An Interview with early season Saloon Stockcar Mildenhall Championship leader 304 Martyn Parker
(interview published April 14 2015 in the lead up to the Saloon Stockcar English Championship at Mildenhall on April 25)

Age: 50
Home Town: Norwich
Occupation: Owner of skip hire company
Family: Wife Wendy and children Daniel and Stephanie
Racing career: First race was at Hammenfield Dirt Track aged 13 in Boys Bangers, first Saloon Stockcar meeting was aged 18 or 19

At the end of the first full month of the season you are the early leader of the Mildenhall Track Championship, are you pleased with your early season success?
I am, it’s gone really well so far and it’s actually been a bit of a surprise because to be fair most of the work we’ve done over the winter has been on (son) Daniels’s cars. It’s been a little unfortunate really because he’s not had the results he deserves I think for the work he’s put into getting his cars as good as possible over the winter. There were a few times at the last Mildenhall meeting where he would go flying past me and then on the next lap he would be spun out and I would go back in front of him. I think that underlines how important luck is in this formula. You can have the best car and be the best driver and all that but it’s so easy to get taken out by someone else, especially at Mildenhall where the track is that bit smaller than most of the others, so without luck you have nothing. I guess the luck has been on my side so far this year and it’s nice when things go your way but in all honesty at my stage in life now, racing is very much just for fun for me, I really try not to take things too seriously and Daniel’s racing is more the priority for us. I think also I have been making the most of going down to the yellow grade for the start of the season and while there are still some really good drivers in the lower grades there is no denying the fact that it is a little easier starting from closer to the front of the grid. I’m guessing that the results I have had so far this year will move me up the grades at least a little pretty soon, probably before the English (Championship) which might not help my chances but getting back up the grades was a target for me this season. I hope to get back to the red grade, that’s my goal but if I get there I then want to stay there and that is the real challenge because staying consistent from the back of the grid is hard in a formula as good as this. Having said that I’ve always found it easier to start from the red grade that the blue grade. In the blues it’s very easy to get crowded at the start of a race and taken out where as from the back of the grid sometimes it can be a little easier because the drivers in front do some of the work for you by taking some cars out and then by the time you get up the places things are a little more settled. But we’ll see, hopefully I will get myself back into the red grade and then stay there, that’s my hope anyway.

Given your current position in the Mildenhall points, is the track championship a target of yours?
I think it is still far too early to be thinking like that, especially because the meetings I have done so far have been from the yellow grade and that’s probably not going to last for much longer so I guess things are about to get a little tougher! Having said that when Daniel won the Mildenhall points a couple of years ago, he led at the start and I think that early lead made a massive difference. Not just because it gave him an early head start but also because it gave him a huge confidence boost. It’s different for me, firstly because I’m obviously a lot older (laughs) than he was when he was in this position but also because again this is much more about having fun for me whereas Daniel’s racing does have a bit more of a serious edge to it. I finished in the top 10 at Mildenhall last year and I was really pleased with that, especially because I had such a bad end to the season where I just didn’t seem to have any luck whatsoever and everything was going wrong so I dropped a few spots because of that and my final position wasn’t perhaps as good as it might have been had the form from earlier in the year continued like it had. It was a shame but again that’s just how this racing goes, especially with luck. I’d be over the moon to finish the Mildenhall points in the top five or six this year, that would be brilliant for me but we’ll see how it goes. Again I know it’s about to get tougher and there are still a lot of meetings to come but I will definitely be doing my best at every meeting I race in and that really is all you can do sometimes.

