dbRacing - Pembrey race report 1/2nd September 2001

Race Report - 1st/2nd September 2001

The Circuit

Pembrey is located in Camarthenshire in the south west of Wales, and in my case is pretty much as far from home as you go without getting your feet wet. On a good day the travel time is 6 hours.

The circuit itself is a converted airfield, and is therefore flat in nature, whilst its proximity to the coast means that winds can become quite blustery. The circuit opened in 1989 and facilities are slowly being added to the place. Access to the paddock is via a road across the circuit, so timing can be very important for arrival and departure. Pembrey circuit has a character all of its own. It has the very sharp hatchets hairpin, followed by a very tight succession of curves cumulating in Dibeni bend, which takes quite some time to learn the correct lines. The second half of the circuit is quite different, with a fast back straight leading through a very fast Honda curve onto the long start / finish straight.

Practice

Following the turbocharger failure the previous weekend, we had a busy week with ITS rebuilding the turbocharger so that Strasse could get the car ready for the weekend. Dave Sunderland from Strasse gave up his Thursday evening, working until 10:00 so the car would be ready so that I could go testing on Friday. I arrived at the circuit for testing, and found many of the other Classic competitors already there. Historically I have always done well at this circuit and I was planning to use my points doubling joker at one of the races, so testing was not going to result in a competitive advantage after all !

I set out onto the track for the first session of the afternoon, and after taking things very easy for the first lap I started to set about getting my first lap times. As soon as I started letting the car come on boost, the overcast switch was activated and power to the engine cut. I had exactly the same problem before the turbo expired at Donington. This meant that there had actually been two, almost simultaneous failures at Donington the previous week. I decided that I would continue to do a few more familiarisation laps to get used to the circuit, but short shifting so that the boost did not build, before retiring to the paddock and setting about removing the wastegate. I feared that the diaphragm in the wastegate was punctured, but when I dismantled the wastegate I found that the diaphragm was just twisted, and not sealing properly. I missed the second session, but was able to go out for the third and fourth sessions, in these sessions I practiced my lines, but had little opportunity to make changes to improve my times.

Saturday morning was bright and sunny and we had an early start as we were scheduled for the second practice session of the day. Everyone else it seemed wanted to be first out onto the track - I went into the collection area about 15 minutes before practice was scheduled to start and there were already 7 other cars there. Practice went reasonably well, though I had difficulty getting a good time because the engine started pinking quite heavily after about 5 laps. I hadn't had the problem the previous day so I suspected that a combination of the warmer, drier weather on the Saturday and harder use of the engine contributed to increased underbonnet temperatures. My lap time was good enough for 8th, in the 1:09's, but I knew I would have to make some engine adjustments for the race.

Race 1 - Saturday

I lined up on the fourth row of the grid, with Colin Broster ahead and Steve Winter behind. At the green flag I tried a practice start using a little higher revs than usual. The initial wheelspin was followed by rapid acceleration, so I decided that was how I would start the race. As the lights went green I rocketed off the line and as we approached hatchets for the first time I was happy that I had managed to keep Steve Winter behind me, though Steven Smythe and Richard Harrison had got past on the outside. Winter made a point of reminding me that he was behind me by tapping me up the bumper. We rounded hatchets, but at the exit of dibeni Harrison took to the grass. Avoiding action was taken as he came back onto the circuit, but Winter took the advantage and slipped past. I harried Winter for the next lap before overtaking him on the exit of Honda Curve at the end of the second lap. My next target was Steven Smythe, the tactics were to be the same, but his teammate Colin Broster had taken a spin at hatchets on the second lap and was also pursuing me. I passed Smythe at the end of the fourth lap, but by this time the rest of the class one cars were the full length of the straight away and out of touch. Broster tried to catch me for the next 7 laps, but twice had mild excursions onto the grass at Honda curve, before finally finally doing it properly and making a 360 degree spin at dibeni bend on lap 11. For the next four laps it was simply a case of bringing the car home with a secure 7th place in the bag and double points. After the race the results were issued and I was pleased to see an improvement in my lap times into the 1:08's, what would happen tomorrow though in race 2 ?

Race 2- Sunday

I lined up again on the fourth row of the grid, on the preferred right hand side of the track, this time with Colin Broster behind and Ian White ahead.

When the lights went green I moved off the line and as we came to the end of the pitwall a red 911 was close on my tail. I suspected this was Broster, though I later found out it was the fast starting Smythe and moved to the edge of the track to defend the line into hatchets. Everyone got around safely and at the end of the first lap the first 7 cars including myself had already extended a lead over the rest of the field. The second time into hatchets was more interesting a Tony Brown spun out of second place on the exit. As Pearce and White took the outside, I nipped through on the inside into 4th place. The then developed into a very close and well fought battle for the rest of the race. For the next 7 laps the four of us raced round nose to tail with Brown picking off firstly White and then Pearce with never more than a second covering the four of us. I was able to extend a lead over the three of them for the second half of each lap, but lost out under braking into hatchets as the rear end reached the lock up point and started squirming around. Finally on lap 8 Brown was close enough to make a move down the inside. I took a wide line to come back on his inside, but the pick up from the GT was not as quick as from his RS and so he took 4th place. For the next 6 laps Pearce tried to find a way past, and almost did on lap 12 when he nudged my rear bumper under acceleration out of hatchets. This was getting too close so I decided to try a different gear through dibeni for the rest of the race, which proved to be quicker and allowed me to extend a lead over Pearce and White. By this time though, the engine was getting warm and the engine was starting to pink again at the end of the straight. I had to run with slightly less than full throttle to preserve the engine, but did enough to secure 5th place just 3 seconds behind Brown and 0.6 seconds ahead of Pearce.

After the race was finished the results showed my fastest lap was 1:07.8, nearly 2 seconds faster than practice on Saturday and only a few tenths behind the cars in the first 3 positions. This is the best result to date for a 924 Carrera GT in the Classic championship and gives signs that the car is coming finally together.. I'm looking forward to Castle Combe, the car will be paying a visit to the rolling road before then to check the fuelling !