I'm out!

As letting out time approached yesterday afternoon the pain started increasing, until 6pm when i said i didn't think i was up to going home, so ended up staying in overnight again. I was put on some anti inflamitries (sp) and this got the pain down and i became quite comfortable. The hospital then had 3 power cuts, the entire hospital went out and the emergency generators didn't kick in! Luckily 2 of the cuts were very short, but the middle one lasted about 15-20 minutes! God knows what this meant for people in theater or on life supporting machines! I did hear a nurse say that a bleep went out to all doctors telling all available ones to go to ICU, so i assume there was some panic!

Anyway, its 10am wednesday morning and i'm standing in the car park waiting to be picked up but am 2nd in line after the xmas food from marks and spencers, hence this endless wittering! I feel better than i have since friday, and fairly comfortable, and just have to watch what poitions i stretch to as that can hurt. I'm keeping myself drugged up for a couple of weeks and hope to be back to full service in the new year. A bonus is i am not on antibiotics so can have a bit of xmas spirit!
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Sent from my Blackberry
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Weight reduction plan completed!

My bid to reduce the racing package weight is now complete! Rather than spending a fortune on light weight parts for the car, or the impossible act of the driver going on a diet, my appendix was removed some time after 11pm last night. I should have asked the surgeons to take a picture so i could put it on here!

Considering everything i don't feel too bad, although it does feel like i've been kicked in the stomach by the entire premiership league and my nuts feel like they have had bags of sand hanging off them for a few hours. Hopefully this is due to the operation and not the nut job finding his way back into my room last night while i was heavily sedated!

The drugs are giving me the weirdest and most vivid dreams. As i was coming round for the first time i dreamt i was a pissed santa claus holding a bottle in a brown paper bag and falling into load of kids, and it looked like it was set in a late 80's american family film! I've also dressed Nigel Mansel in tin cans.

As long as everything stay ok i'll be going home this evening, so i'd better hurry up and get my head back down and see who else i can meet in my drug fest sleep!

Oh and i opologise for the spelling and grammer, not my strongest point at the best of times, but doing this on my blackberry with a warped mind are definetly affecting it ;-)
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All Plans scuppered for xmas!!

Well all my best laid plans for the xmas holidays and early Jan have been wrecked! I'm currently lying in worcester hospital waiting to have my appendix removed! Its been a tricky liitle bugger! It put me in hospital for 2 days 6 weeks ago, but wasn't removed as it settled down, but last friday (first day of my xmas holiday) i woke with slight stomach pains. This slowly built while at son number 2's nativity performance and a joyful visit to sainsburys. By 3 oclock i was doubled up, at 4pm i called the doctor, at 5pm i saw the doctor but the horrific pain had died down and i could just about walk crunched up. The doctor refered me the surgeon at Worcester hospital but i would have to go to A&E, on the last friday night before xmas! This really did not appeal, and the pain was still there but was bearable. I decided to ride it out hoping it would pass like last time, but on saturday morning it was obvious i would have get myself down A&E

A&E was surprisingly pleasant, and within an hour and a half i was back on the same ward and same bed as 6 weeks ago. There is only one thing worse than pain, and thats the boredom of hospitals or maybe reading my blog??? So here i am 3 days later, still have my appendix and trying to chew my way out of the hospital walls! I've been x-rayed, prodded, scanned and had severaal fingers up my bottom and have finally been told its coming out at 10pm tonight, only to be told later it might not come out! So i guess i may be enjoying the pleasures of morphine tonight, or could just as easily be still chewing the walls!

One thing that will hopefully be different tonight is the unwanted bed activity on my ward! Last night i was moved to another room with just 2 beds in it (and private bathroom), great i thought, until i clapped eyes on the nut job i was sharing with! A bloke in his 70's with mad hair, and obviously not of the best mental health. He spoke some shit to me, but i just put my head phones on and he shut up. At about 11pm he decided to get out of bed for a wander, but then tried to get into bed with me! I directed him where to go and i hoped that would be the end of it. 10 mins later he stripped off completely and tried to get into bed with me again! I told him where his bed was. A few minutes later i see him crawling round the room on all 4's still starkers, after a few minutes of this he tried to get into my bed again! I had enough this time and bleeped the nurses, they all found it highly amusing, but got him dressed and back into bed. He did try again to get in the bed, but this time was fully clothed but did managed to get his arse onto the bed before i pushed him off! Then to top it off i heard him piss the bed at about 5am, and prayed he didn't try and make another move, lucky he didn't and has now been put in a room on his own!

So roll on tomorrow, hopefully the little sod will be out and i will be home before xmas!
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Chassis Rebuild

While at work i've been thinking about the chassis rebuild. I've been playing about with the idea of a bolt on front subframe. The idea is that it will make it easier to jig and build the chassis, but also make future repairs easier, with even an option of a changing the front end in the paddock if needs must. My biggest dilema is whether i should try and frig with the geometry to improve the handling or just copy what is there. My suspension design skill is zero, so i just worry that by trying to improve it, i will ruin it!!! At the moment i have knocked this up based on the standard geometry (this is WIP and has plenty of detail still to add)

Nice rear end!

Not much to see this week, just tidied up the the cut out and capped it all off with aluminum channel. The lower rear edge of the floor/body work was at 3 different levels after the framework had been removed, so using left overs from the frame work I have built it up to the same level and capping it off with 45mm steel angle. This will finish it off neatly and also give a hard wearing edge/step. I’ve also fitted a length of steel angle as a cross brace just below the cut out. This serves a few purposes, it strengthens up the rear body work, provides a lip to fit the rear garage shelf and upper bunkbed base to and also acts as a face for the rear doors to close onto. These 2 lengths are off to the galvanisers this week and will be fitted permanently with rivnuts and sikaflex

I have cut the doors to size and shape, and by adjusting the aluminum capping before I screw and glue it to the doors I should be able to construct 2 well fitting barn doors.

The Work Begins

This is my rough plan of the interior layout.

The Yellow block is the car, the silver block is the bathroom (still deciding if i want a full shower or not), the golden block is the kitchen and the blue blocks are the sofa/beds. There will be shelves behind the rear bunk, accessed from the rear doors of the van.

First job was to set up a water proof cover and get the doors off to see what i had to work with.

I need a gap of 1750mm to get the car into back of the van. After removing the rear doors and carpet covered aluminium internal panels i could see the main internal frame of the body. To my delight, the internal framework is made of stainless steel and obviously had no rust or corrosion. The rest of the dody is made from aluminium and fibreglass, so other than the floor i have no worries about corrosion on the main body. Just to the inside of each light there is an existing upright, so the plan was to cut the entire rear section out around this frame and build a steel and aluminium horsebox type door/ramp. But after designing it and looking at the weight and cost of it it i had to discount the idea and come up with something else.

