Campbell Cassidy's blog

So like the flaky crust round a well formed pork pie our novice tale comes full circle back to edge of winter on the Norfolk broads. It’s been a fascinating summer of up downs and far too many all-arounds. I’ve met a whole cast of the weird, the wonderful and the downright holy, with just enough evil characters to keep the plotlines driven. Seriously though it’s statistically unlikely that with 65 separate drivers over the course of a 14 race calendar that you’d find so few cads and rotters. Says a lot about the formula and a lot about the Seven Fifty Motor Club (www.750mc.co.uk) who are in their 70th year this year and long may it continue. I’ve learned almost nothing about the oily, smelly bit at the front, other than Tony’s yer man. I’ve also learnt that practice does not make perfect it only makes permanent.

The seven point haul at Oulton left me with a slender 3 point lead in the highest placed novice competition over Max in the Pro-comp 91 car and coming into the final championship round of the season at Snet. I needed a good result to ensure my place. Friday testing was a glorious affair, a lovely late summer’s day in Norfolk and I was surprised that only the TMC guys (and Sian) showed up. Eager to get as much track time as possible but hampered by my own disorganisation in booking so late that only morning testing was available, it was only through a fine balance of cold hard cash and a willingness to prostrate myself on Dr Jonathan Palmer’s red carpet that got me the afternoon session as well.

Last time we were here my qualifying time was a geriatric 1:33.9 and the first session was starting to look good as my laptimes tumbled toward the 1:30.00 mark that was my goal. The noble little 74 car puts out a solid 90hp however today there was a true beast sharing the track with both a giant Mosler and a variety of other very quick and very large cars. Perhaps this was the inspiration as towards the end of the day I managed to sneak a 1:28.8, some 5 seconds faster than I could manage at the start of the season. Thanks for this should got to Matt at TMC and Mr Laconic himself (www.seanedwards.eu) . I was naturally cock-a-hoop at this however my calvanist genes prevented any distasteful continental style jubilation.

Sunday was race day and from high point of a decent low lap time on Friday it was easy to get nervous in the manic 10min qualifying. I was ready to radio back to the pits and call for the ‘F**k’s Sake’ board to be shown as rather than a bit of co-operation on putting down a decent lap, the natural untamed aggression of the average Locsost driver left us racing and it was not till I had a bit of breathing room in the dying minutes that I managed to secure 12th on the grid, pretty much equalling the best performance to date but still a good few tenths of my best in testing. Never mind though Max appeared to be having problems with an overheating car and he only managed a few laps and a grid slot well beneath him.

The low sun over the Norfolk countryside lent a dramatic cast to the final round. A season full of terrible starts would not get turned around here, as the mad dash to the 1st corner had me down a few places and by the back straight I had dropped to 15th with max 7 places back. By lap two I was out of the points in19th with Max making ground in 22nd. A spin, I think by Max on the third lap put him at the back of the field whilst I started a bit of go forward, passing David Morrow on lap 4 and then another five cars on the next lap up into 13th . I watched Tim Cheney spear off at Sear, shortly followed by an explosion of titanium, carbon fibre and other pricey parts as there was a coming together of cars. This was the last locost I saw in my rear view. Victoria Pickles was a few seconds up the road from me but she drove a faultless five laps to finish in 11th two seconds in front. I ended up where I started in 12th. Max DNFed and the championship was over for this season. I came in was 26th overall in the championship (out of 66 starters), highest placed novice for 2009 with my best results being 2 x 12th places and thankfully no longer a novice. C

Getting out Jetsetted by LA Rob, Points!!! and Slightly Aggrieved (not Mad) Max.
It is still not clear to me why I had to go to Houston for a fortnight but I did and in order to get back in time for Oulton this involved an overnight flight into Hellrow, a mad dash into Camden to change bags and up on the train to Crewe, arriving somewhat smelly, straight into the, by now very many blues, 74 car and out into the Chesire parklands to try and learn the Oulton layout. At the head of the championship folks were pounding out laps some 2-3 secs below the lap record and now with a few miles under my generous belt my times were also coming down with every lap.

