dbRacing - NSSCC Race Report Cadwell Park 28th September 2003

NSSCC Race Report Cadwell Park 28th September 2003

Practice

This was a 750 Motor Club meeting and with two full days racing there was not the normal opportunity for a Saturday afternoon test. Qualification was going to be a real shoot out with just a 15 minutes on circuit and no-one having any advantage from testing. NSSCC only had a single grid for this meeting and remarkably we managed to get ourselves organised with the faster AE & F cars in position to take to the circuit first. This worked out really well, as it gave a session that was really quite free of traffic.

As I went out on circuit Ryan Upson was the next car in line and I wanted to get a quick start to give myself plenty of space. On the first lap I passed quite a few cars before coming up on Terry Wright, who after an engine rebuild was in his much improved Rover 100. Down the Park Straight he was jostling for position with Darren Flounders and I had to work out a way past them. With the benefit of the downhill section both cars were quicker in a straight line than I expected and eventually had to take them one by one, firstly on the run down to Coppice and then at the top of the hill at Charlies. From then on I was quite surprised how quickly I pulled away from them. The next few laps were simply spent leaving the braking later and getting the throttle on earlier in a bid to improve the lap times. This certainly worked as with each lap the time improved, within 4 laps I was already quicker than I had been a few months earlier at the first visit of the year to Cadwell Park. In the distance I could see the bright yellow lotus Cortina of Nigel Vaulkhard with Mick Starkey just a little further down the road. I set about catching them, and although I was gaining ground I was not gaining so quickly so it was not obvious who would have the better lap times. On what turned out to be my final qualification lap I left the braking later and lighter for Coppice. The car made it up the hill with no problem and I kept it tidy for the rest of the lap. When the lap was over I saw from my pitboard that my previous lap had been a 1:47.2. From what I remembered that was my previous best ever lap at Cadwell Park, the question was had I managed to beat it ?

When the result sheets came out Gills' stopwatch time was confirmed at 1 minute 46.8 seconds. Not only was this over 3 seconds faster than my last visit here, but it was my best ever lap round Cadwell Park and I had qualified a creditable 12th on the grid. That was behind 7 of the A & E cars and the usual suspects of Morrison, Ferguson, Caig plus David Cox in the ex Dougie Andersons rapid Peugeot 1.9 GTI. So, that's who was in front, what about behind me ? I had managed to outqualify Nigel by just 0.2 second and then there was a total of 6 cars all within one second. This had the makings of some race.

Race

I know I have probably said it before but the grid layout at Cadwell is "tight" to say the least. A successful start means a combination of not getting bogged down by wheelspin and most importantly not getting held up by a slow starting car on the row in front. We were all lined up, the 5 second board was shown and the red lights came on. The revs rose and after holding us for a couple of seconds they turned green. As the cars moved forward they changed back to red again. What were we supposed to do ? The front row of the grid hadn't moved and so the rest of the grid had nowhere to go and we all braked to a stop obediently just like we were in town on a shopping trip. That was fine, but then the lights turned green again. Being stationary on the grid when the lights are green is not a good idea and fortunately the lemming instinct is strong in racing drivers so we all set off for the race.

As we ascended through Coppice Corner I had managed to get away from all the cars behind me and was in fact right up behind Ferguson and Cox on the run down Park Straight. When we got to the end and were braking for Chris Curve the red flags came out and we all returned to the start. Chatting to the marshalls it appears that the Clerk of the Course had decided that the start had not happened correctly and the race had to be restarted.

One green flag lap later we reformed on the grid and the when the lights changed from red to green we moved forward but I saw red brake lights ahead. Quite fortuitously Ian Blacklin had blown the engine in his Westfield up in practice so there was a space to my left. I took advantage of this space and swerved to the left and onto the grass narrowly missing David Cox, whose Peugeot had decided to mount the Fiesta of Tony Caig, which had made contact with the back of Andrew Morrisons Rover which in turn had made contact with Malcolm Turnbulls Westfield which had not got off the line. With the benefit of hindsight restarting the race did not look to be such a clever decision. Post race Coxy thanked me for missing him.....I don't know if he knows just how close I was !

Yet again I had created some space but by the time we got to Chris Curve again the red flags were out as it became obvious the circuit could not be cleared in time.

After about 10 minutes waiting on circuit the drivers were told of the shortened race distance and we were given the opportunity for yet another green flag lap as we prepared for out third start of the day. I now had a wonderful starting position as there were two clear rows in front of me, any delay in my start would be entirely my fault now. The lights changed and I got yet another cracking start and beat Vaulkhard into the first corner by taking the outside line and leaving my braking late. I did keep it tight to give him some breathing room though. He was closer this time as I had not pulled out 20 yards on him this time. Over the first lap I pulled out some space until we came to the mountain and woodlands section. We had obviously been so close together in overall lap times from practice that I knew all I needed to do was to keep taking the right lines and be aware of any moves he might make. I learnt very quickly that although I was able to pull out 10-15 yards over the first part of the circuit I lost it all in the woodland section. It seemed to me to be a combination of an unresponsive throttle due to the turbo engine and understeer through the slower speed bends. Either way it was obvious I was holding him up through that section, but as soon as we came onto the exit of Barn I was able to feed the power in and pull away for the run up Coppice. After the second lap the cars in front had disappeared so for me this was just like defending a race winning position, and I didn't want to come second. Nigel got close a couple of times on the run along Park Straight but defending your place is quite easy at Chris Curve and I was able to pull away again on the run down to The Gooseneck. Nigel was obviously trying, I saw him on a couple of occasions with the car sideways on in a full powerslide. Great fun ! However, Nigel was not alone in his desire to pass me and his son Oliver in a Sierra Cosworth wanted to have a go next. What was this, the father softening me up so that his son could get past ? I was having none of it. On the 7th lap Oliver got a better run out of Charlies and passed Nigel along Park straight. This freed him to have a go at me. I would have two choices, either pick up my pace and try to drive away from him or go defensive. In the end neither of these things happened. Mark Campbell left the circuit in his Lotus Elan and yet again the red flag came out. On the count back Oliver finished just 0.7s behind Nigel and I was just 0.5 seconds further down the road.

In summary this was a good day. I experienced some good clean racing, finished 7th overall, 3rd overall not counting the A & E cars and all I had had to do all day was put petrol in the car. I like motor racing again !