Have you given any thoughts to the English Championship or do you treat it like any other meeting?
I think you have to try and look at it as any other meeting but then again the amount of effort which every driver is putting into their racing at the moment, every meeting is like a championship. Back when I first raced stockcars in the 1980s, drivers would race every weekend and then when a championship was coming up, then they would spend every night on the car getting it ready for the big race but now that’s what everyone is doing every week so every weekend the cars are at their very best which is why I think the racing is so good. Of course you usually get more cars for a championship and you have the grid for the final but for me that is really the only thing which is different because the racing will be just as hard and fast as any other meeting. It’s funny really because I think my best chance at winning events like this are probably behind me. I finished third in 1984 at Ipswich and it’s weird because looking back I almost wish I’d taken those meetings back then a little more seriously but being young and not really thinking about the future I never took it quite as seriously as I should have done and now I do regret that a little bit because I think they were probably my best chances of winning a race like this. But saying that, you never know do you! I don’t think many people expected Daniel to win it two years ago but he did and any championship at Mildenhall is always likely to be that extra bit unpredictable so it’s anyone’s race really. I think the key to it is just staying out of trouble really. As I said at the last Mildenhall meeting I think Daniel was probably quicker than me but he didn’t end the meeting with the points I scored just because he didn’t have the luck and that’s probably going to play a big part.

How important will a good grid position be in the race?
I think it will matter but it’s not guaranteed to be the end of your chances if you haven’t got one. Last year Lee Sampson was at the back of the grid for the European Championship with me and he finished up on the podium so it can be done but it won’t be easy and again you will probably need that bit of luck on your side, maybe some crashes to take out some people at the front or a stoppage, something like that, I do think it would be hard to win from the back if there isn’t a stoppage in the race. Again going back to when Daniel won the English, he started from pole but it was far from a flag to flag win, he got taken out and when the race was stopped and restart I don’t think he was even in the top 10 and he had a lot of luck to help him get back up the front. I think a big advantage of being at the front of the grid is that if you do get taken out you might have a chance of getting back in the race without being lapped. Given how small Mildenhall is, if you are taken out the chances are you are going to get lapped, unless you are right at the front when you are taken out so that’s a big advantage from a good starting place in the race and again that’s why I think it will be important to stay out of trouble in the race.

We also have the World Final at Mildenhall this year, is that an event you are thinking about?
Funnily enough it has been because I qualified via the last chance races last year at King’s Lynn and that was only the second time I’ve been in the race, the first and only time before that was back in the 1980s at Wisbech. Again like that English Championship 30 years ago, looking back now I think that maybe I missed my chance a little with that World Final. The week before that meeting I won all three races and again being a bit young and naïve I thought my best plan would be to leave the car exactly as it was for the World Final where as everyone else spent all week making their cars better for the big race and it caught me out. I went into the race thinking that because I’d gone so well the week before I would again in the World and of course that’s not what happened and I got stuffed into a dead car. I came back and finished just outside the podium. I made the mistake of passing Eddie George before the last bend and of course he came back and stuffed me so that was a lesson learnt (laughs). Getting back in the race last year did make me want to do it again, I’d forgotten what a buzz being in the big race was so I would like to qualify again but it will be a tall order given where I am at the moment in the World Rankings, hopefully I can have a good showing in the English and that might give me some hope.

The Saloons have experienced some very difficult conditions at Mildenhall so far this season, how have you coped with the challenges?
You just get on with it the best you can. The holes and ruts (on March 7) were the worst I think, that was really, really hard because you could just get thrown out of control in a split second and have no idea it was going to happen so it was extremely difficult and unpredictable, again you just had to get your head down and do your best with it.

We often ask this question to stockcar drivers, at Mildenhall red flags are used more commonly than most other raceways to stop races, is that something you agree with and what are your thoughts on the changes for 2015 so races with lap sheet order restarts are lined up the same way now whether a red or yellow flag is used?
I do agree that sometimes you need a red flag to stop a race. I wouldn’t like to say exactly what situations should and shouldn’t but I do think if a driver is hurt or upside down or in immediate danger then the race should be stopped as quickly as possible and I think it is better that we now have one way or lining cars up for a restart rather than two, it’s a lot less confusing for everyone I think. Again I’m not sure which one of the systems is better but I think it probably is better to restart the race as close to how it was stopped so leaving the back markers in position does make sense.

Is there anyone else you would like to thank or mention?
Daniel especially for everything he does to help me with my car, my brother Nigel who is a massive help now to both of our racing and does so much to help me and Daniel and also Steve and Wayne who do a lot of things to help us, David Aldous for all his input and everyone else who helps us with the cars.