9th October 2011 Cadwell Park Rounds 12/13

With the damage from Pembrey fixed we thought it was wise to race at Cadwell Park just to make sure everything was ok with the car before the Birkett.

Qualifying
With the start of the day being quite wet, and considering I don’t have much tred left on my tyres Qualifying was going to be a difficult session, I found my self in the middle of nowhere with no one else around for the 1st half of the session, this wasn’t too useful as I couldn’t follow guys that had been testing or watch other people find the limit of grip, I had a couple of off track moments due to this but thats all apart of learning a track. When i finally got used to the track I had come up on some back markers so didn’t manage to improve on my time, my fastest time was good enough to put me 16th in the session so 13th on the grid for the qualification race which I was fairly pleased with as it was about where I had been speed wise this season.

Qualification Race – 10th
At the start of the race, Lee Gamble the driver directly infront of me was told to leave the grid as his car was dropping fuel on the track, this leaving a nice big puddle for me to drive through at the start causing my wheels to spin and loosing several positions, as the race went on People were slowly getting caught out by the conditions and I was overtaking a few people and got back up to 11th before a battle with Rob Wells that lasted a couple of laps before I found a way past giving me 10th place, in the remainder on the race I was chasing down Paul Grimmet who I didn’t quite catch up but I did close the gap from 7 seconds to 3 seconds which I felt was a good effort, 10th place put me 13th on the grid for the Final 2 races

Final 1 – 13th
Starting in 13th place again, I got off the line much better than the previous race (possibly because there was no fuel infront of me!) but I still got crowded out at the 1st corner and lost 1 or 2 places which later in the race this probably benefited me as some oil got dropped on the track and a fair few cars went spinning off but I got advanced warning of this because of the Yellows and seeing people spin off enabling me to ease into the corners and feel the grip levels for the following lap, but then Paul Hinson (with a bit of red mist due to a earlier incident) came past me part of the way round charlies 2 giving me no room on the exit (similar to pembrey) having taken to the grass I rejoined the track about 4 places down on where I was entering the corner in 13th place,  as the race went on I was trying to get back to where I was before that incident but only managing to get past Paul Grimmet and close in from 9seconds to 1 second on the battle that was going on ahead also loosing a place to Steve Lumley on the last lap leaving me to end up 13th place.

Final 2 – 12th
Starting in 13th place, (I got quite friendly with the spot!) and used to the grip levels for the launch as I got a much better start but Rob Wells who was just behind me got off the line better (again!) but lucky for me I found a way around the outside of 4 or 5 people at Charlies but I did loose out to Steve Lumley on the following straight, then a little moment at the goose neck I ended the 1st lap in 15th place, I was in a solid battle throughout the race with Mathew, Clive, Roland, Michel, Alex, Paul and Rob swapping positions all the time, I then benefited from Roland, Michael, Rob and Steve Lumley having their own individual off track moments and I ended up finishing in 12th place.

Review
So overall the day was pretty good and we showed the car has gone back to how it was before the incident at pembrey which was the whole reason why we were there, but with a better qualifying and better starts I had the pace to fit inside the top 10 quite comfortably so that was a little bit of a disapointment but still a big thank you to Andrew Bayliss for his local knowledge of the track and taking pictures.

I finished 18th in the championship which is 12 places up on 2010 so we are heading in the right direction, fingers crossed I can gain another 12 places next year, congratulations have to go out to James Cross on winning the championship, full season review coming soon!