Round
3 Winter Series – “a podium thrown away”. Paul’s Annus Horriblis continues…
Kart 78, or 8 as it is now because someone else is racing as 78, was wheeled
out for its second race outing and a cold but dry Rye House.
Mods were limited to moving the back wheels out 5mm to try and stop and some of the tail happiness that it seemed to suffer last time, a set of new tyres (Vega XL’s are the new compound for 2003) and a new plug – apart from that we decided to leave well alone….
Toby had read that the new regulation tyres took a few laps to get warmed up and he was right. The first few laps of practise were like driving on ice but they soon bedded in and the kart seemed to be handling OK – although neither of us were convinced about the change in characteristics with the wheels moved out – I think I was happier but Toby was quicker despite not “enjoying” the handling round stadium bend…
Our different styles were evident when I said “it turns in nicely now” – to which he replied “I find it runs wide…..” hmmmm, no wonder these F1 teams have trouble in setting the cars up for different drivers !!
Practice went without drama – well apart from forgetting how to reset the Alfano on- board lap timer ! Times for me were mid 37’s and for Toby high 36’s so not quite as quick as we have been at our fastest but not bad as it the track was very cold so ultimate grip levels weren’t that high….
Qualifying started and I went first (apparently my extra bulk helps heat the tyres… ??) and saw one lap in the high 36’s but that was as fast as I could pedal it…… Toby however was flying and managed to post a fastest of 36.10 on the Alfano (which equated to a 36.46 on the Deavinsons scoreboard as they time the lap from a different position) which put us in our best grid position ever…. 3rd out of 15. Well done that man !! I made sure I took plenty of photos of the grid positions as normally we are mid field, so this was definitely a moment worth capturing…
As the chequered flag came down for the rolling start everybody dived for the inside and I lost sight of Toby in the melee of karts and 2-stroke smoke – but unfortunately the kart had bogged down and Toby had slipped from 3rd to 6th but was well in touch with the karts in front and those behind were dropping back…
Toby seemed to be as quick as anyone else out there apart from the lead Biland who was already stretching out a lead even after 3 laps.. 2nd place man in a Max soon started to pull away as Toby and the other 4 karts in his train seemed to be being slowed by the kart at the front of the pack and lap after lap they chased round in close proximity. Eventually Toby pulled a nice move on the kart in front and got past cleanly… and started bearing on the next kart (I’m not sure if he realised it but Alan Bullock was right on his tail all this time…).
Then the lead Biland pulled off with problems which left us in 3rd and AB pulled into the pits relieving the pressure a bit, but another kart which we later learned was the lead Max, was soon right behind Toby (they must have stopped early) and for about 8 or 9 laps they lapped in the low 36s as though joined together with a rope… the guy later commented that Toby “was a difficult man to pass”…
The racing was so good I left Toby out for an extra 3-4 mins to continue his battle until eventually the other guy came into the pits and so I called Toby in next time round… at this point we were lying 2nd and all I had to do was keep it honest…. Just stay out of trouble.. that’s all ….
I joined the race right behind two other karts with the lead kart now with driver number two right behind me…. to be honest I can’t remember exactly what happened but I got past the two in front but got passed by the guy behind when I overcooked it and lost momentum coming out of one of the hairpins…. But we were probably still in the top three or four … I stayed with the guy in front for a while but then we came across some slower karts and he got past them better than me…
I then pitted for the second mandatory stop and again came out in a gaggle of karts. These were easier to pass except one who was a tad slower but not much, there was no one behind and no-one else within reach in front, so I decided to stay close, not take any chances but just wait for an opportunity. Alas it wasn’t to be… as he got sideways out of a turn I saw my chance to get alongside but couldn’t quite make it and as we approached the first hairpin he braked hard a split second earlier than I did and I hit him quite hard and actually impaled our nose cone on his chassis rail… although I escaped unscathed having only lost a couple of seconds through running wide he unfortunately was not so lucky and was off the track.
I then tried to decide whether to pull over and give back track position or to hope that the clerk of the course judged it as a “racing incident”…. The decision was made for me as the BLACK FLAG was shown… The penalty was a 30second stop-go penalty…. Aaarggghhhh. I was so distraught I nearly did a Mika Hakkinen… I just couldn’t believe I’d made such a silly error when not even racing for position and with less than 3 laps to go too !
Not sure where we ended up but obviously not in the top 3 and as we both had appointments with beer that evening we beat a hasty retreat – my tail firmly between my legs….. Toby passed little comment – apart from branding me “Mr Liability” and I’m sure was just gritting his teeth as this was the second time in two races this year that I have lost the team a good position due to a silly error….. hopefully that’s my quota for the year done now !
Roll on round four in March…
22 Feb 2003 - Rye House Winter Series (Toby and Paul)
