17th July 2011 – 2 Lap Sprint – Curbrough Lifeline Sprint Championship
I had entered in the Sports Libre Class for up to 1700cc cars in the fifth round of the Curborough Lifeline Sprint Championship, a 2 lap event. There are some Championships that have Sports Libre categories up to 1400cc, which would be better suited to my 1197cc engine, but unfortunately the 1700cc class is the most common. I was therefore going to be up against some serious competition in the form of Les Procter and his OMS (think Radical) Hayabusa engined car that’s been bored out to nearly 1600cc! Talk about taking a knife to a gunfight!
The first outing in the new car, the Matador (Mallock) motorbike engined sprint car, was always going to be a baptism of fire. I didn’t have chance to test the car or even drive it more than a few feet before the event so what could possibly go wrong? Things didn’t start well when I tried to get the car in the new box trailer the day before the event and managed to badly bruise my ribs when it made a bid for freedom when it was half way in the trailer and I was at the access door at the front. All I could do was leap in the trailer and grab the front wishbone and got slammed in to the door post as the car tried to drag me through the door! Then came the fun part of trying to work out how to stop it from disappearing any further out the trailer without letting go of it but in true MacGyver style I managed to make a strap using my belt, shoelaces and wristwatch one-handed to save the day (either that or I just moved the front wheel to wedge it against the side of the trailer – I forget which).
The forecast for the day was light rain and then heavy rain which wouldn’t have worried me at all if it wasn’t for the fact that my choice of tyres are slicks, slicks or slicks. Fortunately the rain that was forecast for the morning held off and I managed to get to the track on time and through scrutineering without any issues, which is a novelty for me.
The day then took on a more familiar theme when I tried to demonstrate the engine to some interested spectators and the car promptly decided not to fire up and flattened the battery in the process! This was the first time I had had any difficult starting it and it was also the first time ever that I have not taken my Jumpstart pack with me, despite looking at it in the garage the night before and thinking “Should I bother taking it when this car has an alternator/generator…” Clearly the answer should have been “Of course you idiot!” and I just wondered if I should have just stayed at home. Fortunately Mr Procter was able to lend a jump start and I got the car going in time for the first practice run.
There is no rev counter in the car and with no experience of motorbike engines it was hard to judge how many revs I needed to get off the line cleanly. The advise from Mathew was to give it plenty and it would fly off the line. So that’s what I did, and boy he wasn’t joking, that car shifts! First gear was pretty breathtaking but second gear was just as savage and the first corner came round really fast. Trying to handle an unkown car at race speed can be difficult with some cars; others just feel natural and inspire confidence. This one felt very at odds and wanted to drive all over the road and I wasn’t convinced that it was due to the power either. The power down the straight was awesome and the flatshift worked a treat with the sequential gearbox. It was even more exciting at the end of the straight when the brake pedal went flat to the floor! Fortunately I wasn’t giving it full beans on this first run and was conservative on the brakes; it really could have been a big off. I pootled round to the pits and started investigating the problem.
The car had been fitted with reconditioned callipers early this year and had not been run since so I assumed the problem to be an air lock, particularly as the front hose appeared to be kinked. A quick bleed of the brakes was needed but the other thing I didn’t bring with me was a brake bleeder or brake fluid! So it was a trip back home to get all the things I should have taken with me in the first place. By the time I got back and bled the brakes I had missed my second run but the session was still going. With some more assistance from Les I got out again out for another run, thanks Les!
Once I’d got in the car I could tell that the problem was still there but at least the pedal wasn’t going all the way to the floor. I gave it a bit more beans but I was still cautious with the brakes and recorded a time of 65.26secs and 95mph over the finish…nice!
The brake problem was traced to a leaking brake calliper fitting and the brakes were sorted just in time for the first timed run. This time I was in “Attack” mode and tried pushing in the corners. The car still felt wayward and the throttle had a very snappy action which made it difficult to have a smooth run. The grip on turn-in wasn’t as good as I was expecting and it hurt the run out on to the straight which meant the top speed was up by just 1mph to 96mph but the time had dropped to 61.81sec, a good improvement.
For the final run I put more positive camber on the n/s front and adjusted the tracking to give toe-in as it looked to be toeing out a huge amount. Then it started raining….a lot. So much so that Les Procter decided that another run would not improve his time, a stunning 56.10, and packed up! I decided that I would go out again to see if my tweaks had made any difference and sod the rain! As it happened the track had mostly dried out by the time I lined up and although the track was slightly slower I still managed to improve on my time by two-tenths with the improvements to the car being very effective indeed. I got way too much wheelspin on to the final straight and it hurt my top end speed, down to “just” 94mph.
With a proper set-up on the car (all my settings were done by eye and I have since found out that my tyre pressures were several PSI too high) and with some work on the brakes and gearchange, I think a sub-60 time is on the cards…but a 56 second run isn’t! However, as it turns out under the championship rules you can only win one award. So Les Procter got FTD which meant I inherited the Class win! Well I’ll take ‘em any way they come but it’s a bit of a head-scratcher as to whether to try and do anything to get on terms. I have been looking at turbo kits for the Blackbird….
Tags: curborough, Mallock, matador, sprint
