“Once hooked, teams return year after year, blind to the strong chance of inhospitable weather, because it’s great fun. And, given a fair wind after a summer of sprint races, plenty of mileage for your money. The perfect opportunity to wear machinery out prior to the winter rebuild is oversubscribed from the moment the regulations are published. Like being on the waiting list for a Bournemouth beach hut, it may take years to join the party, but that only heightens the anticipation.”

To me that gets it exactly right. To get another idea what it’s like, see the photo above, taken after last weekend’s race. You will probably think that we seem to exceeded the maximum number of drivers slightly, but that’s the entire team including all the hangers on. The lunatic on the left is Guy, our team manager who seems to enjoy nothing so much as bossing us around for a day. Eagle eyed readers will notice Anthea standing in front of me. (I’m the mop of unkempt grey hair at the back.)

Anyway, back to the beginning. Having spent a while getting the car sorted for the race, as described previously, we drove over to Silverstone on the Thursday evening before the race on the Saturday. The race was taking place on the Silverstone International circuit which I’ve not done before. It was also on this circuit last year but that was just after Anthea had had her coronary bypass operation and it didn’t seem sensible to get involved in such a race at the time. So, I wanted to the outrageously over-priced test day that the circuit was offering us.

We’d rented a garage so we parked up behind it, in readiness for another three members of our team to meet up on the Friday morning. In the morning it all looked a bit greasy and wet. However, the forecast was good, which was more than could be said for the race day.

We only got three 30 minute sessions for our £170 (!!!) so we got out early and found out what the circuit was like. Slippery was the answer and the fastest lap in the morning session for me was 1:50.8. My target for the day was to get below 1:35 which was the fastest lap that an RGB class B car had done in the Birkett last year. So, 1:50 wasn’t very clever but, as I said, it was slippery.

Later on and it dried up a lot. In the next session I got down to 1:34.3 and I knew I could make that about a second quicker at least. To get an idea what this circuit is like, here’s that lap:

After that session I decided to call it a day as I didn’t want to risk bending the car and it was clear that I did now know, sufficiently, my way round the circuit.

So, in the afternoon I got the car scrutineered and we moved camp over into the outer paddock. As there’s hundreds of cars in the Birkett we’re limited to how many vehicles are allowed in the main paddock. Later on, all the rest of the cars arrived and this is a fragment of our garage at the end of the day. This space would be used by a single F1 team, so they’d have two cars in here. We (and there’s four  teams of RGBers  in here) had 22 cars. Oh, and that’s the safety car over there in the far corner too.

In the night it rained.

And rained.

And, in the morning it was really wet. Ho hum. Still it was the Birkett and we were going to enjoy ourselves. We’d got load of provisions in as you can see, we had hundreds of litres of fuel and we needed to have fun. So, after we did qualifying (which is a bit daft really as the grid positions are allocated on the basis of the times we submit to the handicappers. The qualifying session is just to satisfy the regs that say you have to do three laps of qualifying. I was down to do the start, for some unknown reason I’d volunteered. As we were on row 5 of the grid that meant there were about 45 cars behind me at the start. Stalling would be a very, very, bad idea.

And, as the start time approached it rained even more. Eventually we went through the start procedure which, for the first time ever in a start that I’ve done, proceeded to the times shown on the boards. Normally, the club just goes through the 5 minute/3 minute/1 minute/30 second boards as fast as they can so as to keep the meeting rolling along. This time, as the Birkett is scheduled to start at 11:15 exactly, it was done to schedule. Eventually we were off. You can see the first couple of laps and a few other bits of my first session, which took just over 40 minutes and in which I did 19 laps, in this video.

We had been a bit worried about tank capacity before the race. This is because key to doing well in the Birkett is optimising the changeovers between the cars and running for a long time is a Good Thing. After the session I measured the tank and found I’d used a whole 10 litres. At that rate I could have kept going for another hour or so! My FL in this first session was about 2:04 which is reason for this. The problem in the wet is that RGB cars just can’t get any heat into the tyres and the cars are so light and they just skitter about on top of the puddles, which you can probably see in the video. Mind you, we were as daft as that chap in the Radical you can see in the video. He rammed the pit wall on the very  first lap. That, of course, brought out the safety car so we were doing laps at around 2:40 before they cleared up the mess.

At the end of the day, we finished in 19th position on the road which was actually in first place for our class. In that I did 42 laps and about 1 hr 20 mins on the track. It’s not wonder I was so tired later that day. The problem is we got shafted on the handicap and ended up 50th on handicap. As you can see in the video we were just being driven around by bigger, heavier, tintops all the time. (And those BMWs apparently had ABS which seems a mite unfair. How’s that then?)

All the same, we had a great time. Roll on next year. Let’s pray for non-rain next year!

Now, though, it’s down to the serious business of the winter. First thing will be to tidy the Fury away and then it’s back to the Spectre. I’ll tell you all how I’m getting on with it soon. Problem is, I’m a bit short of time at the moment as I’m lecturing on this course at the University at the moment in my copious spare time.