Eventually we decided upon the way to go was to chop one of the existing doors down and hanging it from the top, so there would be access to high level shelving, and having 2 barn style doors below it to allow the car in, under the shelves/rear bunk bed. The rear barn doors are going to be made of GRP skinned ply as used in box van, catering vans and some horse boxes.

After some cutting, shutting and riveting the basic idea started to come together.

The lower opening has just been roughly cut out to see what is exactly there to work with. It will be trimmed back neatly to the frame upright and capped off with aluminium section and reusing the hinges and latches from the old doors to hang the new doors and the recobbled upper hatch

I have the GRP coated ply and aluminium capping ready and waiting to make the doors.

Its bigger than I imagined!!!

A 7.2 meters long and 2.2 meters wide the bus is a pretty large van!!!! Its drives great and you forget how big it is, but getting it into the allocated place to work on it at my parents was abit trickier than anticipated!!!! It took 1.5 hours to get in position, and required the removal of a bush and some very delicate driving. Unfortunately the drive was not quite long enough to get it in and shut the gate, or be visually acceptable by my mom!!! Fortunately my dad had a cunning plan using 2 steel work benches and some scaffolding he had spare!! As you can see from the photo, it gives great access for working on the engine, but was fairly scary driving the 2.2 ton truck into position!!!

A BIG job!!!

Now i should be concentrating on getting the car ready, but after the Birkett i was totally cheesed off with camping!!! For the second half of this year i'd been constantly looking at motorhomes, touble is, i can't justify the cost of a decent one to the wife as she isn't that interested in getting one as "there are better things to spend our money on", if its just for racing then i could get an older one, but they are still fairly expensive for what is in essence a 15-20 year old van. If it was an old one the wife would never set foot in it, so buying it would be a completely selfish thing. So a fully converted motorhome is out of the question. I haven't got time to do a proper van conversion, and to be honest it doesn't give me exactly what i wanted. I'd looked at converting a 7.5 tonner, but the problem is i have nowhere to store it while doing the conversion. So i had virtually settled on a dropside transit with tail lift and a cheap caravan, it meant minimal work and was a damn site cheaper than motorhome. But whilst looking for said items i came across this:-

Its a Ducato 2.5T disabled city council bus. The beauty of it it is that its wider than a standard van and the Fury will actually fit inbetween the wheels arches. The rear double axle is on air suspension and at a touch of a button the back lowers only 300mm off the floor, so with some fairly short ramps the car will easily get up and inside. Once inside there is still room at the front for a fixed kitchen and bathroom. When the car is unloaded there will be fold out bench seats from the sides that will double up as 2 beds, and i will also have a fixed rear bunk and also a bed over the cab. This means it will sleep 5 (thats a bed each for all my trusty weekend warriors), but will also be capable of carrying everything to the event without towing a trailer.

Ok, the astute readers may have noticed the rear doors aren't exactly wide enough to get the car through, but i have a cunning plan involving a big cutting disk!!!

Build update to follow!!

End of 2009

What a fantastic year!!!! Racing has changed my life, I have met a fantastic group of like minded people and made many new friends, most of my spare time is spent either at race meets or preparing for the forth coming event, even when I’m busy doing something less important, such as work, my mind is else where thinking of the next modification or the list of jobs to do. I am already waiting for the fixture list for next year, hoping and praying that it will not collide with anything I can’t get out of (i.e. sister-in-laws wedding) and planning how to ensure everything else will fit in around the schedule. I recently described to a friend that racing is like being an alcoholic for me, its all I think about, everything else has to revolve around it, if I'm not racing I'm thinking of where and when I can get my next one, the wife hates what it does to me and is convinced it will kill me.

I have learnt a lot this season, but know I have a lot more to learn if I’m to get me up the front of class C. I started as a complete novice and progressed to finish the year with a few good qualifying grid starts, several top 10 finishes and 1 trophy (3^rd at Anglsey) which now sits proudly on the shelf in the kitchen. There have been a few occasions where my car could have become rather miss shaped and with only one majorish mechanical expense (gearbox rebuild) I consider myself to be very lucky. I know this can’t last forever, but if I have half as much fun next year I will still have a great 2010!!

A big thanks goes out to everyone in the RGB paddock for the friendly welcome, advice and help, with a special mention to Andy Bates for everything he brings and puts into the formula. And obviously not forgetting a massive thanks for all the help, prepping, support and general banter from a lads weekend away from William, Dad, Dan, Steve, Jack, Miles, Sally and all the other mates and colleagues who have come along to try and watch me compete or cook a BBQ!!

ROLL ON 2010

Now the work begins!!!!

Now the season is over, the car needs some general love and attention!

The following list is growing daily, but somethings have to be done before the start of 2010

1. Front end rebuild - Andys brilliantly paddock braised up front end really has to be replaced!
2. New body work - the last 2 or 3 races saw plenty of panel damage, and i'm sure there is more filler and patches than actual body work
3. Replace all fluids
4. New tyres
5. Full geo
6. New harnesses
7. Full strip down of all suspension and replace all worn parts
8. New plugs and general engine maintenance
9. New under tray and stronger flat rear tray
10. Evaluate springs/dampers - may replace

Other than buying the harnesses i haven't even looked at the car since the Birkett other than getting it off the trailer, but plans are to get started over the xmas holidays, wife permitting!!!

Birkett 2009 – Birth of Team RGB Pups

I’d been looking forward to this for months!!! A 6 hour relay race, 6 cars, 6 drivers and 55 teams and a massive array of cars!!! Bob and I decided to set our own team up, and pull in as many of the newbies of RGB as possible, and hence the name RGB Pups. There were 3 all RGB teams entered and another partly made up but RGB cars, plus Judy in her own team, so a very healthy showing by our formula!!

Team RGB Pups:-

Bob Mortimer

Austen Greenway

James Walker

Andy Cunningham

Rob Grants

Paul Rickers

Now if you look through the list and know anything about how the racing in 2009 panned out, it would be fairly safe to assume, there was a very good chance that at least half the team wouldn’t finish the event due to one problem or another! So an exciting 24 hours was in prospect! We Had also drafted in Tim Cheney to be a our team manager, plus various other dogs bodies to help us run the team.

As it was being held on the international circuit I thought it best to book the extortionately priced test day on the Friday! I did the first 2 sessions and James had the third so he could get a taste of where the track went. I must say the international is a great circuit, and really wish the 750mc race would be held on this rather than the national.

