Mallory Park Race Report

Nice to see Di and Toby on the Saturday night before race day, sorry I didn't take you up on your offer to go to a pub but I think it was for the best

A post taken from one of my 'regular' forums please excuse the names but you should get the general idea. Enjoy

Mallory Park - 25/07/2010 Morgan Sports Car Club

Many thanks to Familie Pinder for coming along and helping out. Nice to see Teffer's plus ickle ones. And my parents saw me drive on track for the first time, they've never been to a trackday let alone a race.

Pics and Video to follow soon (my camera was stolen in the Landy so Pinderman/Pinderboy supplied and operated filming equipment, thanks again.

Another fantastic weekend, I was gutted to have missed Lydden but that was made up this weekend.

RAFMSA practice was good, I had pre-arranged to follow Martyn around for a couple of laps although I feel the lines our lines were slightly different I still managed to find out where it went left and right, Martyn waved me to overtake so he could follow and check out what I was doing (I think he was scouting for next weekend ). Nothing further to report. Datalogging showed I did a 58.3 but massive differences in sectors meaning a 'theoretical' best of 56.7 from the software but this is hardly every achievable. We knew there was more in the car!



One for Teffers....





Martyn following me 'checking my lines'



Other machinery from the RAFMSA grid

Westfield V8 and ex-Rover Challenge 216Gti



Locoblade and Zetec Westfield



Chris (D-Type Martyn's Son) in Metro followed by a torquey D-Type



Westfield, Locoblade and 750mc Locost



Nige works CircuitTools for us



Teffers pretends to be a racing driver



Toby has a go too



Lunchtime serious discussion face...



My mate from work, Stu is masterchef for the weekend



S&S practice. I only managed to get about 3 decent laps in due to the traffic but managed to get my time down to 58.0. Datalogging now suggested a 56.5.

Much different machinery on this grid, some of the Jag's were a complete pain.



Schnell....



Me





Session finished, window down for a well deserved breeze



RAFMSA Race. I can't really remember the start, just the it was much more bunched up than Anglesey and I bogged down on the line, I also knew I'd be close from Frodo due to his vast circuit knowledge. Into the hairpin I decided to have a look up the inside of Si but realised we wouldn't be able to go three a breast as he was already making a move. My car has an extremely long first gear so I backed off, into 1st to then have a drag out of the hairpin with PW in the mighty Mi. I checked the mirrors constantly all was good until the point where I'd turned into the hairpin when I heard a massive screech and got shunted in the back. I didn't even know who it was The next lap showed when I came round. Anyway, race on!

Green-flag Lap



Opening Lap



Note the position of the blue Locost..











I managed to pull away from PW and the mighty Mi and get into the battle with Frodo, it was very close. I picked my place, this was on the exit of Gerrard's where I was carrying much more speed. Frodo was taking a much wider line so I had a go and the gap increased, I kept getting a good run onto the straight but the diet affected Rover had too much in a straight line. Had the hairpin been open for overtaking I'm pretty sure I'd have been passed eventually on the brakes. I had lost quite a bit of confidence after the Lap1 incident. So, in summary good race with a good battle, worse lap time than qualifying, lost confidence and a dented back end.

A great battle at the front between Darren Berris (Westfield V8) and Paul Martin-Jones (Radical 1100 Clubsport)



Race on!!



Coming through....





Better line?



I think not...



The lovely D-Type



Trying again



RAFMSA Race on Vimeo

In between the race we looked over the car and tried sorting the damage out. Suspension check carried out, all good. Because I wasn't hit square on the exhaust took some of it, it was now bent and catching the tunnel, nothing could be done but it was still secure so we cracked on.

It doesn't actually look that bad but it was one hell of a bang in the car. Damaged bumper and bent rear panel in view





Car checked out ready for next race



Nige and my Dad plan my race tactics for me (I think)



S&S. I wasn't really looking forward to this one, three reasons. 1. First race issues. 2. I didn't have the best opinion of the Jag drivers after following one at Anglesey. 3. Car already damaged I had to make sure it was good for my mate and MartynA to race next weekend. To improve from my start in Race4 I applied more revs, excellent. Lots of wheelspin now! Frodo got a flier as did most others around me.

Vast array of machinery involved in this one



Loosing places









One place made up



And another



Next target...





The hairpin was heavily defended by the Jaguar so I tried as best I could to force him running wide by moving around under braking. He did run wide.





But had far too much power for me to take advantage of it. Back to the drawing board.



I managed to get past at Gerrards



I was being far too over cautious for the first lap resulting in Frodo, PW in the Mighty Mi, BillB and a couple of others getting past. Once the field was spaced out I was more comfortable so started taking the places back. My best overtake previously was going round the outside of Ben Keift into Rocket at Anglesey, this was to be beaten . I caught up with 'a big Jag', not very quick around the bends but proper quick (compared to mine) down the straights. I tried carrying speed from Gerrard's but couldn't pass on the straight, I tried into the esses, resulting in said Jag taking up most of the track as he regained control (Operation preservate 306 was now in force) and I didn't have the confidence to pass him into the hairpin on the brakes, it was very well defended. Over the next few laps I made some observations around Gerrard's and decided that was the place to do it and I drove all the way around the outside . I was asked, "Have you driven around the outside on Gerrard's before?", "Nope", "Did you know how slippy it was?", "Nope", "Would you do it again?", "Nope". Car preservation worked and it lasted the day.

Sports Vs Saloon Race

Thanks again to the Pinders for the video, circuit tools and support and thanks to Darren for popping along too

Until the next one....

Ace stuff there Chris - and brill fun.

Great stuff Chris - a great write up. Thanks for sharing.

Top driving Chris, did i see you eating sausages in those buns,,,,,,,,,,still got some left from the trip!