A racing driver from Wokingham has finished second in a national racing championship, and has won his class, following an emotional and challenging season finale held on Saturday 8th November.
26-year-old Bobby Trundley was diagnosed with severe autism as a child, and is a driver for Team BRIT, the world’s only competitive team of all-disabled racing drivers.
This year, Bobby has been competing in the Britcar Endurance Championship alongside teammate Asha Silva, who is also autistic, driving a BMW M240i. The pair have dominated the championship all season and went into Saturday’s finale at Brands Hatch as overall leaders.
The event saw 2 x 45 minute races, with the second being a night race, starting at 5pm.
Race 1 saw huge drama as Asha delivered an excellent stint before being forced off track by a car from another class. The contact caused major suspension damage to the car, and left the team facing an enormous repair job between races.
The Team BRIT crew pulled off nothing short of a miracle – with less than one minute to spare, they got the BMW back on track for the night race. Bobby started from the back of the field and fought hard through the darkness. Sadly, with the car being so badly damaged, the pair missed out on P1, finishing P3 in class in the night race, therefore narrowly missing the overall championship title by just two points. The pair did however win their class.
Bobby was diagnosed with severe autism as a child and found a love of motorsport through karting at age 10. He found it to have a profound impact on the way he manages the challenges of autism, and went on to become a 5 x national karting champion before joining Team BRIT in 2019.
Bobby said: “I have no words for how disappointed I felt after race one’s accident. Asha drove amazingly up until the contact from another car, which left us in a mission critical position. As always, the Team BRIT crew worked a miracle to get the car repaired to a good enough standard to mean we could go back out for race two.
“The night race saw me starting from the back after we failed to finish race one. I managed to get the car up to P1 in class, but the previous damage reared its head, making it so difficult to stay competitive. I handed over to Asha who then managed a sterling P3 under difficult circumstances. Ultimately, we won the class championship and took P2 overall.
“It has been an incredible year with some fantastic moments. I’m so proud to be a part of this amazing team! I love all the guys and girls and I hope next year we can climb even higher #believeandachive.”
