Another race day was upon us, the last of the season and the first 750MC event to be filmed for television (Hi Mum!) I really was pretty desperate to pick-up where I had left off (in terms of pace) at Oulton. More importantly, I was determined not to make a daft mistake and spin. I hadn’t in testing, although I’d pushed a bit hard into The Esses on one occasion so knew my limits there.
Scrutineering went without a hitch, although the gentleman looking at my car wanted to ensure that there was brake fluid in my integral master cylinders. Of course there was, but I had put the caps on a bit tight so they were not easy to remove for inspection. Qualification was soon upon us. I was lined up in the holding area about mid-way down the field alongside friendly faces in the form of Mr Boucher and Mrs Stafford. Oddly a few of the cars required bump-starts which raised a few eye-brows. Later checks revealed nothing untoward but it can’t help driver confidence if your car struggles to splutter into life.
I’ve found that I seem to take a long time to get up to speed in any session. This could be down to a number of factors:
- Car set-up and the way that I warm my tyres
- Depletion of fuel load
- Growing confidence, made all the more prominent by my inexperience
The result was that I was nowhere near as smooth or committed as I was during the last two sessions on the Friday. The lower track temperature may have played a part too but I wasn’t terribly happy when the chequered flag was shown at the end of the session. It was still my best grid position; sixteenth.
As usual, there were a few hours before the race. I made the usual checks to fluids and bolts and tried to chill-out a bit. Kate and I also packed the van so we were more or less ready for the off as soon as we could strap the car to the trailer after the race. It was soon time to get togged-up and strapped in. For once I had a nice clear view of the starting lights. I was very pleased with my start; using just 3000rpm to get off the line. Ideally I should have squeezed the power in a bit sooner than I did but it was a 'good un' none-the-less. I was conscious that I didn’t want to throw it away in the melee that is lap-1 and, as a result had lost a place by the time we crossed the stripe for the first time.
The next few laps were typically hard fought and I found myself as low as 17th and as high as 12th by the start of the sixth lap. I felt like I was ‘getting into the groove’ too. My pass on Campbell was shown on the Motors TV footage and I remember throwing the car into Riches to make it stick. I had a good run to Sear and braked, went for third and was inexplicably unable to move the gear stick from fourth! This unsettled the car horribly and I had a huge tank-slapper which carried me well wide onto the run-off area. Thankfully nobody was really near me. Campbell, Vicky Pickles and others shot up the inside as I yanked at the gear-stick to try to get it out of fourth. Eventually I was succesful and I set off in warm-pursuit. Not having any speed to carry down the Revett made it excruciating. Even the Monkey-mascot on my dash appeared to glaze-over. My subsequent shifts felt only a little awkward - at least until I tried to short-shift to fourth for the Bomb-hole. Again, it was wedged in gear and I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and pulled off the circuit half-way around Coram. I was able to drive onto an escape road and a friendly Marshall then opened the gate allowing me to drive onto the infield and back to the trailer, all in third gear. I launched the car up the waiting ramps as best as I could and headed off to find Kate. I was disappointed but my race was effectively over at Sear so I was pretty philosophical by the time I got out of the car. Kate was relieved to see that I was ok – it’s clear that I do her nerves no favours when stopping out on track!
So, just when I was finding my feet and on the cusp of the top-ten, the car let me down for the first time. Still, I consider myself lucky, particularly given the problems that Sian has had with the more expensive car that I almost bought! As for my general outlook, after the lows and highs of Oulton, the events at Snetterton meant that I felt pretty peeved. I still feel a little glum when I think about it now, some five months on. This probably isn’t helped by the fact that I won’t get a chance to put those feelings ‘to bed’ in 2010 due to the sale of the car and travel plans.
On the plus-side, the weekend had resulted in some strong interest in the car. Presumably though, any prospective buyer would want a car with a functioning gearbox.
More on that next time.
TC
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