Smyth starts Walter Hayes victory defence by romping to heat four pole

Photo: Ida Wood

Team Dolan’s Jason Smyth began the defence of his 2025 Walter Hayes Trophy crown by claiming pole for heat four.

The Irishman was fastest from the off, leading four-time winner Joey Foster and Klaus-Dieter Haeckel at first.

Vertical Racing’s Ian Campbell, another Irishman, was the suprise pace-setter briefly on the second round of flying laps, with Haeckel improving to second, before British-Pakistani driver Haarni Sadiq lowered the pace to 1m03.753s.

Dousse Int. Sanglier’s Mathieu Boissiere moved to the top once Sadiq’s laptime was deleted for track limits abuse, then Smyth returned to the top with his third lap.

A 1m02.533s put him a huge 0.713 seconds clear of Foster, with KMR Sport’s Julian Van der Watt and Sadiq the only other drivers within a second of him at that point.

Smyth improved to 1m02.354s next time by, but his advantage was far smaller as Van der Watt got within 0.298s of him. Both failed to improve on their fifth laps, but Foster did to get within 0.413s of pole in third.

With five minutes to go, the laptime to beat became a 1m01.849s as Smyth found a slipstream. Foster made pace gains on his next two laps, but once he was back into second he was still 0.694s slower than Smyth.

There seemed to be zero chance of beating Smyth, as he set new personal bests on his seventh and eighth laps and a benchmark 1m01.438s.

That lap put him 0.732s ahead of Van der Wat, with Ammonite’s Jase Petty jumping to third ahead of Foster and Campbell.

There was one more change to the order near the front in the last two minutes, as Sadiq set a 1m02.149s to go second fastest. He ended qualifying 0.821s off Smyth’s pace, as the poleman met the chequered flag in 1m01.328s to record the fastest lap across the morning’s four qualifying sessions.

Heat 4 qualifying results