Matt’s dreams of a maiden championship were left behind in the barriers at Silverstone but I had recently been informed that my consistently sluggish races to date had put me in the frame for the other end of season gong, Highest Place Novice. Being an engineer and therefore not to be trusted with numbers and complicated stuff like adding up. I took it on trust and this trust was rewarded when my nemesis in the 91 car showed up round the truck with much gentlemanly pre-race expressions of good luck and may the best man win and all that. Being largely concerned about not getting in people’s way up to now this development rather set me back a bit, could it be possible that after all of the tail-out stupidity to date that there might be a prize on offer? My previous sang froid was now boiling with anticipation and I’m now profoundly worried that we had not, as yet, had to fix anything on the car.

Qualifying
It’s a long lap at Oulton in a Locost, 2m 08sec was the lap record, and even at that pace you don’t get many in a 13min session. I still hadn’t put in a decent turn when the red flag came out and with 5mins left on the session upon restart it would need to be two quick ones, well for me anyway, and an out lap to get anywhere. At the same time Max was tearing it up in the front group, head down and couple of brave pills at Island and I got a 17th and a 20th out of my laps. Not too shabby.

Oulton Park Race 1
With the points starting at 16th and 17th on the grid, there was a reasonable chance of points today. Typically the ninth row of the grid was a long way from flat and again my start left a lot to be desired: and even that’s only if you are in the vanishing small (but tasteful) minority that considers me to be desirable, as that’s exactly what was left on the start line, me, bugger.

Survival was foremost on mind in the first lap as Locosts battle commenced with cars spearing each other into the scenery. LA Rob had flown in especially for this race and rather bravely, a couple of All Comers later in the afternoon, and with four races on his dance card today I could feel the pain radiating off the remains of the 47 car, laid up in bits by the barrier on the first lap.

By lap two I was up to 15th and gathering (or rather maintaining) momentum however a spinning Welshman in the 41car forced me onto to grass at Knickerbock and I fell back down to 18th but a few more retirees, spinners and one instance of two locosts mating like dogs in the street, which I was sure would bring out the red flag had me back up to 15th for laps 5&6. Reeling in the yellow peril of the 93 car was relatively straightforward but passing the erratic machine might be more challenging however with a final brave pill I managed to keep the gas pedal firm to the floor round Island and a wee chink in the door became a mile wide and I was easily through in one piece and into 12th on the final lap. Best result ever, beating my pie loving teenage nemesis down into 15th.

Oulton Park Race 2
With five empty slots on the gird from the carnage of the previous race my 20th was actually 15th and already in the points however the customary poor start left me in 23rd after the first lap and despite having a better drive than the first race the places would not come however my principal competitor for the novice class in the 91 car was visible up the road and although I couldn’t seem to make up place in the overall, Max was coming back to me at a rate of a car or two, each lap. By the final couple of laps I was right behind him, drafting him closer than I had ever attempted, or even considered prudent, beforehand. Going up the hill to druids I had a good tow and moving the 74 car into the clear air I expected to pass him comfortably before the corner however once in the clean air my progress was negative and I seemed to be going backwards. With laps rapidly running out I stuck the 74 car up the inside at Druids, forcing Max wide and I managed to hold onto the minor tank slapper that resulted from the quasi desperate lunge. I planted the throttle however there was clearly something amiss in the oily bit in front of me as the previously gutsy little motor fell off a cliff in puff of white engine smoke. I tried to trundle round to collect a finish but the up hill run from druids was beyond the broken bottom end of my engine and I pulled over for my first DNF since Mallory. Maximus however was unable to full advantage of my despair finishing a creditable but pointless 17th Leaving the race for top rookie wide open going into the final round of the championship at Snetterton, watch this space…

I was fairly sure that the normally redoubtable Mrs Wick had over catered the scones. There were a great deal of scones, there was practically a garage that could take two formula one cars and their assorted paraphernalia, full of scones, savouries and other delicacies. The shining marble floor that Maclaren at put in at some expense was by lunchtime swimming in clotted cream and everyone appeared to have a baby. The TMC truck, never especially fragrant at the best of times, was now being used for nappy changing and it was nearly impossible to find somewhere to smoke without withering under the death ray of the maternal evil eye, whilst their charming offspring played peek-a-boo behind the drums of bioethanol.

After some satisfactory testing in mixed conditions (wet and very wet) it was looking good for qually but on the day I just simply couldn’t put a lap together, being belligerent and Scottish I refused to follow the crowd and ended up 30th more or less last on the grid and for the first time being unable to replicate testing in qualifying, bugger.