Of course, I was hoping that the car was going to work after sorting the cam position sensor at Mallory and, subsequently, fixing the clutch. I didn’t have time to do any running before getting to the circuit so when we got there on a fine Friday afternoon I took the car for a run down the old runway (which is inside the national circuit) to see if it worked right. Luckily, it seemed to do so. Even better, I managed to get the car scrutineered on the Friday evening so I could have a bit of a lie in on Saturday morning.

I didn’t manage to do so, of course, because I never do on race days. I got up, checked a few things and essentially waited around for qualifying which was a joint session between us and Bikesports. I had worried that we were going to get mugged by hordes of Radicals but that turned out not to be the case, oddly enough. The problem was that this was my first time out on this circuit since I fitted the CBR1000 so I was pretty much at sea with respect to gearing and braking. So, I was going to have to re-learn that as well as putting in a half-way decent time.

In the event, it wasn’t too bad, even though qualifying was marred by a large number of yellow flags and, right  at the end, by Phil blowing up in spectacular fashion and dumping a prodigious quantity of oil in the circuit. When I hit it, at Copse, I thought I was going to be in Silverstone village before I stopped but I slowed once I got away from the most liquid of the oil.

FL, though, was 1:04.73 which wasn’t too bad. It was good enough for 9th, out of 16, on the Bikesports/RGB grid and 8th, out of 23, on the RGB grid. Also 3rd in class for RGB, and directly behind Duncan on the grid. That was good, normally he was out of sight.

The bikesports race was next and we formed up on the grid. A novelty for us was the green flag lap, as the Bikesports boys are on slicks they need it. Come the start and I got my now trademark useless start and Bob Mortimer came past me like I was standing still. That was annoying, especially as his lap time was about 3 seconds slower than mine! Still, I managed to squeeze by into Becketts, admittedly with a rather forceful move. Actually, Bob’s slowly getting faster and faster which is nice to see. He’d done some mods to the induction for this meeting and it looks as though it’s paying off.

Once the race was properly underway I was in position behind Duncan who was crawling all over Steve in front of him. We stayed in that situation for a while and I managed to work out how to go a bit quicker (I was still in getting up to speed with the CBR1000 mode). In fact, my FL was a 1:48.4 at about this point. In the process, I got closer and closer to Duncan and started making a few attempts to get past him. Mind you, he’s a hard but fair man and I was clearly going to have to try harder. However, perhaps provoked by me dodging around behind him, he spun on the exit of Luffield; most likely on the cement dust/oil mixture that was on much of the circuit after one or other of the Formula Vees, who were on before us, had dumped oil all round the circuit. I’ve never seen the attraction of Formula Vees, becaus they’re essentially VW Beetles and use the same deeply, deeply naff suspension system. I’m even less enamoured now.

Still, I was past Duncan, although later in the paddock it was clear that he’d been having clutch problems which were doubtless part of the reason I’d got past him. Then Steve was in front of me. I’d surely never be able to pass him? However on the penultimate lap he seemed to be slowing a bit and I got closer and closer on the last lap, going round Luffield, the last corner, I was really close to the back of him, hoping for a dodge to the inside at Woodcote and he suddenly practically stopped! I oh so nearly ran into the back of him but managed to dodge right and crossed the line 5th overall! Coo, that had been real fun.

I’ve realised that a real attraction of Silverstone for me, even though it’s not a fun place in many ways, is Copse corner. This is really, really, quick and is a real adrenalin fix as you go round it. I approach it in 6th, doing about 122mph, and then it’s a surprisingly light dab on the brakes, down two gears and hard on the throttle before you get to the apex. If you get the line right and take lots of kerb on the inside the car just hunkers down onto the (progressive rate) bump stops and blasts up the hill towards the Maggotts kink. Great stuff…

Lots of people came up in the paddock afterwards and congratulated me on the drive. From inside the cockpit it had seemed business as usual, but I guess it was better from the outside.

Later on we lined up for the RGB race proper. This time I got another lousy start, although that was probably a good thing. As we approached Becketts on the first lap I was quite wide, looking to pass a bunch of people as they all tripped over each other. I saw Duncan spinning and putting his arm up to try and warn people but to no great avail as David hit him quite hard. I avoided the mélée by going even wider, even though that meant bouncing over the huge Becketts kerb but it seemed likely that they were going to red flag it. On the way past after they’d stopped it, it was clear that Andy had piled into David quite hard after the initial accident and there was a lot of oil on the track. Hmm, that’s a shame.

This is my video of the first start, although you can’t really see that much about what happened:

Still, the restart came and we set off. Pretty rapidly I was into 4th place but not really making any progress towards the leaders, who I could see in front of me. Then my palm display fell off the dash! I could feel it swinging about on the cable and at an appropriate point I managed to grab it and lob it into the passenger side of the car. That meant, though, that I was driving blind with only the shift lights and an oil pressure warning light. I don’t work well like this although the lap times weren’t too bad. FL was 1:04.7. I couldn’t catch up the leaders though and, to be honest, I had a pretty lonely race which happens sometimes.

