Turbos.
Me and my dad were at Snetterton this weekend to take part in the Britcar race as an invitation entry. Watching Top Gear, i thought it was going to mean all manner of cars and to be honest i was looking forward to a class victory! Problem was, our 'Production' class rules were extremely vague, somehow our mate in his Superchaged K20A M'Sport Elise got in too... so were farked, but anyhoo, still an awesome weekend!
All the pit garages were full of Aston GT3 cars and the like, we managed to blag a scrutineering bay. Some prep shots:
Friday was a test day (a track day without rules) for Britcars only. We started off hopelessly, but eventually managed to scrape down to low 1'20s. I rather usefully decided to test the car's off road ability at the end of the day. It didn't fair so well, resulting in the boys working until midnight to get it fixed. My bad...
As good as new!
Saturday consisted of two test sessions and then qualifying. We made progress, getting below 1'20 but there were M3s, Steve's Honda'd Elise and some unfathomably quick ex-Cupra Championship Leons a few seconds quicker. Out of the bag though, my dad pulled out a 1'16 and we managed to qualify 4th. To put that into context, that was 30 seconds quicker than the NSX was in the wet last year
Today was race day, which was two 50 minute races. My dad and i swapped half way in both. Being wet i let my dad have the honours of starting the first race, which consisted of a rolling start. Unfortunately all his hard work was undone as he got barged out of the way and ended up near the back by the first corner! Thanks to the rain - the first of the weekend - there were quite a few DNFs and i managed to bring us home in 8th.
We were frustrated by the result and desperately wanted to improve in the second race. Our 8th place meant that was our new qualifying position. I nervously accepted to go out first this time. Despite my worries, it went really well. I got up to 6th by the end of the lap, and 4th by the end of the 2nd. Annoyingly, a seatbelt problem meant our pitstop overran by 15 seconds, and combined with the speedo not working i was very slow coming into the pits (in case i broke the limit). This cost us dearly, but my dad did admirably, climbing back up the field to clinch 5th.
Meanwhile, Steve had a massive 5 minute pitstop thanks to a sticking wheel (he changed to slicks as it started to dry out). Despite this he caned it, broke the lap record just about every lap and finished 3rd from 7th. He also won the first race, so a good weekend for him!
Couple of shots at the end...
Finally, we paid tribute to David Leslie (who won his last race in Britcar) and Richard Lloyd before heading home. They had a minute's silence and a parade lap for him.
Wanted to get more pictures but they wouldn't let us on circuit. Anyway, sorry for my pic whorage but it was a great weekend, had to share it!
All the pit garages were full of Aston GT3 cars and the like, we managed to blag a scrutineering bay. Some prep shots:
Friday was a test day (a track day without rules) for Britcars only. We started off hopelessly, but eventually managed to scrape down to low 1'20s. I rather usefully decided to test the car's off road ability at the end of the day. It didn't fair so well, resulting in the boys working until midnight to get it fixed. My bad...
As good as new!
Saturday consisted of two test sessions and then qualifying. We made progress, getting below 1'20 but there were M3s, Steve's Honda'd Elise and some unfathomably quick ex-Cupra Championship Leons a few seconds quicker. Out of the bag though, my dad pulled out a 1'16 and we managed to qualify 4th. To put that into context, that was 30 seconds quicker than the NSX was in the wet last year
Today was race day, which was two 50 minute races. My dad and i swapped half way in both. Being wet i let my dad have the honours of starting the first race, which consisted of a rolling start. Unfortunately all his hard work was undone as he got barged out of the way and ended up near the back by the first corner! Thanks to the rain - the first of the weekend - there were quite a few DNFs and i managed to bring us home in 8th.
We were frustrated by the result and desperately wanted to improve in the second race. Our 8th place meant that was our new qualifying position. I nervously accepted to go out first this time. Despite my worries, it went really well. I got up to 6th by the end of the lap, and 4th by the end of the 2nd. Annoyingly, a seatbelt problem meant our pitstop overran by 15 seconds, and combined with the speedo not working i was very slow coming into the pits (in case i broke the limit). This cost us dearly, but my dad did admirably, climbing back up the field to clinch 5th.
Meanwhile, Steve had a massive 5 minute pitstop thanks to a sticking wheel (he changed to slicks as it started to dry out). Despite this he caned it, broke the lap record just about every lap and finished 3rd from 7th. He also won the first race, so a good weekend for him!
Couple of shots at the end...
Finally, we paid tribute to David Leslie (who won his last race in Britcar) and Richard Lloyd before heading home. They had a minute's silence and a parade lap for him.
Wanted to get more pictures but they wouldn't let us on circuit. Anyway, sorry for my pic whorage but it was a great weekend, had to share it!