The TMC jamboree was joined by the WAGS and WAGS in law but also the stout, well one of them anyway, men of Track and Racecar Magazine. An entertaining duel between the features editor and the editor in chief had been arranged, with LA Rob out in California the 47 car (not be confused with the even bluer now 74 car – a cider related event in Wilsthire I suspect) was being piloted by the Editor in Chief and Brian ‘Catering rUS’ Mitcham’s gentlemen’s racer in the responsible hands of Features Editor. Sad to say that there was no Bjorg-McEnroe style sporting Bannockburn as the sprightly EiC ran off with the plaudits and put the 47 car on the podium in his first race. You can read their views on the matter here….

Being the 10th birthday of Mr Champion’s formula, a parade lap of Silverstone had been organised, as we dawdled onto the famous circuit my car seemed to give up the ghost in a spluttery, sort of, I’ve run out of petrol kind of way. I didn’t even make it round to the start line despite my best efforts at propelling the car forward using nothing but invective and deep understanding of swearing. The long suffering marshals pushed me back to the pits where they availed themselves of scones and angel cakes, whilst I sought out, Cinderella style, an arse that would fit my foot. Naturally enough my total incompetence with the messy oily bit at the front of the car led me to castigate the innocent and it was indeed a proper bit of fortune as there was plenty of go juice in the car but the fuel pump had died a death. Missing the parade lap was a tiny price to pay for being able to swap out the pump prior to the race. Tony works in mysterious ways.

Thoroughly annoyed at my lack of pace in qualifying and relieved to have fuel pumping car, I employed an ancient scottish combat yoga routine that involved smoking half a pack of cowboy killers and then laying upside down on Victoria Pickles ramps till all the blood rushed to my head and then immediately getting strapped into the cockpit.

Finally a decent start with a few scalps on the grid and in the heat of battle my serene yoga and fags combo was paying off. My late breaking routine, which was just rubbish in qualifying, was actually pretty useful in the race and ever more heroic lunges up the inside was gaining me places. Matt was parked at the side of the track, his championship hopes more or less gone with this DNF. It’s a long way from 30th to the start of the points but with some attrition (sorry Matt) and a few passes I was nearly there. Since starting in Locost with some very nervous and shaky driving this was first time I really felt confident behind the wheel and getting out at the finish with a couple of real racers behind me was a feeling of satisfaction that a man of my age usually has to pay heavily for. I joined the features editor for a parc ferme fag and a review of the racing, I’ll bet we looked like a couple turf accountants that’s just seen favourite jockey appear over the fence before his mount….

The very thought of sliding a locost round the trees at Cadwell in the rain is enough to drive a man to drink. It was to imposing, grey and threatening skies that I arrived at Cadwell on the Thursday night to be up and about for testing Friday. The whole crew were in attendance, including ‘LA’ Rob Palin and the Birmingham Three. Testing was a fairly perfunctory affair with a reasonable progression of falling laptimes, most of which fell short of being actually fast but were at least heading in the right direction. The most entertaining affair of the day was trying to fit LA Rob’s erection (a very SanFran gayzebo thingy) in the space between the trucks and as for its ultimate usage I personally found it very difficult to swallow.

All looking good for race day and on the way to noise testing there was distinct lack of thrust and being pushed out of noise testing was not the most glorious of starts for the weekend. Tony had the problem narrowed down to the diff in seconds but after hauling the offending piece out of the car we discovered that we had found another new way to break a supposedly unbreakable thing. Thankfully the TMC truck yielded a spare, however it was not the preferred 3:9 but a distinctly un-preferred 4:1 differential which was going to make climbing the Mountain, feel like climbing a mountain.

Qualifying and race 1 were sequential but oddly parallel disasters, a couple of laps in and the carbs started making a noise like a Dyson attached to an industrial sherry trifle, with the occasional bits of raspberry spluttering out the exhaust. Not good. The technical committee met over the engine of the 74 car, which was now starting to look a lot bluer than it did at the start of the season, when it was largely white. Parts of carburettor starting flying about and finally Tony (who else?) put his finger on the problem, an inverted jet that was doing the very opposite of carburetion and may have been more than a contributory factor the strange noises and the lack of progress.

