Nurburgring - Qualifying

As you know, since the last round at Dijon my car had been completely restored, back to bare chassis, the engine has been refreshed, which will have given me back a couple of horsepower, I have new tyres on it, the chassis is stiffer after the cracks were repaired. The car is going very well, and my driving confidence is improving. To top it all off I am 5kgs lighter myself. So I am confidently expecting to go quicker than ever ... 

Yesterday my best in free practice was a 2:15.6 - 3 secs quicker than I ran last time I was here with the FJ. I had a look at the times that John Delane ran here last year and see he ran a 2:13.4, so I am getting closer...

In Quali very early this morning, i am delighted to run a 2:13.5, 2 secs quicker than yesterday. I don't think that I left much time out there .... Only 0.1 slower than John Delane's best here last year ... I am 0.3 behind Kim, and alongside him on the grid. Car going very well. Session got red-flagged with 7 minutes to go, but I didn't bother going out again, 7 minutes might have given me two more times laps, but I didn't really think I'd go any quicker than that.

But John has knocked a massive 4 secs off last year's best - there's not much more I can do! I am not allowed to fit a Ford engine in my BMC-powered car, so to be close to Kim's Lotus-Ford is pleasing. I am trying hard to take the competition to John, but I can't live with that!

There are 7 cars in my class here this weekend, out of a total grid in excess of 40 cars, I am 20th overall on the Grid, 3rd in class, there is a 5 secs gap back to next class competitor.

Weekend is going very well so far ... And it makes me nervous putting that in writing ...

Going to prep the car now for Race 1, then do the pitwall for Mike in his Morgan for his qualifying. After that I have a hilly 5 mile run planned, hoping that'll get me the half second to get Kim tomorrow ... Do you think if I did a second lap I could get up to John Delane...?! No, I don't reckon so either!

Nurburgring - Thursday

It was a long night ... Of course I'd missed the ferry I was booked on, the next one was scheduled just 70 minutes later, but then left late ... I got 40 minutes doze on board... All in all it was nearly 0100 French time when I hit the road in Calais. Sustained by the newly acquired Eddie Stobart Truckers' music compilation and the Eddie Stobart Truckers' diet (unofficial!) of biscuits, sweets, crisps and coke I drive straight through, with just one refuelling stop and two other 10minute breaks. Got to Nurburgring just before 0600 this morning.

Had 40 minutes sleep ... Then got sorted, met Iain and Mike and deposited the Motorhome on the sloping field they call the competitors campsite here.

Had a lot of small jobs to do on the car, plus documentation and scrutineering. Free practice sessions were available at extra cost, and I elected to do these having had merely a curtailed run at Mallory last week.

First run was at 1045. Now to be honest I've been pretty nervous that we'd taken a fully functioning car to pieces and would somehow have to suffer an attack of Murphy's law ... However so far (and I shall be keeping my fingers crossed until the chequered flag on Sunday) it's all going very well. New tyres on the car, so worked up to pace slowly in the first session; but no snags. Pushed on a bit harder in the second session, encouraged by the close proximity on track of Ford-powered class competitors John Delane and Kim Shearn. Despite threatening clouds and occasional light drizzle the track stayed dry today which was great for me. I didn't bother running the third session, I was tired myself and didn't want to chance my luck with the car!

Finally got scrutineered and popped back to to the Motorhome for 40 minutes sleep and a shower before drivers' briefing and then dinner in our favourite here: Pistenklaus. Clouds have lifted and we seem set fair for a nice weekend.

Now if you've added up those 40 minute sleeps you might realise why I'm a bit tired and as I am on track at 0840 in the morning, I'm going to bed - night night!

What does Google Maps know anyway...

Spent today at Brighton races courtesy of a hospitable client, sadly returning to the bookies what I won off them at the same event last year. 

Brighton's on the South Coast ... So's Dover, where my ferry sails from tonight ... Why on earth would I follow iPhone's directions and go up the M23, along the M25 (in rush hour) and then down to Dover ... Clearly a leisurely drive along the coast is what I'll do, saves 30 miles and we used to do this drive when we were kids going on family holidays via the Dover Ferries.

My naivety is writ large as I head down the hill in the port to see 'my ship' heading out - blast! The leisurely drive took hours ... Wasn't exactly leisurely either, far too much traffic, barely got the Motorhome out of third gear! Romney Marshes lived up to memories, although is somewhat overpopulated with wind farms. Bexhill (birth place of my Elva), Hastings, Winchelsea etc. probably lovely, but not when you're actually trying to get somewhere!

There's another ferry an hour later, and I was smart enough to splash out the extra £5 for a fully flexible ticket!

Going to be another long night, bag of Chocolate Eclairs, and For company I have just acquired the Eddie Stobart Truckers' Music compilation from the shop here - awesome, no chance of dozing off at the wheel ...

See you on the other side!

Testing at Mallory

Left home at the rather early hour of 5am on Wednesday morning, nice morning at home, and indeed until about 10 miles south of Mallory Park, where it started to drizzle ... I overclubbed the early departure, arriving at the circuit at 0715, unsurprisingly it was a bit quiet at that time, but at least it meant that I drove the 125 miles with very little traffic. On arrival I tried to doze off in the car, and was just getting there when some flash bloke arrives in by helicopter!

Wednesday mornings at Mallory is open testing, so anything can turn up, depending on whats there they run alternate 30 minute sessions for Closed Wheel and Single-Seaters. Real mixed bag of cars turned up, current BTCC Saloon, a pair of Ferrari 458 GTs (that'll be the bloke in the helicopter I reckon!), several Mazda MR2s, Mk2 Ford Escort, etc., then the single-seaters included a modern Formula Renault (Chris Middlehurst), some classic Formula Fords and a couple of Historic F1, a Lotus 18 being exercised by my old chum, Scotty Taylor from Oz, and a Cooper T45 being run by another Australian.

