Donington Park 5 hours 2005

Qualifying :

The Donington 5 Hours attracted 21 Cars for the 2005 Uniroyal Fun Cup and was the 1st race in 2005 for Connell racing.
Practice was wet, but with the actual grid drawn by ballot it was largely irrelevant…………especially as we drew 10th place on the grid.

The Race:

Ian started the race and moved into 7th by the first corner. On entry into the corner a tap from behind appeared to cause no more than some panel damage to the rear bodywork….

…. Two laps on and Ian was up to 5th place, but entering Coppice, the rear right tyre collapsed, a legacy of the first lap tap which had not only cut the try, but also damaged the tracking, which was to cause handling problems for the rest of the race.
A pit stop to put on a new wheel lost us one lap, so after just 10 minutes we were last.
Marc took over and was flying and back up to 11th place after about 2 hours, despite some tricky handling. A great chance to get a lap back was lost when the “pace car” came out directly in front of Marc, but then failed to wave him past, despite the leader being only two places behind in the queue.

Richard continued the good work in his first stint and moved up to 9th place by the end of his stint, having tracked the leaders SSangyong for nearly all his stint, despite being a lap down. One lap prior to re-fuelling, the oil pressure suddenly dropped so he came in 15 seconds before the “pitstop window” officially opened.
Oil problems quickly solved, Ian set off for his 2nd stint, but had to come in for a “stop and go penalty”, as we had not passed the pit-stop board when Richard came in with the oil pressure problem.

Marc’s final stint came to an end when he under-steered off at Coppice & ended up stuck in the gravel trap. By the time we were towed back, we were 6 laps down. It was decided to repair the suspension problem, rather than get back into the race. Richard went out a few laps from the end just to check out the repairs, so we were classified as last place!
Not a good start, but the pit crew all deserve a mention as they toiled to keep the show going. So thanks to Colm, Adrian, Chris, Mark, and Becky for their efforts.

Race Lap Times:

Richard Connell: 1.29.2

Marc Connell: 1.29.8

Ian Connell: 1.30.1