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Freddy Nordstrom of Weybridge made a solid start to his 2008 campaign in the SEAT Cupra Championship held at Brands Hatch at the weekend. Racing his new SEAT Leon, backed by Surrey’s Building Trade Skills Centres PlumberTraining.com, Freddy was stepping up a level having competed in the R Class last year.

Up against the reigning SEAT Cupra Champion and a number of others who had already experienced a season of the SEAT Leon, Freddy was quick to make his mark as a potential front runner. In qualifying he qualified 8^th and 4^th for the weekend’s double header event.

Perhaps the greatest obstacle wasn’t going to be his fellow competitors but the changeable weather conditions over the Kent circuit. The first race took place on Sunday morning in cloudy conditions and a heavily damp track. Only one other race had been on the track and the time came to take the tyre gamble – wets or slicks. Freddy went out on wet tyres but the rain held off and the track began to dry off reasonably quickly putting him, and others on wets, to a disadvantage. Freddy came home in 10^th position resigned to the fact that the tyre gamble hadn’t paid off.

By 5.30pm, and Race Two, the sky remained cloudy but the track dry. Starting from 6^th on the grid Freddy was in storming form. He reeled in Carl Breeze who was in 4^th place and the two battled nose to tail for the second half of the race. Freddy was unlucky not to make a move stick on a track where overtaking isn’t easy at the best of times but it certainly made for entertaining racing with Freddy displaying a mature race attitude. Coming home in 5^th was a welcome result for the start of the season which sees a further 18 races over 9 weekends across Great Britain.

“It was an encouraging weekend” said Freddy afterwards. “We are still getting familiar with the car and I think for our first race we were solid and I’m looking forward to the rest of the season even more so now.”