I signed on and got the car through scrutineering on Friday afternoon to cut down on jobs to do on Saturday morning. By the evening all the team was assembled and we had our own RGB Pup BBQ, where stupid amounts of meat was eaten a sensible few beers drank before retiring for the evening. Again I could not sleep, the excitement was too high, I was desperate for a drink of water (which I had left miles away in the garage) and the roof tent had now totally lost its novelty. So at 4am I was wondering around Silverstone in the drizzle wondering if I’d get more sleep in the garage!

At 6.30am, I woke up to a horrible, dark, foggy, rainy morning! It was going to be a wet race! As we were nearly all prepared the only thing I had to do before practice was fit the wet tyres, soften off the suspension and eat bacon sarnys. We all went out for our practice sessions and were equally impressed by the shear lack off grip!!! I nearly span on the out lap, but not to be out done Bob managed did manage it!! I had seen a 7 with only 3 wheel by 9.15 am, so decided that it was best just to take it easy, especially in practice as that was all it was, it did not effect out grid position. As it was our first year at this (apart from rob) and we knew we were never going to win, we decided than rather than trying to stick out there for 40+ minute spells, we’d all just do 3x20mins and just try and enjoy it. Bob was our first man out and had the task of the grid start, by this time it was teeming it down with rain, there was standing water everywhere and visibility was terrible. I really did not envy Bobs job!! The race started and immediately the safety car was out, on the lat corner of the first lap a radical had implanted itself into the pit wall. This set the scene for the rest of the race, the safety car came for over an hour in total, most of time when poor bob was out!

By the end of the 6 hours, all 6 team RGB Pups cars where running without a hitch and apart from a few minor spins no one had to be recovered. The only real drama was when the marshal came over and told us that bob had gone off and was stuck out on track, so I was sent straight out. On the out lap I was keeping my eyes peeled to see were bob was stuck, but then to my astonishment I saw him driving round as normal a couple of corners ahead! I wondered if he had managed to get going again so waited to see if he went into the pits or carried on, he carried on so I came straight back in. The marshal admitted they had made a mistake and it was all cleared with the race steward and we didn’t get penalized.

At the end of the race we finished near the back, in both the scratch race and handicap race, but personally feel we had achieved our own goal of getting all 6 cars home in one piece. Maybe next year we change tactics, or maybe we just run the same again. The wet really does put our RGB cars at a disadvantage, and are probably the most effected cars, if it had been dry we would have finished a lot higher up.

Well done team RGB Pups (and that includes all our helpers), roll on Birkett 2010!!

Mallory 11th October 2009

The last race of the season!!! I can’t believe the year went so quickly! And have no idea how I’m going to wait 5 months to get back out there again!!!

There was only a single RGB race, but as there was an all comers race the same day I thought it would be rude not to enter!!! The weather started off dry but could see the rain coming in the distance. Qualifying for the all comers was dry but the surface was fairly slippy in places. Qualifying went without a hitch, but I just couldn’t seem to get into it and was over a second slower than when we were at Mallory last. I put some of it down to the fact I was worrying about smashing the car up for the Birkett and I had managed the entire season so far without any serious incidents so was being subconsciously conservative trying to look after the car. Added to the fact I had a lot of people coming to see me race today, the wife, 3 kids, parents, parents-in-law and grand parents plus my usual crowd so was very aware that it was a recipe for a big one!

As we were lining up to go out for RGB qualifying, the heavens opened! The session was very wet, but I felt like I was starting to push it a bit more. I seem to qualify well in the wet so kept on trying to push, until a huge spin at the Esses! There is a small hump as you change direction in the middle of the Esses, a couple laps previous I had some fairly big twiches, but not enough to slow me down, but this time it snapped out to the right which I caught but it sent the back out hard left. I was slidding on complete opposite lock at 90 degrees to the track, the back wheels went onto the grass and I slammed the brakes on to try and reduce the speed of the inevitable collision, by luck more than anything else this kept the car at 90 degrees, rather than continuing in a clockwise spin which would had definitely have sent me into the Armco. The rear wheels must have dug in and it spun me anticlockwise back onto the circuit, I did 420 degree spin and was now back on the outside of the circuit travelling backwards onto the grass towards the Armco, but luckily I travelled in a straight line until I stopped with the rear off side corner a few feet from the Armco. I was convinced during all this I was going to end up in impaled in a wall, as was my dad who was watching on the hill, so I consider myself very lucky not to have damaged the car!! The spin definitely knocked my confidence and I took it easy for the rest of the session.

The All comers race was proper wet, and with all the different machinery and larger tintops out there I felt rather intimidated. I got a decent start and squeezed past a couple a few cars but the car infront sprayed oil or fuel up up off the track infront of me and covered my visor, the first few laps were horrific, I could not see anything, wiping the visor just smeared the goo across it and I was struggling to even see the edge of the track. As the race progressed, the MR2’s, who were all a lot further down the grid after the dry qualifying, started to pass me. At first I thought I was just being an idiot, but they worked there way up the field as there weight obviously helped there grip levels in the wet. I ended up 10^th after qualifying 11^th, so was fairly happy, but just happy I it was over as it was not nice out there!

In RGB I’d qualified 10^th, 5^th in class, not as good as I was hoping for, but there was very little in time separating me from the front of class C wasn’t too disappointed. By the start of the race the track was drying nicely and the sun was peering out. I had had a good couple of hours with the family eating pork pies and scotch eggs up on the hill, it was nice they were all there but definitely not the way to set you mind up to try and race on the ragged edge!! I had a cracking start and was up to 4^th overall and 2^nd in class by the Esses! This was unknown territory for me, but it was to be shorted lived. I couldn’t get gerrards right and just kept getting passed on the straight into the esses. I really was lacking confidence after my big spin and the thought of binning it infront of the family was playing on my mind. After a few people came past I let Tony through as I knew he was in a battle for 2^nd in class B championship with Tim and was then on my own for the rest of the race, well until I saw Tony Spin off at Gerrards, marginally missing the Armco before rejoining. I finished 10^th and 6^th (last) in class. I was over a second slower than last time and miles off the pace from the other class C boys so finished the session pretty disgruntled with myself! I’m putting down to being too conservative due to what was going on in my head, and is something I must banish for the start of next season!!!

Snetterton 19th September 2009

I had to miss this meeting as my 3 year old son went in for an operation to remove his adenoids and tonsils a couple of days before. It’s the only race I was missing all season, and to be honest I didn’t really fancy the 8+hour round trip for 1 x 13 minute race. Although the race is being televised on Motors TV so I missed my chance to actually watch myself make a balls up from the outside of the car!!

