Turbos.
Over the winter, my old man and i had virtually convinced ourselves we were going to win class in the GT Cup. After all, it was an amateur only series and we'd be in a reliable Honda, what could go wrong?
The first test at Snetterton was a dose of reality. This was still essentially a road car that had been rushed to become a race car and niggly issues soon cropped up.
With our expectations realigned, we arrived at Silverstone last Friday for a test day before the race weekend. We were to use the now 'old' GP circuit. As ever, the team was already there setting up.
We shared the garages with Adrian Newey's toys and a fellow GT Cup team. Cheap crap...
I always like to shake off any nerves ASAP, so i took the first session and once more, started to question my previous confidence. I don't know Silverstone inside out, but confidence wasn't helped with the track now looking like a desert! Braking reference points were non-existant and Abbey was completely different. Also had to remember what all those buttons did...
Talking of brakes, they were shocking. It stopped fine, but there was absolutely no feel. Brake reference points were the last thing on my mind!
So throughout the day, we adjusted settings on the brakes and at least we got to a stage where i got used to them.
On the Saturday, we had practice and then qualifying. It was a very hot day which presented another issue: overheating. Oil temperature was getting bad after just a few laps which meant we had to back off, losing out on precious track time. I was starting to wonder if our flat underfloor, which traps in heat, was a good idea!
Also wasn't impressed by the amount of ballast required for me!
The team started making changes, fiddling with the radiator ducting and even spaced the engine hatch to give some room to breathe.
Just to add another one on the list of moans, my foot kept getting caught on the steering column!
Because of the problems, my dad barely got out. As i was the quickest, i therefore did qualifying. In practice we did alright, did a 2m10s. I took a brave pill and pulled out a 2m07s for qualifying but was dismayed to see my action track position was down from practice. Everyone else had improved too, cnuts. Worse still, the now solved oil temperature issue turned into a water temperature issue!
The team worked into the night to solve the issues...
Some play near the driveshafts revealed a problem, and the pads were replaced to try and improve feel for the race.
Sunday was race day, being two for the GT Cup. My dad took the first race as i was worried he'd have no time in the car if i blew it up! Thanks to F2 being there, we got to see the race as if it was televised live, there was plenty of dicing!
Despite the engine warning lights going crazy, we finished the race to it ending a few laps early because of a red flag (Porsche binned it into the new pit wall). My dad also managed to equal my qualifying time and gain a couple of places.
I then had a few hours to wait for my race...which felt like forever.
Seeing people's race pace was somewhat off qualifying times was a little comforting consider we were upto 2 seconds off the class leader (Ferrari 360 Challenge). As over 40 cars barrelled into the first corner though, i was wondering if i was going to make it to the end of the lap!
With it only being a 25 minute race, i had to get on it straight away. Starting from the back, i had to get past 8 cars, including the Ferrari, a Z4M, an M3, XBow, Exige, Ginetta and 944 Turbo. I also had to contend with faster cars in other classes that started from the back. It was chaos!
Fortunately, as people were concentrating on their own battles, i started to pick off people one by one. Within two laps i had managed to jump to second class thanks to the Z4M spinning in front of me.
But then disaster, the red lights of doom illuminated the dash! The overheating warnings i had been ignoring were now critical, so i had to pit. Being such a short race, this obviously put us last. Nevertheless, i went out and had some fun with higher classed cars who were lapping me and at least i finished. Some others weren't so lucky, so although i finished last, points were picked up from DNFs. Not so bad...
I rolled back into the pits with a broken exhaust and clutch. The poor NSX had had enough abuse and was pushed back.
So with aspirations a little more realistic, we're trying to get as much development time in before the next race in May. We also have a slight distraction with the car being displayed at Japfest.
I will leave you with some more shots of Newey & Co's cars...
The first test at Snetterton was a dose of reality. This was still essentially a road car that had been rushed to become a race car and niggly issues soon cropped up.
With our expectations realigned, we arrived at Silverstone last Friday for a test day before the race weekend. We were to use the now 'old' GP circuit. As ever, the team was already there setting up.
We shared the garages with Adrian Newey's toys and a fellow GT Cup team. Cheap crap...
I always like to shake off any nerves ASAP, so i took the first session and once more, started to question my previous confidence. I don't know Silverstone inside out, but confidence wasn't helped with the track now looking like a desert! Braking reference points were non-existant and Abbey was completely different. Also had to remember what all those buttons did...
Talking of brakes, they were shocking. It stopped fine, but there was absolutely no feel. Brake reference points were the last thing on my mind!
So throughout the day, we adjusted settings on the brakes and at least we got to a stage where i got used to them.
On the Saturday, we had practice and then qualifying. It was a very hot day which presented another issue: overheating. Oil temperature was getting bad after just a few laps which meant we had to back off, losing out on precious track time. I was starting to wonder if our flat underfloor, which traps in heat, was a good idea!
Also wasn't impressed by the amount of ballast required for me!
The team started making changes, fiddling with the radiator ducting and even spaced the engine hatch to give some room to breathe.
Just to add another one on the list of moans, my foot kept getting caught on the steering column!
Because of the problems, my dad barely got out. As i was the quickest, i therefore did qualifying. In practice we did alright, did a 2m10s. I took a brave pill and pulled out a 2m07s for qualifying but was dismayed to see my action track position was down from practice. Everyone else had improved too, cnuts. Worse still, the now solved oil temperature issue turned into a water temperature issue!
The team worked into the night to solve the issues...
Some play near the driveshafts revealed a problem, and the pads were replaced to try and improve feel for the race.
Sunday was race day, being two for the GT Cup. My dad took the first race as i was worried he'd have no time in the car if i blew it up! Thanks to F2 being there, we got to see the race as if it was televised live, there was plenty of dicing!
Despite the engine warning lights going crazy, we finished the race to it ending a few laps early because of a red flag (Porsche binned it into the new pit wall). My dad also managed to equal my qualifying time and gain a couple of places.
I then had a few hours to wait for my race...which felt like forever.
Seeing people's race pace was somewhat off qualifying times was a little comforting consider we were upto 2 seconds off the class leader (Ferrari 360 Challenge). As over 40 cars barrelled into the first corner though, i was wondering if i was going to make it to the end of the lap!
With it only being a 25 minute race, i had to get on it straight away. Starting from the back, i had to get past 8 cars, including the Ferrari, a Z4M, an M3, XBow, Exige, Ginetta and 944 Turbo. I also had to contend with faster cars in other classes that started from the back. It was chaos!
Fortunately, as people were concentrating on their own battles, i started to pick off people one by one. Within two laps i had managed to jump to second class thanks to the Z4M spinning in front of me.
But then disaster, the red lights of doom illuminated the dash! The overheating warnings i had been ignoring were now critical, so i had to pit. Being such a short race, this obviously put us last. Nevertheless, i went out and had some fun with higher classed cars who were lapping me and at least i finished. Some others weren't so lucky, so although i finished last, points were picked up from DNFs. Not so bad...
I rolled back into the pits with a broken exhaust and clutch. The poor NSX had had enough abuse and was pushed back.
So with aspirations a little more realistic, we're trying to get as much development time in before the next race in May. We also have a slight distraction with the car being displayed at Japfest.
I will leave you with some more shots of Newey & Co's cars...