Out on the track there was little I could do about the cars in front as the world turned to treacle on the uphill sections. Frustration got the better of me in the complex and I nearly put the bluing beauty of the 74 car into the very brown and sturdy trees. Passed by two other cars I took me the rest of the race to catch up and pass these two but given the circumstances it was probably a blessing just to get out and round for a finish.

Brands Hatch – Testing

A Thursday night first date with a hot lawyer was not supposed to impact the weekend racing however things went astonishingly well and it was only at 2am that I realised that an 8am sign on was starting to look a little tight. A fitful few hours of sleep before the alarm went off and a high speed warm up drive through central London saw me at the leafy Kent circuit with whole minutes to spare. Talking of spare, Tony was edging towards going spare at me being late, yet again, but once behind the wheel things seemed to calm down and the benefits of preparation started to become apparent as consistency, slow but consistent, started to come.

Brands Hatch Qualifying June 2009

My education as a driver continues with lessons in humility and superstition. You may have read that our first visit to Brands was less than successful for me and the paddock wisdom suggests that drivers have lucky and unlucky circuits. I’ve always leaned towards Jackie Stewart’s view here: he was adamant that his only superstition was to be completely un-superstitious but this weekend has had me questioning the great man’s dogma. Last time we were here Matt rather famously wrote that Paddock Hill was “a lot quicker than it looked” and rather failed to demonstrate this as he binned it into the gravel on his first qualifying lap. Having taken a fair amount of ribbing for this, his jaw was set fairly squarely during qualification and set right behind him on the start finish straight was mine. We pelted down to Paddock and I was determined to follow him directly but at the short braking zone I pumped the middle pedal once and the brakes locked up for a couple of meters. As Matt nailed the turn in point like a rock star at the prom, I sailed straight into the off cambered half of the turn and the marshals hunkered down behind the Armco. Another pump unlocked the brakes and I tried to turn in. For a very brief moment the car was straight and I tried tickling the accelerator. It was going to be okay but then the momentum caught up with me and after an enormous tank slapper I shot backwards into the kitty litter exactly replicating Matts performance of the previous meeting.

I then had to sit and watch the remainder, nearly all, of the session with the august men of Post 4 who gave me the honour of being their first chalk mark of the day.

Brands Hatch Race 1 & 2

Keen followers of this blog will be aware that my starting performance has not been great. I lost 15 places off the line at Anglesey however starting from the back here today would offer up another challenge as the back of the grid is on a downslope which requires the driver to hold the revs and brake with the same foot before releasing the clutch. By the time the red lights went out my calf was cramped and it was with some relief that I was soon charging past a couple of cars. A very, very soft brake pedal prevented any further heroics and it was simply a matter of claiming the odd place here and there and waiting for the natural Locost attrition to lift me up the order. Started 32nd finished 22nd not a bad result overall but not really that satisfying. Not remotely satisfying compared to the howling banshee of a performance put in by Matt. Seven years of Locost and finally he meshed with the black beast to record his maiden victory by the grease on the hair of a gnat’s chuff.

Its rare that you see someone get what they deserve, politicians spring to mind here, even rarer to see someone get something positive but in the short while I’ve been racing with Matt I don’t think anyone has deserved quite so much. Tony too should be mentioned in these dispatches, he’s put more broken Locosts back on the track than mere sporting etiquette would demand, and this is as much a team victory for the Cherringtons as anything else. In fact it was difficult to say who had the bigger grin at lunchtime.

Race two was a similar affair for me, minus the good start. Got a couple of places back in the race and finished 23rd from 32nd. Hardly setting the world alight but from the cockpit more satisfying as for once I could actually see where the speed was coming from and where it was simply desperate ragging it. The former is something that can be built upon whilst the latter is behaviour of Yoofs.

To confirm my suspicions that Brands might be becoming Matt’s lucky circuit, both his first podium and his first race lead were here, was an immediate follow up to his maiden win with another win. Stunning result for Matt, Tony and TMC Motorsport (www.tmcmotorsport.co.uk) and the black beast never looked better with two winners cups and garlands.

In order to make up for not getting an upgrade signature on my licence due to the over exuberance of the marshals at Snetterton, I made up for this by standing on Post 2 for the day on Sunday, resplendent in Orange. Of the plaudits headed Matt’s way the most sincere I was witness to was the senior marshal, himself a former F3 driver, when he said that both Locost races were easily the best sporting spectacle of the weekend and by far the most intensely fought races on the card. They all loved it, I loved it, congratulations Matt.