I was very excited to see my freshly restored car unloaded from the van, and looking splendid. We had to reset the seat belts and some stuff like that, plus refit the fire extinguisher. My first run was at 0930 ... by which time there was rain, only light, but persistent and a fully wet track ... not what I would have asked for. I ran about 10 laps quite gently, just checking it all out, keeping a good eye on the gauges etc., then brought it into the pits for Martin and Josh to give it a quick look over too. Then back out for a few more laps, a little quicker, except round the hairpin where a car had spun and stalled on the approach.

We needed to do a little more work to get me comfortable again, mainly moving the pedals and adjusting the belts (I'm a fair bit slimmer than when I was last in the car - seriously!).

Back out on track at 1030 again, but it's raining harder now, there is standing water in a lot of places, and a couple of rivers across the track; despite running at cautious speeds only I still had a lot of sliding around. After about 10-12 laps I decided that I wasn't really learning anything, and it was clear that the sun wasn't about to come out, so I brought the car in, and we called it a day, better than sticking it into the tyrewall.

It's a bit disappointing not to exercise it properly, especially considering the effort/cost to get up to Mallory - 250 mile round trip for me, 200 miles for the boys, all for less than 30 laps in the car! But we have achieved what we aimed to, which is to prove that it was all working, although we haven't really 'tested' it in anger running at these low speeds, low revs etc. It now goes back to Iain's workshop for a few other bits and pieces, and some brand new tyres, before heading out to the Nurburgring on Tuesday, I follow 24 hours later. We have some free practice available to us on the Thursday, so I plan to make use of that, hope it's dry ...

Thanks to Iain, Martin and Josh for all their hard work in restoring the car in this 6 week midseason break.

Resplendent in the new livery

At Mallory Park on Wednesday, before it started to rain heavier ...

Time to go testing ...

Off bright and early tomorrow morning up to Mallory Park to be reunited with my rebuilt Elva.

I called Iain this morning and asked if it is was back in one piece, to which he said "It'll be at Mallory in the morning", not quite answering the question ... it transpired that it had 'some work' yet to be finished. But he texted me this evening to tell me to look at a photo he'd stuck up on  the 10/10ths Motorsport Forum, my car back in one piece (apparently - cameras CAN lie, but i trust him!) and resplendent in new paintwork.

Engine has been refreshed at Swiftune, gearbox rebuilt and the car stripped all the way back to bare chassis. Some broken/cracked tubes were found so they've been repaired, the whole chassis was then blasted clean of paint and powder-coated, before Martin and Josh started to screw it all back together again. I'm looking forward to seeing it tomorrow, forecast is for drizzle, will be a shame to get it dirty!

Testing tomorrow is all about installation stuff really, just proving that it's all working properly before it goes out to Nurburgring next week. After Mallory the car will come home via the tyre shop for a new set of race tyres, then we'll be really ready to go racing again...

The new colour scheme was chosen to match my TR5 racecar, and also my brother's racing Ford Anglia. I was never very keen on the previous colours of the car, bit too 'Renault Megane' for my liking, and not very 'period'. I did some research in order to try to establish what the original colours of my car were, but was unable to find anything out. I do have a photograph of another Elva 200 from a magazine article in 1960, which although a black and white photo rather looks as though it might have been dark blue with silver.

So, I wonder if it'll go any quicker ... the engine should be back on full song, and I am pleased to tell you that the driver's own midseason overhaul will see me getting into the car tomorrow about 4kgs lighter than when I last climbed out of it ... I wonder if David Coulthard could work out how much that should be worth in improved lap times!

Midseason Overhaul ... Not just the car!

In my last post you will recall I mentioned that with a seven week break in the excitement we would now give the car a midseason overhaul ... well the boys have been getting on with it. The engine was removed and sent to Swiftune for a refresh, I spoke to Nick this morning and it's practically back together, it was running fine anyway, but was getting close to rebuild time; the good news is that there were no issues found, just routine 'consumable' parts such as bearing shells and piston rings to be replaced. It should go onto Nick's dyno on Monday and be back with Iain by the end of next week.

Iain convinced me to go 'the whole hog' and strip the car right back ... there should be a photo here to show you how serious he was ....
 


Almost ready to race ...Not! At least one crack was found in the chassis, so it's been stripped back, repaired, blasted and then painted. The bodywork is getting repainted too, the gearbox overhauled, and it'll all get put back together with a few shiny new nuts and bolts ... We need to test it before Nurburgring, and the only date I can do is July 31st, so fingers crossed it's back together in time for that ... it will be keeping the boys busy anyway!

But it's not only the car that's getting an overhaul ... oh no! Driver too ... My darling wife signed herself up to a pretty serious fitness, nutrition and detox programme that lasts 19 days. She challenged me to do it with her, not absolutely my thing if I'm honest, but we are now on Day 5 and I've started to feel the effects. 2 workouts a day, including quite a lot of weights-work, lots of stretching, no carbs (no beer, wine or chocolate ... grrr!), lots of green veg and high protein foods. Even a drink made from broccoli, spinach, kale, and watercress ... looks, smells and tastes exactly as disgusting as you'd think it would. I mentioned somewhere earlier that I sometimes had to cope with things that Lewis Hamilton probably didn't, well he probably does have to do this! Mind you, he doesn't have to cope with commuting to London everyday and sitting in an office for 8 hours as well! Coupled with my usual games of squash and a few 5 and 10km races, there's a pretty reasonable chance that the next time I pull on that new racesuit I might find it a bit baggy. If it shaves a second a lap I guess it's worth the pain and misery ...

I might have shown you a picture of the car undergoing its overhaul, but I'll spare you a photo of the driver improvements!