Brands Hatch 2007

The Brands hatch race attracted a good grid of 31 cars on Saturday 1st Sept.
It was great to have Richard Connell back in the race-car after having missed all the races, since Croft due to clashing Grand prix commitments with the Super Aguri F1 team.
Qualifying was a bit frustrating as we were scrubbing in new tyres which seemed to have poor grip. Worse still we again drew a poor grid position, 25th in the ballot for our actual grid start place!

The Race - Great fun but pretty much a shambles

Richard started and after a cautious few laps got his head down to move up top 14th place by the time of the first pit stops. A good call by Mike and Nick in the pit saw us take advantage with a very early pit stop call just as the safety car went out. As a result we emerged from the stop up in 3rd place.
Ian than had a great scrap with several cars in a long train, scrapping behind to find a way by him. In the end he only lost one place to the winning Perry’s car having driven nearly 20 laps around Brands Hatch on the inside line. The stint included a long broadside slide into and out of Graham Hill bend after a very hard (but accidental) tap from behind from Tim in the WASP car.
Marc then took over and drove quickly back up to 4th. Then however the race started to take a different shape as the organizers timing computer controls started to go awry.
Although we continued to race hard and enjoyed the balance of the race, we along with most other competitors, never really knew where we stood. For a long stage mid race the timing screens showed us as leaders, while we believed we were still 3rd or 4th. While this was eventually adjusted, it was not until after we were held and delayed behind the safety car, as the lead car. The 3 actual leaders were waved through and therefore effectively gained a lap on us.
Clearly this was very frustrating, but the organisers were doing their best to sort out a difficult technical problem, while being pestered on all sides from many teams who clearly felt frustrated by the time problems. We decided not to make a fuss or protest, despite clearly being compromised by events as we still had a good fun race!
For what its worth, at the finish we were apparently only 24 seconds behind the winner in 6th in the unofficial results, which are under protest. It was a shame the race ended in disarray, but it was just one of those things! ….

The Next Race

Next race is a 4 hour on Saturday October 6th at Oulton Park, Cheshire.