Anglesey 7th June Race 2
Despite the borderline, brummie, poofery in the adjacent tent, I managed a decent nights kip and woke to another dreech welsh morning. Our race was not scheduled till after lunch and this gave me time to tour the local villages with a bootfull of soaked nomex searching for a beautiful laundrette. My luck was finally in at the local village, a place named without the use of vowels, where somebody had set up a shop specially for me, a combo espresso bar, restaurant and laundrette. I proceeded to invest a tenner, to relieve my Sunday morning misery, on 30mins of industrial dryer, two bacon baps, a Sunday Times and an espresso so very, very large that it would take some hours to recover from. Welsh entrepreneurs take note: at that time I would have happily shelled out 500quid on a 200quid suit if that beautiful laundrette had been closed.

Yesterday’s inundation had now been supplanted by a howling wind that dried the welsh asphalt in no time at all and it wasn’t long before the sounds of squealing tyres and twisted metal rent the tranquil landscape in twain. There was a very nasty looking high speed shunt in the bike powered RGB class that thankfully resulted in nothing more than financial pain and a similarly fortuitous result from an upside down sax max at Rocket. Lap times were finally back around the same times as Friday’s testing and it was with some determination that I formed up on the gird. Yesterday I lost 15 places on the first lap today I was determined to keep station. The red light went off, my wheels spun like politician trying to explain his expenses and the field zipped past me. I’m not normally given to the use of f**king foul language (sic) but anyone with a nervous disposition would have given thanks for my helmet at this point. I doubt that there has been such profanity on the Sabbath in Wales since the All Blacks put JPR Willams nose out of joint.

Three laps in and I’ve found my natural level, in front was the 54 car of David Morrow, which appeared to be wider than the Menai Bridge, and with every desperate lunge into rocket the blue striped livery of Victoria Pickles 71 car filled my mirrors. I was quicker in places but I was neither quick enough nor smart enough to get past the 54 car. I hadn’t eyeballed the last lap board however it was quite clear that my time was running out and I lined him up for a pass into the first half of the corkscrew. He wasn’t as quick as he had been out of the previous corner and I managed to get front wheels halfway up the side of his car before age and experience (beauty too probably) stepped in and told me to get out of it and my race was run. Placed 21st, not great from 13th on the grid but given the catalogue of learning experiences to date, I was still on a high as this was the first real racing for places that I had experienced. I pumped the hand of the man who beat me and despite my lowly result I had Matt sized grin to chum me down the motorway and back to the Slum.

Anglesey 6th June Race 5
Miles of tailbacks and rain like curtain rods followed me back from the mainland and by Saturday morning there was the nasty air of an English bank holiday brewing. The track was wet for qualifying. Wet as in, that’s not dry it’s wet, wet. Lap times were around 10secs off dry testing and some of the ‘not so locosters’ were fiddling around with special wet tyres. When asked if I would be running wet tyres, “well, yes of course I am, my car’s been parked outside all night and the whole thing is wet” this didn’t go down too well with the purists but an all time best 11th spot in qualification was my reward and with a second best spot for race 2 in 13th it appeared that my first time out in the wet was not such a bad showing. Pleased with my efforts I repaired to the bar for some rare welsh bit and a bit of a dry out.

The driech drizzle continued thru lunch and after some hand wringing from the stewards, our race was on. Conditions had deteriorated and helicopters had been dispatch to Snowdon to rescue the fell runners engaged in their masochistic footrace up the fell. No such luxury for us and barely able to make out my air filter during the green flag lap, we were launched like herring into the first corner. Unable to distinguish grass from asphalt, either by sight or grip the only method to determine wither you were on track was if you were luck enough to feel the rumble of kerbs before swapping ends. Conditions were marginal at the good bits and after a few quicker laps I finally found how bad the bad bits could be. Whilst happily aquaplaning toward the run up the hill to rocket, I cleared the lee of the hill and was blasted straight into next week by powerful gust of wind. I was actually surprised to see a number of cars barrelling behind me at full gas up the hill. I pressed all of the pedals, pushed all of the buttons and levers however it was now quite clear that I was simply a passenger and the little wheel in front of me was about as much use as an ashtray in a thunderstorm. Coming to rest near the marshals, huddling in their hut, I considered shutting the whole thing down right there. Something that a number of my fellow powerboaters owned up to after the race, my confidence knocked I toured round the welsh countryside trying to remember where the track was and what the view looked liked till someone waved a chequered flag and then we could all go home.

