging onto.
| Qualifying Session | Time | Grid Slot | Gap to pole |
| 1st Qualifying | 2:37.741 | 13 | 9.282 |
| 2nd Qualifying | 2:38.411 | 14 | 6.271 |
Race 1 15th at end of lap 1 Lap 2 - Overtake Robert Sadler into first hairpin Nigel Innes (14) drops back behind me 13th Following andrew partridge but can't keep up Lap 11 - James K (65) out engine problems 12th Race 2 15th at end of lap 1 Lap 2 Overtake Julian Newman into first hairpin Adrian Beard - 88 spins? 13th Lap 5 Get past Nigel Innes Chasing Andrew Partridge Lap 7 race stopped