Silverstone 22nd August 2009

A lovely morning again, but no time to sit and relax as I had a few jobs to do before scruitineering. I needed to set the toe and camber and also get a new rear tyre as it was well past its best, aswell as the usual sign on and new drivers briefing. After getting this all done and and very brief scruitineering session I was ready for practice. We were grouped in with Bikesports (due to their low numbers), which I initially thought would cause problems, but infact it was no problem at all, which I think was down to the nature of the circuit (wide and fast). Practice wasn’t good, I took the first few laps easy to check the chassis didn’t snap and to ensure I got the 3 laps in to qualify, but as I started to pick the pace up yellow flags started to appear and a different points until Phil Alcocks Pulsar spat a conrod out the side of the engine and sprayed oil all over the entry to copse. I saw the red and yellow flag and thought I’ll “stay out of …..” and then started squirming all over the track. I had visions I joining Phil at the Armco, but managed to run wide over astro turf back onto the run off tarmac and gain control. So at the end of the session I didn’t feel that I had had one good lap, but then again it was the same for everyone. I qualified 5^th in class C on the 7^th row alongside Bob with the other 4 class C cars directly ahead, so I was pleased with that and hoped for a good race.

A quick check over the car showed no problems with Andy’s repair, although the steering wheel was very very slightly out, probably one spline on the rack, but as it was going in a straight line I thought I’d leave it until I got home.

There was a bikesports race that a few RGB’ers had entered, but I didn’t bother as I had tested the day before. So this gave me a chance to actually go and watch some racing!!!!

I got a reasonable start and managed to get a head of Henry, and as usual Bob had a flyer. We were alongside each other around copse but he managed to pull away from me as headed up to maggots, he seemed to be going a lot quicker than before! Unfortunately at Beckets Duncan spun and collided with David. lots of cars dived everywhere and I went up the inside, but in doing so Richard T boned me in the drivers side and pushed me along at 90 degrees to the track. We both managed to carry on but as we went up club straight I was aware of flapping body work and the steering was definitely not straight. By the time we had got to Brooklands the race had been red flagged, unfortunetly while David was facing the wrong way, Andy C couldn’t avoid him and had a head on!! Both drivers were OK, but the cars were looking very battered and there was coolant all over the track.

We all lined up on the grid again, and during the lengthy stoppage I had a quick look at te chassis (well as best as I could with a helmet on and the bonnet down, and a marshal helped me to tape the now flapping front corner of the rear tub. The flappy bit of panel was right next to the extinguisher pul, so the marshal (and I) wanted to make sure it wouldn’t flap and set it off!!

I had a slightly better start in the restart, but Bob still powered past me coming up to maggots. Bobs car was flying, his airbox has made a huge difference to its speed, and I suspect his balls are getting bigger. It was great going around luffield side by side but I had to back off as Pauls contour conked out at my exit point, although I suspect Bob would have still powered away from me from there up to copse anyway. Was close up with bob as we came into beckets for a 2^nd time, but he got a great exit as I slipped on the coolant on track and shot past Colin and and Al as we headed up to Brooklands. I think Bob was so surprised he forgot to brake and ran wide and Al, Colin and I passed him, but just as I was coming past his rear wheel just touched the gravel it caused him shoot across the circuit hitting me fairly hard in the drivers side. I kept hold of it but was convinced the car had had it. As I came up the pit straight the steering seemed to be even less straight, but the car seemed to be still going with no nasty noises so I thought best to continue. There was some nasty grinding coming from the body work as I braked and entered beckets but I wasn’t far behind Al and Colin and a trophy!!! The rest of the race was uneventful for me, I couldn’t quite close the gap enough to play with Al and Colin (I still obviously have a bit to learn to be able to play with these guys properly), I’d catch them as they were scrapping, but then make a mistake trying to over drive and get in their pockets. After what happened at Brands earlier in the year I decided my best plan of attach would be to drive as fast I could without making a mistake and taking myself out of the race, and hope that Al and Colin would have one of their small and frequent coming togethers and shoot past them. Unfortunately for me this never happened and I finished 4^th and 8^th overall. Al and Colin had a great race which I had a brilliant view of, and hope that I can eventually get up with these boys and be able to race in a such a clean and entertaining way!

In Parc ferme I had a quick look at the car, the body work was pretty battered and there was no obvious front suspension damage on the impacted side. The rear wheel had a large mark on it and had obviously take a fair whack when Bob hit me so I assumed something had moved at the rear causing the steering wheel to be at an angle.

So all in all a very eventful meet, I was happy with the result and know that I have got to pick up the pace very slightly to get to a stage where I can be in for a real chance of a top 3 result on a regular basis. The car looks a bit battered and will need some investigation and repair work for the next meet. I can’t make Snetts as my son is having his tonsils removed, so I have 6 weeks to prepare for Mallory! Roll on October!

Silverstone Testing 21/08/09

After waking from my best ever nights sleep in the roof tent (10pm-7am), well probably best sleep in weeks, i stuck my head out of the tent to see a lovely clear morning!!!

I'd never done Silverstone before, so i wanted to make the most of testing to try and learn the circuit and hopefully get a reasonable grid position. My aim this weekend was to have a decent grid AND finish position, i don't seem to be able to to combine the two!

First session out and i was susrprised by the track! I was expecting a flat out, boring circuit, but infact, although its very wide and has 2 fast straights and copse corner, the rest of it is fairly tight. So much so that i ended up in the kitty litter after 10 minutes and reg flagging the first session, what a prat!!! I went back out and slowly built up speed and recored a 1.06.48, which i was happy with, and hoped i be able to reduce.

The trip to the kitty litter seemed to have off centred the steering wheel slightly, i didn't have time to sort it out before the next session but a quick checkover didn't how anything obvious, i just assumed the steering rack had moved very slightly on its mounts. The 2nd session was greasy due to some light showers, and the session was close 5 mins early due to 5 formula Vee's spinning off at various corners around the track. I have the same view as Tim on these, i can't see the attraction, they are based on my most hated car, the old VW beetle, they are noisey and stink and usually pump some kind of fluid onto the track!

With the help of John Cutmore, I checked the (well John checked) the tracking, and yes it was out. All the suspension looked fine and the rack was tight so again asumed all was fine. John made the adjustement. Then the heavens opened so i din't bother with the 3rd session as i would have been soaked and learnt nothing. 4th session Again it was slightly wet and i couldn't improve on the first sessions time but the car felt fine. The 5th session came and it was dry so i was hoping for an ipmroved time. But as the session progressed the car just stopped wanting to go round left handers (beckets mainly) and was understeering badly. I wondered if it was just me trying to hard, or flying into beckets to fast, but by the end of the session the car would go round it at all wothout loads of understeer. A quick check under th bonnet revealed the problem, the chassis rail where the lower wishbones attached had snappped and was being held to gteher by a thread of metal! I felt very lucky it didn't actaully collapse on me, 1 more lap and it may have!!