Pulling up in parc ferme the locosters looked like Manx boat people who had been recently pulled out of the Irish sea. Robert Palin was shivering uncontrollably and clearly in the early stages of hypothermia. Matt was doing a creditable impersonation of an epileptic chesire cat but with the warming effects of adrenalin waning, the rain slacked off to a torrential downpour and it was time to slip into something a little less damp. My race suit is normally a bit of a struggle to get in and out of but disengaging the zip the sodden nomex split and slid to the floor like a banana suit and as I sat naked in my steamed up hire car with the heater on full blast, quizzical locals peered in looking for evidence of sheeping, (the local equivalent of dogging I’m reliably informed by the Birmingham Two & a Half). On the upside, I was still alive and despite much circumstantial evidence to the contrary, I had not driven blindly off the headland into the Irish Sea. I had come second last but like the first beast to crawl from the sea to the land I now had a dry tomorrow to look forward to.

Brands Hatch – Race 4
Despite 80 reasonably event free laps on Monday one tour of the indy circuit during qualifying was enough to tell me that we had a problem. The 74 car now sounded like a raspberry being shot out of a canon and despite being normally aspirated had developed a chronic turbo lag. Coming out of Graham Hill bend I took a bit more kerb than normal resulting in a minor tank slapper however a missile appeared in front of my head and without the time or possibility to duck (you try ducking in a six point harness!) I was struck in the head by the only survivable component of a locost, the air filter. Without the air filter the car was now devouring air like student at an all you can drink buffet and sounding like orgasmic death throes of a blow up doll, not good.

Qualifying was a wash out for me with a 62sec lap and 20th on the grid. The remaining question was could we find the problem and the air filter and fix both of them in the three or so hours before the race? My air filter last seen by me at Graham Hill bend, and was rumoured round the paddock to have made it all the way round the lap to Clearways, which was a lot further than Matt had in the belligerent black beast. Quoting from his excellent circuit guide Matt had declared that Paddock Hill bend was “quicker than it looked”. He went about demonstrating this by chucking it backwards into the kitty litter on his first lap. Whilst no doubt fuming to himself in the gravel Matt was rapidly joined by another locoster, pointing forwards this time with the steering wheel in one hand and the other fully engaged in a titanic struggle to deviate the car from a potentially ankle snapping nose first entry into the tyres.

My errant air filter was finally recovered somewhere around Maclarens but was, even for Locost, in pretty poor repair. Tony called in a couple of the, perhaps, millions of favours he had performed over the years and found us another. A quick check of the engine compression and spark plugs found a bizarrely damaged plug and the 74 car, resplendent in her new mud guards was once again ready to race.

I’m yet to get anything like a good start and this is something that I should definitely practice, I thought as the field inched away from me down to Paddock Hill bend. No sign of the black beast as yet as we all dived into Druids (spoke too soon below) and I managed a rare pass down the hill into Graham Hill bend. Right were on here I thought as two white Locosts (you know who you are) touched and started spinning in front me of me. A gap appeared between the revolving obstacles and it was only at the very last minute that I realised that by the time I made the ten meters up to the gap it was going to be firmly shut. I took to the kerb and the grass on the right easily avoiding the spins however with the rest of the field, including the black beast disappearing up the road, I pointed the car back down to the track and nailed it. Bad move. I was at the centre of the world for a what seemed like ages, as brand hatch gyrated round me a few times and the engine coughed and died. I was now sitting in my own little crop circle, dead last, whilst the motor race whined on somewhere out of my sight. Bugger.

Back on track and giving it more than was sensible or quick I managed to catch up some of the back markers after a couple of laps and a few hairy moments. Finally with someone to race, I charged up the inside of Druids hoping that the car, who thought he had the inside line, would recognise the hopelessness of his position and give me some room. A micro second later that car was sideways in front me at the apex, after being tapped, and my nose cone was under his front wheels with the two of us locked in an L shaped tangle. I could hear sniggering from the boys in orange as I reversed out of the lovers clutch and roared back down the hill looking for black flags that would tell me that I was depositing fluid on the track from a surely gashed radiator. No black flags and the rest of the race was a lonely struggle with two bent lower front wishbones that converted the normally predictable little car into a end swapping monster and quite the biggest armful of understeer I’ve ever had to contend with. Finished next to last but with a number of cars lining the Armco and looking like a locost showroom I’d only lost 2 places on my qualifying back to 22nd and got my couple of points for showing up.

