An Interview with 871 Mark Simpson

You are one of just two drivers to have qualified in the top 20 in this years qualifying series who raced in the very first World of Shale Championship back in 1995, do you remember anything about that race?
A little. I remember that Bert (Finnikin) won it and I was racing a self built car and was starting to do well for myself on shale. Before that we had a race called the King of Shale and then it became the World of Shale and it has gone from there. It was a couple of years later that Skegness became a shale track and being my local track I started racing more on shale but at the time a championship like that was needed for shale drivers and I think in a small way it helped improve the shale scene because it gave those drivers who only raced on shale something to aim for each year and it's still the case now. 

Nearly 20 years later you are still a very active racer in the sport, clearly you still enjoy your racing?
Very much so. I don't think I take it quite as seriously now as I perhaps did once but I do very much enjoy it. I still like my shale racing but I do stick to Mildenhall and King's Lynn now because they are more local to me, my years of travelling across the country once or twice a month to all the shale tracks are behind me I think now but I think that is one of the reasons I'm enjoying my racing as much as I am because I race more when I want to and it takes a bit of pressure off.

You have quite the record in the World of Shale, five times on the podium and three times a runner up but still yet to win the title. Are you proud of your track record or is their any frustration from not quite taking the top spot?
There is certainly no frustration from not winning the championship, especially because what the results don't tell you is that there have been times when I really should have won the race. In 2003 at Skegness I was leading by a length of the straight and cruising and the diff blew and another year at Belle Vue I was miles in front and the car just packed up. We spent all night that year at the track trying to solve it with no luck and later found it was the distributor. So had the circumstances been a little different I could have won but to have finished second and third five times is a tremendous record and one I'm very pleased with.

Are you pleased with your qualifying series this year and your grid position?
Yes I am, it's been pretty good. Again I've only really done the local rounds but I went to Coventry and Sheffield and I didn't have a bad round each time so I was somewhat fortunate that my bad meetings this year weren't at qualifying rounds as it could have been very different but I'm pleased to qualify just outside the top 10, I think that is pretty good going.

As a veteran of the World of Shale Championship, what you think of the changes to this years series?
I quite like them, I think it's good to tweak things after a while to keep them fresh and give it a bit of new life and I think that has happened with the World of Shale series this year. I think it is good as well that there hasn't been too many qualifying rounds. The economy is hard at the moment and a lot of drivers are finding it hard so I think it is important to keep the number of qualifying rounds reasonable so drivers can have half a chance of committing to them all

How do you fancy your chances this year and who do you think are the leading contenders?
I think a lot will depend on the first bend and the first couple of laps as to how I get on. There are a lot of good drivers at the front and George Turiccki and Chris Bradbury have a very good chance from the front row and if they get away it will probably be quite hard for anyone to catch them. I honestly think the winner will come from the first couple of rows.

Again as a driver with much experience of this race and as a former World Champion, how does the World of Shale rank for you as a championship event?
Personally for me, the World Championship is the biggest race of the year but this one is one of the next biggest and it is certainly the biggest for a lot of the shale drivers and you can see that by the amount of effort that so many drivers put into the series.

Is there anyone you would to thank or mention?
Everybody who helps, there are too many to list, it would be like an Oscar acceptance speech so just everyone whose helped, they know who they are.