A dragged the car over to Andy Bates who had a quick look and said it was a common point of failure on the fury chassis, but he would be able to braise it up and add some gussets to strengthen it up. So the next 3 hours was spent helping/hindering Andy get the chassis all repaired. I also discovered an engine bolt in the under tray which must have vibrated out of somewhere! Andys knowledge of the blade engine is so geeky that by just looking at the bolt he knew where it had probably come from, surprise surprise he was right, one of the starter motor bolts! Also i notived how bad the nearside front tyre was, i would need a new one before the race!

By the time the chassis was all done and the suspension all back together i couldn't face doing the alignment and needed some beer and food! My trusty side kicks Dan and Steve had had to get the BBQ I invited to them all sorted, and by the time i got back to the tent the food was ready, result!

Silverstone National Prep (or lack of it)

After a hectic few weeks i eventually got round to looking at the car on the tuesday before silverstone! Not ideal, and something i had promised i wouldn't do, but I just didn't have time before hand! After Mallory Both rear arches were damaged, but other than that, apart from anything i found while checking the car, there wasn't much else to do other than the spanner and visual check anyway.

My plan is to fit a full new set of bodywork over the winter as the body is looking very very shabby. A respray would help, but i can't bring myself to respray over the top of the lumps and bumps. I'm also sick of cutting myself on sharp bits when i wash it! So considering there are only 2 more races i decided just to cut off the damaged wheel arch spats and whack a bit of fibre glass over the cracked bits to hold it together.

A spanner check and visual inspection uncovered no problems, so the car was loaded onto the trailer ready for an early start on Thursday.

Update

Right, i have been a bit rubbish keeping up my blog and just can't catch up, so the reports from Brands and Mallory will probably never happen! The Videos are below, But just as a recap, Brands was going great, and got upto 2nd in class near the start, but after attempting the impossible passing manoeuver i ended up in the gravel at paddock hill and recorded my first DNF :-( !. I also entered bikesports at Brands, where i had a good tussle with Adrian and Bob in the first race until Adrian had to retire, and managed another spin at paddock in race 2, but this time carried on! By the end of the weekend the car was jumping out of 3rd gear. This is a common problem with the blades and required a gearbox rebuild, so during the few weeks bewteen Brands and Mallory i undertook my first rebuild of an engine (well gearbox). With lots of help from Andy Bates, both over the phone and sending him my gearbox internals to have the worn bits replaced i got the car up and running a few days before Mallory.

I had only been to mallory on a Trackday once before, and that was about 5 years ago, and in an old E30 325, so i wasn't expecting much. The car overheated in qualifying, but this turned out to be because i had over filled with oil, so after droping some out i was fin for the race. I had another spin in race 1, which was rather annoying, but had a lot better race in race 2, but more importantly the car worked even after i had been messing with it!!!

Mallory park 3rd August 2009

Brands Hatch 20/06/09

Video:-

Anglesey 6/7th June

I was looking forward to this weekend! Anglesey coastal is a great circuit in a fantastic location, I had booked testing on the Friday, practice and race 1 on Saturday and race 2 on Sunday. And sandwiched inbetween the RGB BBQ!

The plan was to travel up Thursday on my own, then Dan, Dad and William woud come up Friday afternoon. Unfortunetly William couldn’t come as he had a birthday party he really didn’t want to miss, so this would be my first race without his support and company, which I was pretty gutted about. I love the racing and everything associated with it, and the boys weekend with my son is a big part of it for me. Anyhow, as it turned out it was a very good job he didn’t come!!!

I arrived at about midnight on Thursday, the paddock area for RGB was small, but I was expecting there still to be plenty of room as it was Thursday night, I was wrong!! The area was rammed, which was made worse by the fact that the big “non essential parking” area was fenced off due to what looked like reseeding of the grass. After much faffing about I managed to squeeze on the end of an access road between the Rob and Andy Grant and the 750 Formula area, unloaded the car and popped the tent up.

As usual I got next to no sleep due to the excitement and the joys of camping, so at 6am I was in the shower block dodging the manky shower curtain. I had filled the car and 2 jerry cans on the way over on Thursday night and the car was all checked and ready to go so I set about setting up my new (to me) 6x3 gazebo. This thing ways a ton, and is pretty tricky to erect on your own, especially in the tight pace I had squeezed into, but as the weekend progressed it would prove to be a life saver!! I then went to sign on with a few of the other RGB’ers, and was very disappointed to find that we only had 4 x 25min sessions all day, 2 in the morning and 2 in the afternoon! The morning session only had 17 cars in it, but the afternoon had 39!!! Oh well, I’d better make the most of the morning sessions!

About 20mins before heading out I started the car up and let it tick over to warm up while I got changed, but when I returned the dash was showing warning lights for water and oil temp!!!! The engine didn’t feel warm at all, but water temperature was showing over 110, oil about 150 degs and oil pressure through the floor! Dave Wale had just turned up so I grabbed him and Andy Bates to see if he knew of anything it could be, we checked the water and used an infra red thermometer to check temperature of the block. There was no way the engine was as hot as it was saying, but I was due out in 10 minutes and would be driving blind, not knowing what the engine was up to! Then Andy had an idea, was the digidash displaying in Fahrenheit and bar? It isn’t possible to change this on the digidash itself, so I loaded up the digidash software on my PC and had a look at the setting,. I have 2 versions of the digidash analysis tool, the older version (which David always used) didn’t allow to change this, but when I opened up the newer version I had downloaded, the option was there! I tried to revert it back to to degs C and PSI, but for some reason it would only allow me to change the pressure. We had been called for session 1, so I decided I’d better make use of the session, and sort the dash out when I got in.

I relearnt my way round the circuit, but my mind wasn’t on it after all the rushing around before, added to the fact my dash was lit up like a Christmas tree warning me of high temperatures and low pressures and no gear read out which was causing me to think and worry about the engine rather than the driving. This coupled to the fact he rear end of the car was all over the place and Session one was a bit of a disaster, with a big spin at Church.

After a waste of time phone call to EBT instruments about the digidash, I started playing with the settings. When I uploaded the config file for Anglesey I must have used the newer version of the software, and the default temperature and pressure scales must have been set wrong. After trying a few combinations of changing pressure and temperature I found I could change the scales for both, but not at the same time and it had to be done in a certain order. So that’s a lesson learnt for the future, only us ethe old version of software to upload config files, and if it does change, bugger about with it!