However, I crossed the line in 4th place overall, 2nd in class B. This would, of course, all be pretty good for my championship standings if I hadn’t missed 4 races this season with the catalyst problems and the cam position sensor problems. I bet the competition’s going to be tougher in B next year too…

I’ve got a couple more videos that I’ll show you when I’ve processed them. In the meantime, it’ll be back to the Spectre. Loads of people came up to me in the paddock asking about the Spectre. It seems that lots of people are watching to see what happens. Sorry people, you’ll have to wait until the next time…

It turned out that the problem with the clutch at Mallory was due to something really rather dim. When we’d put the replacement plates in we couldn’t make things fit properly in that the plates seemed to thick. When I took it all apart, in the calm and lack of heat of my garage I realised that we’d left one of the plates behind; it was just that it had worn so smooth and shiny that it looked like the clutch backplate! Once I realised that I took it out and everything fitted properly.

So, let’s hope it works at Silverstone. I’m not testing there, because the test day’s full. However, there’s lots of runway to play on so I’ll try and get there in enough time to zoom around and, hopefully, the clutch will work properly. Mind you, having had the front cover off the engine yet again I’m slightly concerned that it’s going to leak again, so I’ll have to keep an eye on that.

Wish me luck…

This photo was taken by Mark <something or other> who’s talking about coming racing with is. I’ve shamelessly nicked it off his on-line photos, I hope he doesn’t mind. (You might also be able to tell that I washed the car before the race!)

The weekend started for us with the drive to Silverstone on the Thursday evening, as I was testing on the Saturday. However, there was a race meeting taking place and we had to spend the night in the car park outside the circuit. Of course, if I’d read the testings finals that the club had sent me, I’d have been expecting that. Still, it all worked all right and we got into the circuit at 0730 the next day.

I had been a bit unsure about whether going testing was a good idea, but in retrospect I think it was useful. The big problem was that there were lots of things like stock hatches on the circuit and as the day wore on they got more numerous and seemed less and less able to look in their mirrors. This photo gives an idea what it was like. The wall of cars in front is more reminiscent of the Birkett than a usual test day.

The problem on this day was that many of those hatches were effectively racing each other and completely messing up lap after lap after lap for people like me. In fact, I got tired of it and sold my last session to Andy Grant.

Before the weekend, my fastest lap under race-like conditions was 1:06.82 from qualifying last year. (The race itself was wet, so not representative.) I didn’t manage to improve on that time during testing, as I just didn’t get a clear lap the whole day. I did, though, improve the theoretical fastest lap, from 1:06.38 to 1:05.97. That is, I put in some faster sector times than I’d managed before which should be good.

At the end of the day, I got the car scrutineered as they were allowing us to get this done a day before which was very useful. The scrutineer remarked that my helmet was looking a bit bashed up, which is probably correct. So, as we were at Silverstone I went to GPR and bought a new one. Expensive business, motor racing, but it’s probably best not to save money on safety kit.

Race day dawned bright and clear, which was a relief as the forecast hadn’t been too good. Come qualifying time I got near the front of the queue which gave me a relatively decent set of clear laps in qualifying. I managed to get in a 1:06.57 which was good enough for 13th on the grid, 8th in class. OK but not good really. I’m sure I could have gone quicker. I need to get my head around going really quickly for a single lap, I’m still no good at that… One problem, though, was that the gearbox was clearly not too happy. It jumped out of gear a couple of times, and refused to go in on several others. Clearly, I’m going to have to do something about this.

When the race came around, the weather was still fine. I was directly behind Andy Grant on the grid which was a shame, I’m sure I’m quicker than him. That’s Andy in the white car in front of me.

When the lights went out I was almost caught napping and made a pretty gruesome start with far too much wheelspin. Phil passed me on the way down to Copse as well. But I managed to pass Andy when he left the door WIDE open at Becketts and outbraked Phil at Brooklands. So, I finished the first lap in pretty much the position I started in. I’m not too sure what happened to Andy and Phil after this as I didn’t see them again.

Then I was in a battle which lasted the whole race and was great fun. There was a train of me, Henry, Colin, Al (who’d stalled on the grid and was making his way forwards) and David. We swapped places several times although I mostly just watched from the rear. I was having more and more trouble with my gearbox and on the couple of occasions when I did make progress I was knocked back again. If you click on the photo on the left you’ll get a snippet of video which neatly summarises the problem. In fact, at the end of the race, I wasn’t entirely sure that I’d even manage to get to the finish line. But, I actually made up three places on the last lap as Henry spun and Colin and David managed to hustle each other off into the Brooklands gravel. Thanks chaps!

So, I finished in 9th place, 4th in class. I’ll take it but it was rather lucky really…

Now I’ve got a couple of things to fix. The first is the gearbox which is made rather tricky by Andy going off on his summer holidays! Also, the damper that sprung a leak at Brands earlier in the year seems to be leaking again. Having had it rebuilt I’m not too pleased about that. I’ll phone Protech and see what they say about it.

Problem is, I haven’t got long before the meeting at Oulton Park…