Exhale

Well, first the good news.  The cars in one piece, and so am I.  A long weekend living in the car was enjoyable, and nearly dry.  A great weekend.

It was also a strange weekend for driving.  The first session on Friday was a bit of a disaster - I seemed to be a few seconds off the pace, with a car that didn’t seem to want to go around the faster corners at all.  Come to think of it, it wasn’t too keen on the slower corners either.  My “I’m not going to play with the car setup, instead I’m just going to learn to drive it” attitude cracked rapidly, and I changed the front anti roll bar.  Looking at the weather, I figured out we may only have one more dry session, so I changed the rear too in an effort to aim for right first time, rather than gradual changes. 

Then, with some sage advice on lines from from Tim GO,  I went out, locked the wheels every time I braked, gave up, came in, found one of the front tyres was down to canvas.  And set about borrowing another to test on….thanks Mr Smith.

Next session I was three seconds faster, but the car was shaking like a b*****d every time I braked. Final session I was keeping up with quick cars in the class above me, but the car was still all over the place under braking.  However, I did feel I was improving - not just with car setup, but consistently hitting apexes, and finding solutions to the corners I couldn’t “get” in the 1st session.  Friday ended with Andy M changing my discs for me.  It was a marginal call about whether this was “maintenance” or a trackside fix: the discs and pads were nearly new and I had cooked them on event (I think - don’t see that I over heated anything at Oulton!) but McMillan agreed to change them anyway.  Thanks lads.

The first real test was to come - Saturday’s timed practice (or Qualy as its known to its friends).  I went down early in the hope of emulating my “chase a mega” final session, and having some quick guys behind me to latch onto.  Sadly those I would like to have followed either fell off (oops Hugh) or went off into the distance, but chasing them gave me my fastest lap so far.  JOS (a very quick lad who finally took second place on the grid) got past me, and so I latched onto him and followed for the rest of the session : but I never beat my early lap time.

After the session I was all smiles - I knew that I’d really driven at a pace I’d not been near before.  I’d been passing the people I normally race with like they were standing still.  I felt like I was  on fire.  Someone told me the totem poll (live display of positions) had me 3rd for a while and when the results were published I was 4th.  Second Row! Never been in the top 10 before.  Blimey!

The gap between practice and race seemed huge, and the task of staring near the front daunting. However everyone assured me I had earned my place there.  And it would all be OK.  Of course, they were wrong.

I forgot my drill of slotting the stick between 1st and 2nd gear to open up the gate, until the last seconds, then couldn’t get the car into 1st.  With nano-seconds to spare I and some panic’d actions got it into 1st, the lights went out and for around a second, I got a good start: I was catching 2nd place man JOS.  Then came comedy of errors - the shift to second gear, the 2nd attempt at the shift, me moving the car to the top rail to get out of the way of the pursuing hoards, the desperate yanking on the gear lever before finally getting it into gear.  By now the pack was scything past at speed, and by turn 2 I’d probably dropped 18 or 20 places.  A couple more passed me as  I struggled to find some composure, and talked myself into calming down - letting the pack string out for a corner or 2 then fighting back.

At the end of lap 1 I was in 25th place.  Then the fight back began.  Great racing : I hope I didn’t upset anyone, I think i kept it clean ?  Certainly I got hit from behind a couple of times, but no more than a tap - oh and I lost my front numberplate going into the final chicane in one of those “OMG you’re braking there?!?! ….ANCHORS….phew” moments.

Progress continued through the pack until I got to 12th place.  With no-one left in sight in front of me, and the last car passed no longer in my rear view, I did what I always do in these situations…looked at the clock, figured last lap, gave myself a good talking to about finishing the race, then fell off into the gravel on the exit of turn 8.

Back to 17th place for the flag.

 So in the end - I’d found some pace, driven the car in a way I had never done before, then blown it all when it counted.  Twice.  Silly bunt.

Well its going to be a busy weekend.  I’m not going to get out of work early today, so I’ve made the decision to drive the 2.5 hrs to Rockingham at o-god-o-clock friday morning. 

Then I’m going to spend the day in the rain, trying to figure out where the corners are.

Then I’m going to find some food, have a beer and sleep in the car, surrounded by wet racewear.

Then get up, shower, put on the (wet) race suit and spend a day (in the rain) desperatly failing to emulate my recent fluke 10th place at Oulton Park.

Then repeat the food, beer and in-car sleeping, this time surrounded by even more wet apparel.

Then spend sunday wearing orange and watching other cars (in the rain) - I’m marshaling.

