After the excellent race at Mallory at the beginning of the year I was hoping for a decent result this time round. Unfortunately I did not have time to test before the race which is something that I felt contributed strongly towards my performance last time. As usual there was still something not right with the car and this time it was the brakes. I had swapped the rear brake cylinders after finding out that I had been using the incorrect ones all season and the brake pedal was inconsistent, it would be firm for half a dozen applications and then would go half way to the floor. I couldn’t get the problem sorted before race day and so it was off to see AHS after scrutineering to see if they could help. Jason tried several things but the problem remained for qualifying which wasn’t ideal.
Qualifying
Overall the car was very good, the gear change was excellent (finally!), the handling was good, and the engine pulled strong. The braking was lacking efficiency and power but at least it stopped and I soon got used to braking a little earlier than usual. The only other area for improvement would be to experiment with the fuel jets to get the power delivery a bit further down the rev range, the car pulled like a train towards the end of the straights but if the power had come in sooner the times could have been much quicker. I knew the times wouldn’t be good and with the top ten being so close 12th place was no surprise.
Race
I managed to get a good start off the line and made up three places going in to Gerrards before overtaking Jamie Conyers down the straight. On the second lap Ian Buxton went off heavily at the end of Stebbe Straight and Jamie Conyers managed to get back in front going in to the hairpin. The next time around and the red flags were out whilst Buxton’s car was extracted from the wall.
For the restart I took up 8th place on the grid due to the count back and there was a gap in front where Ian Buxton should have started. I managed a good start off the grid, straight in to 4th place behind Pete Belsey and then drafted past on Stebbe straight in to 3rd. I managed to hold on for a lap before I fluffed a gear change out of the hairpin enough to let Pete through and allowed the chasing pack to catch up. Going in to Gerrards on lap six and Pete was facing the wrong way and as I went past Danny Hands did the same trick and I had to slow to avoid a collision. Martin Farmer was several car lengths behind me and had a bit longer to react and managed to keep his foot in which meant he was right on my tail going down Stebbe Straight. For the next few laps I had to defend hard because he was all over me in to the braking zones. Several times we were side by side but it wasn’t until the second to last lap that Martin managed to make a move stick to take 3rd at the flag.
It was great to have a close, clean scrap and Martin did well to get past so all credit to him. To finish the season with 4th place finished the job off that I started at Mallory back at the beginning of the season, if only I could rewind the clock and start all over again!
