dbRacing - Rockingham Race Report April 13th 2003

Rockingham Race Report April 13th 2003

Practice

The first race of the new season for the club Championship was held at Rockingham in dry and sunny conditions. Having taken part in the Inter-Marque race the day before I had already discovered we were going to be running on the Historic circuit, rather than the longer, but twistier International long circuit that I had done so well at in 2002. Some of the other competitors had done testing on the Friday and strangely their lap times were considerably slower than in 2001 with the 968's and faster 3.2 carreras only matching the times of the 204hp SC's.

I had got a little heat into the car in the collecting area, not wanting to go out on a cold engine, but there was a price to be paid for my mechanical sympathy. When I went out on circuit the car suffered from fouling plugs and excess fuel when it was not on boost and I lost the best part of three laps before the car started to run properly. By this time I was behind the SC of Adam Egar and David Rothwell, last years champion in his upgraded 204 SC, had passed me and gone into the distance. After another couple of laps I worked on maximising my speed round the banking onto the main straight and adjusting the braking point for the turn infield but on each attempt I caught the car in front and was baulked. I decided to drop back and create some space for me to accelerate into and in the process allowed the class 2 944 S2 of Paul Coombs past me. Infuriatingly each time I tried to create space the cars of either Egar or Coombs decided to have a slow lap and I never really got a clear lap before the chequered flag came out. Comfortable that I was quicker than both of them, and subjectively feeling quicker than the previous day I was gutted to discover that I was 1.4 seconds slower than on Saturday and both of them had outqualified me. I would start 12th on the grid, 4th in class while Rothwell had pole and was 7th on the grid.

Post practice checks showed that my front near side suspension strut had suffered more damage at Croft than we thought and the main tube itself was collapsing increasing camber to over 5 degrees. Well at least I had an excuse now, but that did not change the mountain I had in front of me as I set about changing the front strut with the "spectating" Dave Forrest from Strasse

Race

The usual problems getting off the line should not have been too much of a problem considering the long run down to the first corner, but as expected all the 911's including that of Barrie Maskell got in front of me and I got squeezed out in the first corner and just managed to keep Colin Ingram in the other 924GT and Alvero Crego in his 944S2 behind me. Hmm, both front engined cars, what does that tell me !

My first target was Wayne Jackson in his 968 which I managed to get past on the second lap. Next in line was Barrie Maskell who was having a great race. I eventually got past him by taking a better line through turn 1 but wily old racer he is he stayed with me and, getting better traction out of the hairpin at turn 9 managed to get under me in the braking area for turn 1 and passed me again. This just made me more determined and I took him immediately back on the exit of the hairpin at turn 7 and kept him well behind me. Ian Oliver was the next car and after a couple of laps I was in touch with him and knew the easiest way to get past him would be down the start finish straight. The plan was that I would pass him on the straight and be able to take an ideal line through the very fast turn 1. Most surprisingly I was only able to get level with him, but being on the inside I knew all I had to do was repeat Barry's move on me the previous lap which would require being very late on the brakes. We raced side by side at about 120 mph barely a metre apart until we entered the braking zone. We both braked at the same time which gave me the advantage and I moved up to fourth in class.

By this time the next car in view was the 944 S2 of Paul Coombs but he was about 100 yards down the road. I set about catching him, improving my lines, leaving braking later until after about 4 laps I was right behind him. Overtaking a similar handling car was going to be a new experience for me, particularly as the S2 has no turbo, and no turbo lag and larger brakes with ABS. I chased him for a lap, watching his lines and cornering techniques and concluded that my best chance to be through would be on the exit of the extremely fast chicane at the end of the start finish straight. On lap 8 I made my first attempt to carry the speed through to the exit of the corner but misjudged the braking and had to reduce speed by more than I intended to avoid running into the back of him. On the next lap I made a better job of it and almost got alongside into the braking area. Perhaps if I knew the driver a little better I would have made the move, but I decided that I would be better waiting for a more clear cut opportunity. This allowed him through and gave him a little breathing space, but by the end of the lap I was right on his tail again. I decided another opportunity existed on the exit of the tight infield hairpin. As we arrived into the braking area I set the car up for a tighter line and got on the loud pedal as early as I dare. On the track he was by now about 10 yards in front of me but I was accelerating hard while he was still not fully on the gas. I made ground up and drew level with him such that the front of my car was level with his rear wheels as we entered the braking area for the right-hander at turn 8. Now he was on the racing line, but I was on the inside. However this meant I would need to lose more speed to get round the bend. I thought I had the corner when he turned across me and I was forced to brake even harder to avoid him as I missed the turning point and went onto the grass on the exit. Undeterred I brought the car under control and booted it back onto the circuit, now some 20 yards behind him. I kept focussed and made up ground as we rounded what is turn 4 on the oval circuit and was again getting into a position to have another attempt on the exit of turn 1, but it was too late, the chequered flag was out and I finished 10th overall, 4th in class.

Subsequent race information showed that I had improved my lap time by one second from my best at any other time over the weekend and was almost 1 second a lap faster that Paul, so anyone any ideas how to fit traction control to a 924GT ?