Everyone was saying how light the rear of the car was were making changes to the settings, so session 2 I decided to soften the rear off a bit to try and increase the rear end to grip. So I set for session 2, fought with the car and and had 3 spins, either the changes had really buggered things up or I was just an idiot who should hang his gloves up!! I pulled into the pits during the session and dialed the rear suspension in harder (actually slightly harder than I had started in the morning), but by the time I got out again the chequred flag had come out. I was in a bad mood, what a waste of a morning and I was nowhere near the laptime I wanted!

Over lunch I checked the car over and decided to stiffen the front up this time, but was expecting the afternoon session to be too busy to get any meaningful laptimes in, especially as we were in with the locosts, which are considerably slower than the Rgb cars. But too my delight, the changes seemed to work and the car was handling a lot better, and the locosts pulled over to let us past (thanks chaps if you read this)! But I think the biggest improvement was my state of mind, I made sure I was ready in plenty of time and sat in the car and focused for 10 minutes before the start of the session. Another lesson learnt, I must try and get some quiet time in the car before going out to get in the right state of mind.

By the end of the day I was feeling really good on the track, and managed a 1.15.97, I had set my target to get as close to 1.16 so was very very chuffed!

Not long after Dan and Dad arrived, and after going for a frantic search to buy a new gas bottle for the BBQ we settled down for a couple of beers and a proper mans BBQ, i.e. pure meat plus some crisps, no silly lettuce or greens.

After a terrible nights sleep due to he wind and rain, resulting in giving up trying to sleep in the tent at 2.30am and moving to the back seat of the mondeo, i tried to get ready for qualifying. It was raining big time, so after signing on I swapped to the wet tyres and softened off the suspension (so all the set up time yesterday was not useful!). Luckily it stopped raining for qualifying, but the surface was very wet and slippery.

I came in not knowing if I had managed a decent time or not, so when the results were released and I found myself 9th and 10^th I was over the moon!! The grid was all over the place and I found myself a head of some of the seriously fast guys!

It felt very strange being this far up the grid waiting for the lights to go out, I had to try and keep my head and juts try and hold my position as bets as possible, I very much doubted I could finish this high up, let alone overtake anyone. The race started and there were very few incidents (well done RGB boys and girls), but I did lose my head and spun coming out of peel. Up until that point I had a lost a few places to the faster cars and also not defending my line properly (Henry Carr passed me twice up the inside coming into rocket), but was happy until I lost it. For the emainder of the race I tried to catch up my lost positions until suddenly I lost all drive. The clutch was slipping very badly so I slowly came down towards the pits frantically pumping the clutch pedal. As I was about to come in, I had drive again, so I decided to carry on. I finished the race in 16^th and 8^th in class with no more clutch problems. I was disappointed I had chucked it away with the spin, but happy I had finished.

So in the pouring rain (but luckily under my gazebo) we set about changing the clutch, but luckily realized before we had got too far, it was infact the clutch cable. The plastic coating had frayed and was causing the cable to stick. I couldn’t get hold of a new cable so we lubed up the old one and hoped it would last for race 2 on Sunday.

After a cracking RGB BBQ in the bar and plenty of beer I had a great nights sleep in the windy tent. Although I woke up feeling a little worse for wear, the weather looked a lot better, it was windy, but dry! With half an hour before our call it still looked dry so I put the dry tyres back on and clicked the suspension back up to what I had ended with after testing on Friday.

The race went fantastically, see the video below (sorry about the smear on the camera lense caused by leaving it too close to the frying pan):-

There was a nasty crash between Tim, Doug and Rob Grant. Luckily no one was hurt but the race was red flagged for a considerable time to clear it up.

After a great battle with Andy Grant I finished 3^rd in class!!!! My first trophy!! And just to make the day even better I won the tyre draw!!

So all in all a great weekend, even though the weather tried to spoil it!!!

All ready, its only Monday!!!!

Well i'm already, the car is on the trailer, i have my new (2nd hand) gazebo and all i have to do on thursday is pack the car! Somethings bound to go wrong!

Repair and Prep for Anglesey

After my little off at Cadwell i needed to do a bit of fibre glassing and wanted top give the car a good check over.

First off i removed the bodywork and gave the car good check over, tightening/testing all bolts and checking pipework and wires. There wasn't much to report apart from the front wheel bearings had a small amount of play in them, so i gave both hub bolts a tweek which removed it. 4 or 5 of the under tray bolt heads had been ground down from where i had gone over the curb a couple of times at Park bend so i removed them with pliers and replaced with some nice new fresh bolts. I checked the prop shaft bolts again for tighteness which where fine, but noticed that the gear selector arm had come loose on the spline again. This seems to be happening all the time, but doesn't seem to be a bolt coming loose, i need to keep my eye on this as its a potential race wrecker! I also decided to swap the rear body work pins over as they were wearing away on the top edge and could lead to the body dropping if the wore through during a race.

The bonnet needed repairing as it had snapped at the top of the wheel arch. This was easy enough, i just left the tape on from my trackside repair and laid 2 layers of 450g CSM over the crack. Once cured i removed the tape and rubbed it down. I hate rubbing down and always wanted an orbital sander, so when i spotted one on special in B&Q i snapped it up. It made the rubbing down and filling easy and almost fun!!! The bonnet is in a bit of a state after numerous repairs, but i tried to make as good a job as possible as i plan on a full respray this winter. I have managed to get hold of an accident damaged lemans front end off a nice lady on www.loscostbuilders.co.uk, i just need to to organise going to fetch it. After the rubbing down i applied some plastic primer and needed to source a top coat. Prior to buying the car, David had found a fairly close match for the yellow at Halfords from a Daewoo Tico, unfortunately Halfords wouldn't make this up for me as it was lead based! A very helpful lad spent half an hour with me going through all the colour palettes until we found what looked like a good match and mixed me up 2 cans. The match once on the car isn't very good, probably no worse than the Daewoo colour, but again different, so i now have nice 3 tone body work.

Cadwell 9/10th May

I spent the week prior to Cadwell checking the car over, including removing the exhaust and checking the CAT. Everything on the car was fine apart from having t

o tighten up a few bolts, including the gear selector arm that was about to drop of splined shaft and replacing the long bottom engine mount bolt that had stripped the thread by vibrating on the mounting bracket. I had also ordered a powered cool box to keep the beer, oops i mean food, cold over the weekends and some new mugs (the bleach taste in the old plastic camping mugs was bit off putting), which i packed while and organising the camping equipment. I'd even devised away of strapping the spare wheels to the trailer so the back of the car wasn't so full. So by Friday when it was time to pack up the car i was really organised!! This felt very strange!!!! So about 6.30pm we set off on the 3.5 hour trip to Cadwell, fully laden and feeling strangely relaxed!!! But i had a nagging feeling that something was g

oing to happen at Cadwell, nothing was usually this straight forward.......