Then haul the rig home.

…

And we do this for fun ?

There are some more video permission forms on the docs page, covering Silverstone, Anglesey, (Thruxton, although we are not racing there) and Mallory.  That ought to do for the season!  My thanks to Chris Rome for supplying them.

What a weekend. It started with a journey from Surrey to Oulton Park where nearly half of it was spent on the M25! And to make matters worse, it was a journey where I had to stop when i realized the back of the car seemed to be being lifted up over every undulation. A quick check revealed a lump of molten rubber where the jockey wheel had previously been. The clamp was still thoroughly done up so looks like equipment failure rather than operator error. (Honest!)

TomTom did a sterling job of getting between the hotel and the track, even though the main road was closed and on arrival I pulled in next to Charles and hurled myself into the usual tasks of getting the car off the trailer and ready for scrutineering. I also had to fit the wheels : I’d picked up a set from BAT and (not feeling like working on the car in the Easter snow) these needed to be fitted. It wasn’t until I had the last one bolted up that I realised I had 3 left wheels and 1 right one. A quick trip to George Polley to swap directions on one sorted that one out. Thanks George. (Thanks Jonny!)

The car sailed through scrutineering, and suddenly we were ready. The new cameras were fitted and ready to go. The timed practice session came and went quickly - a few laps with Damon where we tried to help each other out, but didn’t really do a good job of it, then I dropped back and found another pack to play with. Time was running out and I was still lapping in the 2:03’s. Last lap, and I worked through the pack, and managed to put in a 2:01:9 in spite of heavy traffic. A bit better, but done on half throttle a lot of the time. I must figure out how to make the most of Qualy - because I’m certainly not doing it well. Grid position : 14th.

Race time was more like bath time. I came off on the green flag lap braking for Cascades and managed to drag myself through the gravel trap and back onto the circuit - as I hadn’t fallen to the back, I was able to retake my place on the grid. At least one driver in front of me gave up and pulled into the pits to retire. I can’t say I blame them…

I was tempted to start from the pits, but decided that in 14th, enough of the pack was already behind me that I had as good a chance of avoiding an accident there as I would have from the back. The start was basically zero visibility. It was just a case of trying to drive in the spaces where other cars were not and hope that nobody did anything too stupid. I think I passed a couple of people on Lakeside, but again it was more a case of just trying to stay on the track and not hit things than any real competitive manoeuvres.

I soon decided that all I wanted to do was finish. If anyone really wanted to pass me they could. It was a good idea, but as pressure built from the guys behind I couldn’t help but defend. In the end I made a mistake under pressure - a combination of aquaplaning, and changing down too early for Old Hall saw me fishtail the car into a spin on the straight, and I ended up parked on the apex of Old Hall. Well done everyone for avoiding me! I rejoined quite a few places down.

A lap or so later the reds were being waved, and my countdown timer said 9:40 remaining. Which mean we were 20s into the second half of the race, and it was unlikely to be restarted. I must say my first though was Phew! I was a bit annoyed with myself for the spin and figured I had finished around 20th. We packed up the car, said our goodbyes and made tracks. I normally like to stay for prize-giving, but I was cold, wet and miserable.

Imagine my surprise when I checked the results sheets this morning and discovered I wasn’t 20th, but 10th. How did that happen ? Mostly it would be the count back- results were declared on the last completed lap, which must have been immediately before my spin. I had no idea I was running in 10th - I guess we had one retirement, probably at least one person off in front of me, and I must have passed a couple of people. My first ever top 10 finish, and I didn’t even notice. Well my next job is to fix my computer, then edit the video. I will post it here soon.

Nerves are beginning to set in about the weekends races.  Its been some time since the cars were campaigned in anger, and I still have a limp from Snetterton to remind me to pay attention!

The car is ready.  Kind of.  Which means to say the bits that fell off at the track day a month ago have been stuck back on, the air filter has been changed and I have some fresh tyres : as yet unattached to the car.  I also have a roll of sponsors stickers which I might get to stick on at the weekend, but as they only arrived yesterday, that’s the one bit I don’t feel guilty about.

I’m looking forward to summery evenings tinkering, and perhaps a warm weekends to change the brake fluid in.  Its a job I’ve been meaning to do all winter, but doing it in an unlit garage, or out in the rain has not appealed.

So to Saturday.  Without testing, my goal is just to get around, possibly avoid the qualy race, get the new video kit working, meet some friends, and have fun at the weekend.  There is also the issue of impending Grand fatherhood…due on 31st March…so all bets are off.

Until Saturday then