Turbos.
So Rockingham was my first race of the season as i couldn't attend Silverstone, our driver coach taking my place. Neither my dad or i have been to Rockingham before, so we were booked on the Friday testday for some practice...
This season we treated ourselves to some new helmets! I love the matt finish but its already marking :dapprove:
We were meant to be revealing our new Geartronics paddle shift system for this race but when the car was undergoing testing last week 5th gear broke in the sequential. So despite having fancy carbon paddles, we were stuck with the old 5 speed manual.
The Britcar organisers checked our figures after the last race claiming we were too fast (despite not winning!) but they realised they made errors with their calculations and the car was given the all clear. We were made to close up the slats in the wheelarches though...
Otherwise, the car was in fine fettle bar the front which is in desperate need of a respray to be fair!
Testing went well, we were very upbeat as from our stop watch timing seemed to be the quickest car there. We even managed to match the times of a Supercharged Honda'd Elise in Britcar GTs.
However, qualifying the next day resulted in a disappointing 3rd. Our old adversary's in a BMW (ex-Nascar champion at this very circuit) and Micheal Caine in another M3 (who normally races in the Porsche Carrera Cup) were too good for us, about a second better.
Unfortunately i've got no pictures to share of the race but it was pretty exciting! I managed to overtake Caines' M3 on the second to last corner to steal 2nd.
We were chuffed with the result but there was a small price to pay, the gearbox seized as i entered the pits. The guys went to work overnight...
They did a great job, especially as the bumper needed fixing after Mike Jordan (of BTCC fame) had turned in on my dad.
We had to wait until today for the second race. We were feeling confident for another 2nd because of the tyre wear the heavier BMWs would suffer from later in the race. As a result, we decided i would start this time to see if we could shake things up. Unfortunately the BPM Clio was stranded on the warm up lap. After hearing on the radio i thought the race would be restarted. Seeing the red lights on the start/finish gantry seemed to confirm this but everyone went! I had backed off and i stupidly let four cars past me!! I didn't realise the red lights went out as the first car went over the line... d'oh!:quiet:
I got stuck behind Caines' BMW and the field was getting away, but in my 45 min stint managed to claw back 2nd place with the leading BMW just in front as i went into the pits. We then held the lead for 10 minutes as my dad tried to keep the fastest BMW at bay. Inevitably though, it got past but at least we were in 2nd with a full lap between us and 3rd. It was just a matter of bringing the car home...
That was until the alternator went on us! Frustratingly my dad had to pull over and retired with 15 minutes to go. We were gutted, as we also had fastest lap which would have meant an additional point
It was a shame, but we still enjoyed dicing for position in both races. We pushed ourselves hard and i'm pretty shattered! Was a beautiful 3 days though, with Rockingham being pretty awesome too. Nice to catch up with Fred who helped the BPM team as well!
Some of my photos of the other races...
This season we treated ourselves to some new helmets! I love the matt finish but its already marking :dapprove:
We were meant to be revealing our new Geartronics paddle shift system for this race but when the car was undergoing testing last week 5th gear broke in the sequential. So despite having fancy carbon paddles, we were stuck with the old 5 speed manual.
The Britcar organisers checked our figures after the last race claiming we were too fast (despite not winning!) but they realised they made errors with their calculations and the car was given the all clear. We were made to close up the slats in the wheelarches though...
Otherwise, the car was in fine fettle bar the front which is in desperate need of a respray to be fair!
Testing went well, we were very upbeat as from our stop watch timing seemed to be the quickest car there. We even managed to match the times of a Supercharged Honda'd Elise in Britcar GTs.
However, qualifying the next day resulted in a disappointing 3rd. Our old adversary's in a BMW (ex-Nascar champion at this very circuit) and Micheal Caine in another M3 (who normally races in the Porsche Carrera Cup) were too good for us, about a second better.
Unfortunately i've got no pictures to share of the race but it was pretty exciting! I managed to overtake Caines' M3 on the second to last corner to steal 2nd.
We were chuffed with the result but there was a small price to pay, the gearbox seized as i entered the pits. The guys went to work overnight...
They did a great job, especially as the bumper needed fixing after Mike Jordan (of BTCC fame) had turned in on my dad.
We had to wait until today for the second race. We were feeling confident for another 2nd because of the tyre wear the heavier BMWs would suffer from later in the race. As a result, we decided i would start this time to see if we could shake things up. Unfortunately the BPM Clio was stranded on the warm up lap. After hearing on the radio i thought the race would be restarted. Seeing the red lights on the start/finish gantry seemed to confirm this but everyone went! I had backed off and i stupidly let four cars past me!! I didn't realise the red lights went out as the first car went over the line... d'oh!:quiet:
I got stuck behind Caines' BMW and the field was getting away, but in my 45 min stint managed to claw back 2nd place with the leading BMW just in front as i went into the pits. We then held the lead for 10 minutes as my dad tried to keep the fastest BMW at bay. Inevitably though, it got past but at least we were in 2nd with a full lap between us and 3rd. It was just a matter of bringing the car home...
That was until the alternator went on us! Frustratingly my dad had to pull over and retired with 15 minutes to go. We were gutted, as we also had fastest lap which would have meant an additional point
It was a shame, but we still enjoyed dicing for position in both races. We pushed ourselves hard and i'm pretty shattered! Was a beautiful 3 days though, with Rockingham being pretty awesome too. Nice to catch up with Fred who helped the BPM team as well!
Some of my photos of the other races...
