Seat Leon Supercopa
A beautiful day at Castle Coombe set a perfect scene for the Clio's last hurrah!...and what a hurrah it was, one of our best results yet!
The summer racing festival at Coombe is a fantastic weekend, with tons of racing, but for us it means a mixed race - GT's and production together.
There's a pretty big difference in speed in the production class alone, but in the mixed races, there's serious mirror watching required as the Ferraris et al come screaming by!
We qualified steadily enough, 19th of 22 with a 1:18 - Much quicker than last year, but still a little way from the ultimate pace of the car. Clear laps were difficult in the congested 30 minute session so overall we were pretty happy with the position.
For the race, we went for no refuelling and filled the car with 90l at the start. I took the first stint and the car certainly took some wrestling with the extra weight on board! I managed to get up to our qualifying pace quite quickly, but although I soon got away from the BMW 130 behind, the class leading Cosworth was just too quick!
We settled into our rhythm and despite a couple of close calls with passing GT cars I handed over to Ash with us 2nd in class and 13th overall. Ash struggled a little to start with, but soon found a groove and got down towards qualifying pace.
As the race wore on, the faster machines began to hit trouble. Worryingly, both Seat's hit problems - one with collapsed suspension and one with a gearbox problem! issues too hit the Morcillo/Cintrano 996 and several of the battling GT cars.
With Ash now banging in consistent times we reigned in car after car and by the chequered flag, we'd climbed to 9th overall and 2nd in class. A great result for the team and a fantastic farewell to the loyal Clio!
Should have some pics up soon.
Thanks to the guys who came and said hello, your support was much appreciated!
The summer racing festival at Coombe is a fantastic weekend, with tons of racing, but for us it means a mixed race - GT's and production together.
There's a pretty big difference in speed in the production class alone, but in the mixed races, there's serious mirror watching required as the Ferraris et al come screaming by!
We qualified steadily enough, 19th of 22 with a 1:18 - Much quicker than last year, but still a little way from the ultimate pace of the car. Clear laps were difficult in the congested 30 minute session so overall we were pretty happy with the position.
For the race, we went for no refuelling and filled the car with 90l at the start. I took the first stint and the car certainly took some wrestling with the extra weight on board! I managed to get up to our qualifying pace quite quickly, but although I soon got away from the BMW 130 behind, the class leading Cosworth was just too quick!
We settled into our rhythm and despite a couple of close calls with passing GT cars I handed over to Ash with us 2nd in class and 13th overall. Ash struggled a little to start with, but soon found a groove and got down towards qualifying pace.
As the race wore on, the faster machines began to hit trouble. Worryingly, both Seat's hit problems - one with collapsed suspension and one with a gearbox problem! issues too hit the Morcillo/Cintrano 996 and several of the battling GT cars.
With Ash now banging in consistent times we reigned in car after car and by the chequered flag, we'd climbed to 9th overall and 2nd in class. A great result for the team and a fantastic farewell to the loyal Clio!
Should have some pics up soon.
Thanks to the guys who came and said hello, your support was much appreciated!