Brands Hatch – Track Day
The return of the Sean-miester, Mr Laconic was back and sad to report yours truly had not as yet pulled his socks up. We had sneaked onto a novice only track day under the premise that with Sean in the car this was an instructional day. Credit crunch attendance left the circuit blessedly empty barring some yoofs in their M3s and the Caterham driving experience lorry, which I’m sure would have given some of the Caterham clients a run for their money if they let it out on the track.

This was my first time at Brands and I stuck in a ca 62sec lap first time out. This would have put me bottom of the bottom half of last year’s grid and as such was a very encouraging sign, especially with 90kgs of industrial grade talent mumbling away in the co-pilot’s seat.

The wind rush in the open topped car was a bit of problem for our 20quid intercom and despite a bootful of helmets we were unable to get a working set of full faces with intercoms. The next best option was the open face rally style helmets with the sun visors down. I could tell that the ethos of locost was finally getting to Sean as he manned up to the challenge by gaffa taping his gloves to his chin and sun visor to the gloves, which made him look like a safety conscious, if somewhat startled, Bedouin. Bound and gagged thus it was only by some negotiation that the marshals actually let us out on the track but on the plus side, cockpit comms were now restored and my final excuse for mucking around was gone.

Brands Hatch Indy is basically a four corner circuit that is fairly straightforward to learn and naturally subtly difficult to master. After a few sessions and the inevitable skinned knee, I was out on the track on my own trying to get it under 60secs (Locost lap record here being 58.4sec, set in 2004) when an eagled eye clerkess in race control black flagged me for undertaking an XR2 doing about 30mph up the hill to Druids hairpin. Back into the pits for a talking to and a slap on the wrist (XR2 man had just slotted in a new gearbox and was taking it easy for a few laps, could have stayed off the racing line, no?) Matt went out to set a ‘data lap’ at 59.8sec but even with a few more laps, and a couple at 60.0 I couldn’t get anything in the 59s but another 0.5sec improvement would put me into the top ten grid slots for the first time and with the possibly to draft other locosts during qualifying I was happy enough to spend the rest of the day pestering the yoofs in their M3, unable to pass them with 90hp under my command but unable to be shaken with 615kg lightly kissing the track. Nice to see that youth of day out playing with the oldies though

Cadwell Park – Test Day
Head for Grimsby and turn left. It is my custom to head for any port in a storm but in this case I would have been quicker trying for Dieppe. It took an age to arrive at Cadwell but immediately the impression was that it was worth the journey Cadwell park is known as the mini-nurburgring, a complex and tight track weaving through the Lincolnshire trees and up and down the mini-mountainsides. Compared to the elegant O-level simplicity of Mallory this test was more akin to sitting A-level maths in Cantonese but what fun. The slow corners are faster than you think and the fast corners are much faster than you think. With the aid of Matt and our GPS data logger we were able to take 13 secs off my original lap time in the duration of the day. As this was a track day rather than an official test day the was a motley assortment of machinery, from mighty minis, to MR2s and a weapons grade Caterham R500 which put out more horses than ben hur.

The day did not lack drama, a well prepared racing Caterham made a mighty mess of the back end of a stationary Lotus Exige in the mountain complex and a MR2 was reduced to scrap after rolling out and over a few times. The thing was flat as a pancake however both drivers limped away with nothing more serious than giant holes in their wallets. I did what I could, narrowly missing the barriers, trees and a slow moving Seat Leon to damage the car but with the light fading and a very, very enjoyable day drawing to a close, it was determined that lack of talent was again holding me back. In the final session nothing seemed to be going right and it was only later that we discovered a small hydraulic leak on the back brakes that squirted a small but critical amount of fluid onto one the back tyres every time I stomped on the brakes. As it was only one of the tyres, the excitement was limited to corners when that wheel was fully loaded, going the other way there was less of an issue. At the time this knowledge was beyond us and with lap times on the increase we called it day.