After a crap nights sleep, including folding the tent up and moving pitches at midnight due to the nosiest generator in the word still running, i got up at 6am, went for a shower (luke warm) and went for a walk around the track with Judi and Dave Wade. I new Cadwell was up and down, but when you are walking round it really shows all the inclines and camber changes!!!

As i was racing in the 1st bikesports race on saturday aswell as RGB i needed to get down to scruitineering when it opened at 8am so i could get to the new drivers briefing at 8.15am as it was the only one i could have made due to the timetable. Scruitineering was being done quickly (unlike brands!) thankfully, but as we ran through the light check the brakes stopped working! I have had light problems at every meet so far this year!! I had 5 minutes to sort it, luckily

i found it within a couple of minutes, the spade connector on the brake switch had come off, so after pushing it back on i had my pass and i ran off to the briefing.

Bikesports qualifying was at 9am so i made my way down to the assembly area and parked amongst some very expensive (and fast) radicals!!! Luckily the field was a 50/50 mix between bikesports and other RGBers so i didn't feel too out of place. My plan was to take it nice and easy in bikesports qualifying, hopefully preparing myself for a good qualifying session in RGB. I'd then have a couple of hours until the 28 minute bikesports race, which again i was planning on using as a test session for the RGB race in the afternoon.

I took it very easy for the first couple of laps to warm the tyres up and just get used to the track again, as i started to pick the pace up the backend of the car felt very loose. I put this down to my driving and tried to get myself into a rhythm, but as i pushed on it just didn't feel right and i was getting annoyed with myself. I smelt oil and actually slowed slightly thinking it was car infront. I had also done an oil change the week before and thought there maybe a bit on the exhaust/engine, so i picked the pace up again but the car was all over the place.

Just after this photo (coming into Hall bends) the car stepped out, i caught it but ran out of tarmac and carried straight onto the grass and hit the tyre wall. I thought the front suspension must be knackered from the impact and as soon as i took my helmet off i could smell transmission fluid and there was smoke coming from the rear offside wheel. Andy bates was standing over the other side of the track telling me to come and see him when i got in.

I was towed back to my pitch, there was oil all over the offside rear wheel and the front nearside corner didn't look too hopeful, I was convinced the weekend was over! My trusty side kick Dan came back with William who was very upset (not sure if he was worried about his dad or the car) and we whipped the bodywork off. To my delight and surprise the front suspension and chassis was absolutely fine, the fibreglass was broken and the mounting brackets bent, but nothing a hammer and bit of tape couldn't fix. The rear corner on the other hand looked more terminal! We removed the wheel, caliper and disc which revealed oil pouring from the seal around the rear axle bearing, and on closer inspection there were fragments of metal on the surrounding area. After a chat and a bit of help from andy the rear axle was removed to reveal the bearing had collapsed.

Axel removed

Andy took the axle away to get the old bearing off while i tried to source a bearing. I didn't hold at much hope, Its a MKII escort Mexico rear axle, not the sort of thing Halfrauds stock!!! I called 118118 to get local motorfactors numbers which returned 2 hits, part co and some local place. I called part co expecting to be laughed at, but amazingly they had 1 in stock!!!!! There were 2 types, i didn't know which one it was and they only had the one type. Surely sods law meant it would be the wrong one! After Andy had heated and eventually cut the bearing off i took it with me to part co to compare the one they had in stock. To my amazement it was the right one!!!!!

A brisky drive back to the circuit, some quick tool fabrication from Andy, a large hammer, lots of help from Dan and Andy plus 2 tins of coke later and my car car was back on 4 wheels!! During the running about Dan had even cleaned all the oil off the car!! A bit of black gaffa tape (see front corner in later pictures and video) and some braket straightening and the car was as good as new!!!

I had missed RGB qualifying and the Bikesports race, but i was up and running in plenty of time for the first RGB race!! And as an added bonus i was being allowed to enter bikesports race 2 to make up for missing race 1 Brilliant!!!! Thanks to all the help from Dan and Andy, i couldn't have done it without you!!!

The only downside to all this was that because i had qualified out of session for RGB i had to start from the back of the grid for both RGB races. At least i could only improve my position during the race!!!

Race 1

I knew cadwell was narrow, but until we pulled up on the grid it hadn't quiet sunk how narrow! My first race at Snetts sitting on the grid was exciting as there seemed so little room, but this was in a totally different league. I had Judi along side and i'm sure if i stretched out i could have changed gear for her! Tony Carpenter was in front, and felt like i was sitting on hos rear clam! But then when i looked forward the lights were miles away and i could hardly read the time boards! I had seen video of carnage at at coppice on the first lap the year before and wanted to stay out of trouble, but also wanted to try and get a good start and try grab a place or two on the run to coppice. As the lights changed i managed to get off the line with minimal wheel spin, but Tony stalled directly in front of me, there was no room to move over to the left as Judi was there, so had to stamp on the anchors, i stopped before rear ending tony, and then had to slowly pull around him. although i was not last now, there was already a gap ahead of me. Due to the bunching of the cars into coppice i managed to pull back the gap and found my self behind Bob Mortimer who was behind Judi. For a couple a laps or so I followed Bob trying to get past Judi, but as we approached the goose neck i went round the outside of them both and was feeling very pleased with myself. Although this was shattered after the race when Judi informed me there was a yellow flag at approaching the goose neck. Bob hadn't seen it either and luckily for me the marshals didn't spot me, otherwise i would have had a(nother) ticking off!

For the next few laps i slowly closed the gap that had appeared in the first couple of laps, and eventually past Neil Constable-Berry. I was then slowly trying to catch the next group made up of the Grant brothers and Neil Palmer in his nice blue Fulcrum. Just as tagged onto the back of them we caught up with a back marker but I didn't manage to get past as quick as the other 3 so a gap appeared again. By now there wasn't enough time to make up any positions, well until Tony Gaunt had a small spin and i gained another place just before the chequed flag and finishing 17th.

All in all i was pleased i had got out there and to have actually raced, plus made up a few places in the process. Its all gaining me invaluable experience!

Race 2

I was hoping for a better start this time, and Tony had assured me he wouldn't stall! We had a green flag this time, so after the lap we lined up for the start. I was expecting a short delay, but virtually as soon as i rolled onto my grid position the lights went out and we were off! Luckily i was already in 1st gear and ready to go, even if i was a shocked and nearly bodged it up! Note toself, be more prepared after a green flag!! Tony didn't stall, but a car a few places ahead did, which caused some mild alarm for me, but didn't hold me up as much as before.

For the first time i had an on board camera, so you can see my attempts rather than listen to ramblings!!!

