Cheeky test day on Friday showed some really promising lap times, getting round the circuit quicker than ever before in our car.
Some subtle changes to the car set-up made it more forgiving on the limit, also a tad more friendly (less snappy).
Saturday soon rolled round, and into our practice session which had been combined with SR> qualifying bringing a total of 32cars onto circuit at once. This unfortunately meant that practice was very busy, with no clean laps and certainly no repeat of the fast lap times from Friday's test day. I got 9th place for Race 1 and 10th place for Race 2, not what I had hoped for, but given the busy and varying relative speeds in practice not at all surprising.
Race 1
9th place, means pitwall side of the grid and 5th row, and as it turns out downhill!! So, for the start, handbrake on a fraction to stop the car rolling and wait for the red lights. On they came, revs steady, then out and GO! Got a fantastic start, hooking up the initial traction just nicely before planting it and thrashing the car through it's gears up to max revs in third gear ready for the entry to Paddock - managing to get past Mathew Lewis in his MNR Vortex before Paddock. MAW and Steve Taylor had some contact heading off from the grid, but both carried on with no apparent issue. Nigel Brown got a great start and catapaulted himself up from 14th to 6th by Druids. Paddock was busy, very busy! Side by side with Stephen Bell round Paddock and into Druids, Steve just slipped past (My excuse: I'd been slightly put off by the amount of tyre smoke on entry to Druids and expected to find a car in two in track!)
Once back on the start-finish straight, the power advantage that a V8 offers became apparent - Mathew came stomping past, despite me having a great run out of Clearways - I guess those extra 4 cylinders create a few more of those desirable pigmy horses! As soon as we got to Paddock again though, it was very clear that Mathew's cornering speed is not as high as our lighter car's. I was hot on the heals of Matthew all the way round Paddock and Druids, he got a better run out of Graham Hill which opened up a gap - very handy since halfway round Graham Hill Mathew started an almighty slide which he did not recover - I jumped on the brakes and was ready to try and decide which way to dodge - left or right, to miss him, when BANG! - Ian Kempson who was following me, came straight into the back of my car and sent me into a real tank-slapper, fortunately I oscillated past Matthew 4 times without hitting him!! I could immediately hear bodywork dragging and see it flapping, so straight into the pits for a checkover. Des and Mike quickly repaired the car so that I could go out a do some hot laps, however the main pack were so far ahead that there was no chance of catching, got some clear laps, overtook a few backmarkers, and enjoyed the drive! No cigar though, finally finished 14th (last) due to the time in the pits having repairs!
Oh well, back to the pits for repairs and read for race 2 @ 1745....leaving us ~2hours to repair the car....So much for putting our feet up then...
Huge thanks to the support team - Des, Mike & Suz especially for keeping the car running! Jo, Oliver, Emma, Jason & Tina with Joshua and Brandon, Graeme, Steve & Suzanne and Nigel for their great support throughout the day. Nigel and Jason, have now attended two years in a row, and were successfully roped into car repairs again this year - thanks!!
Race 2 report and photos to follow...
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