I finished 12th and was elated!!!! My best finish to date, and i started form the back. Every race weekend seems to get better for me at the moment, OK it wasn't plain sailing and at one point didn't think i would be racing, but these up and downs seem to have made the best weekend ever, again!!!! I'm just waiting for it all to come crashing down!

Roll on Anglesey!

Brands 25/26th April

What a great weekend again!!!!  After my testing on Wednesday i felt really happy with the car and the circuit. There were a couple of areas on the circuit where i knew i was loosing time, mainly clark curve and the resulting top speed down the Brabham straight. Initially I kept barrelling in too fast from Mclaren and missing the apex's on Clark, which then meant i was not able to get the power down early enough down for the exit onto the straight. So when i went out for practice on saturday morning with the intention of trying to sort it out and hopefully clock a time as close to 54.0 as possible.

Practice went well for me, i still wasn't getting Clark curve right, i slowed the entry down, but was still missing the apex, i was managing to get faster down the brabham straight as my exit speed from Clark was better, but could still be improved. I clocked a time of 54.07 and was 12th on the grid and 5th in class!!  I was over the moon!!!

There was plenty of action in the paddock, Paul Rogers who was out on his new car for the first time had already completed an engine swap on friday night after troubles in testing had limped off after a few laps as the engine spocket  had come off!! Also Bob Mortimer was having continuing problems from friday testing with his clutch. Luckily for me mw car was running great and had no work to do on it before the race, so i tried to figure out how to download the digidah data on to my nearly purchased netbook. This didn't go well! I couldn't even get the usb to serial cable driver to work to get it connected in the forst place! after some faffing and Dan (my computer geek friend) having a twiddle we got it up and running. Next problem, i couldn't work out how to get the digidash into data transfer mode without turning it off, which i though would wipe the session log. I messed about for sometime and gave up, and decided i'd give david a call later on or when he arrived on sunday to pick his "new" car up from Derek.

At 3.30pm we were called to the assembly area, the weather was fantastic and i was feeling really good and looking forward to being in the middle of it all. We had a long wait as there was a big accident on the Brabham straight during the Formula V race before us. Eventually we pulled onto the circuit and we made our way upto the grid. There was a yellow and red flag (slippery surface) being held infront of one of the starting positions and about aton of sand/cement spread all over the right hand side of the circuit from the spillage caused from the formula V crash. I was on this side of the circuit and would be passing through it all in the start, great!! As we were sitting there, it suddenly dawned on me that being bang in the middle meant there was no spare tarmac around me and i was soon to be accelerating towards to Paddock Hill bend with cars all around me, and i was a little nervous!!!  The boards came up, engines started screaming, red lights off!! We all floored it, i started well, very little well spin and took off, I saw infront tims cars at about 45 degress trying to get grip as he set off from his slippery start position, rob grant was along side me and was so close it actually felt like he was sitting in the car with me, then there was an explosion of debris infront as Dereks Jones's car went  into the armco on the pitlane exit, i then duely shit myself! I was stuck on the inside at as we approached paddock and i made my first big mistake, i flew in far too fast on cold tyres, i felt the back step out, i tried to catch it but it was going to save it and i spun going down the hill! I was now looking back up paddock hill looking at 12 or so cars racing towards me!!! I shit myself for a 2nd time!! Luckily i stopped on the inside of the circuit and everyone avoided me!!!

I was now well and truely at the back! What a prat!!!! I managed to catch up and get past a couple of cars by the end of the first lap. After 7 laps i had managed to get past 6 cars and was now chasing Phil in his Pulsar. For 6 laps i tried everywhere to get past, but Phil kept closing the door and defending his position. It was great fun and the adrenalin was really pumping!!!! Eventually on lap 14 phil got a bit out of shape at Clark, i put my inside wheels on the grass and managed to get up the inside of him and keep ahead up Brabahm straight. The next lap and the final lap board was held out and came round and finished 7th in class and 15th overall. Considering my balls up at the start i was very pleased with my finish, and really bloody enjoyed it!!!!!! Most importantly, after speaking with Phil afterwards i learnt 2 very good lessons, be careful on cold tyres and when trying to pass someone, rather than tryingit at every bend where you have little chance of doing it, plan you move, pick the best point on the circuit and plan your lap to try and to do it there!

Sunday was another glourious sunny day, i woke reasonably late (8am) thanks to a little help from Mr Budweiser. I had nothing to do the car as i'd checked it all over on saturday afternoon/evening, so after being raped by the burger stand for breakfast i spent the morning packing up, watching a bit of racing and general milling around.

I was 12th on the grid for race 2 and I was determined to learn from my mistake in the first race and keep the red mist at bay. My plan was to just try and hold my position in the first few corners and not be too agressive. I wanted to try and get over from the right hand side of the track before getting into paddock hill so i had a slighlty better line and hopefully be able to hold a decent enough amount of speed so as not to lose position. As the lights went out a gap appeared to my left and i managed to move the car into the middle of the track which set me up for paddock a lot better than before, but a couple of cars did manage to get through, although a car ahead did get a bad start allowing me toget 1 or 2 positions back. For the next few laps it was very tight and i was more concerned with people trting to get passed me than catching the cars infront of me. Paul Rickers came up the inside of me at Druids as i left the door wide open for him (note toself, hug that inside line when a car is approching) and then a couple of laps later Tony Gaunt slip streamed me down the Brabham straight, but then as we approached Paddock hill, John Cutmore had gone of into the gravel and the race was red flagged. I was quite happy with the stop as it meant the gap that had grown infont of me was wiped out and i could start again. After a lengthy stop and lots of cars getting very hot we wree ready to start again. I had a great start, Tim Hoverd stalled on the grid and i managed to shoot past him, Tony and Paul. For the next 2 or 3 laps i had paul all over the back of me, he tried it again a couple of times at Druids but there was no way i was going to let him up the inside again, at paddock he out braked me and and tried to come round the outside of me, but ended up running wide and i giot back up inside before we got to druids, on the next lap we were side by side round druids but i managed to hold on again, but the following lap he got up the inside of me and out braked me and held onto the position into Druids. The next car i could see behind me was Tim, and he was approaching pretty fast!! I defended my position around druids and stayed in the middle of the track for graham hill bend, but just as we came into the entrance of surtees Tim got his car alongside me and took me before the apex of. I had a bit of clear track behind me now and i was catching Rob Grant in his striker which was looking very lively at the rear!!! The following lap i managed to take him exiting druids down to graham hill, but was aware of Tony closing in behind. On the penultimate lap Tony took me again on the Brabham straight in exactly the same way he had done before the restart. In the end i finished 14th and 6th in class. I was happy with this again and really felt like i had learnt something!!

Roll on Cadwell!!!!!