You may have noticed a distinct lack of footage from my qualifying ‘incident’ at Donington.
I’ve already made it clear it was totally my mistake, and I was an idiot – even if you can put a lot of that down to inexperience and/or bad luck. But there is a problem with onboard footage, sometimes…
You may remember a video from a few years back where a Porsche 944 driver got crucified after seemingly pushing another car into the pit wall at Cadwell Park? Everyone wanted his blood, but a few voices pointed out that the 944 could just as easily have been trying to pull into the pits, and it was all a totally innocent mistake. The point is, the camera won’t always show you the truth.
We are all competitive on track, and all want to win – but (I hope) it would be extremey rare that any of us want to actually make anyone else crash. It’s expensive, won’t win you any friends, and people can die.
When I looked back over my footage of that first lap of qualifying, the camera shows I dived up the inside of Buxton in an impossible move, and took him out.
Of course, I know this isn’t what happened, but without having you feel that I was at maximum braking trying my best just not to hit Buxton, it doesn’t look good.
Then there’s the adrenalin factor – when you’re on track everything happens slowly and you just react to it. Looking back at the footage it’s not always clear that you did have time to assess the situation – in this case that I wasn’t going to stop in time, so angled the car hoping I’d pull it all up before I even got to the corner.
Anyway, I promised you warts and all on this blog, and the fact is I should have braked earlier or got my tyres up to temp sooner, and this wouldn’t have happened.
So here’s the full onboard camera footage from that lap:
I had to put the earlier mistake from qualifying out of my head, but also make sure I got in a solid and safe finish to get some points on the board.
‘Safe’ was the key – nobody wants to get a reputation as a crasher, or especially as someone who takes other people off!
For this weekend we’d also got the help of Chris ‘Vard’ Vardon – who, unlike me, actually has some mechanical skills that can help Glenn, as well as get stuck in with lifting, carrying and pushing stuff around. It was Vard’s first ever time in the Vee paddock, and I think he enjoyed it – we may even see him on the grid himself, some day. So a massive thanks to him!
Race 1
On the green flag lap I found the car was pulling heavily to the left after the earlier collision. Not the end of the world, as I could drive around it – but more importantly I still hadn’t pushed the Sheane into a corner in anger since we’d changed the engine mountings and rear ride height.
We had also found that the font dampers have 21 settings, which could explain some of the issues we had with our suspension being too soft – I’d thought there were only 10 settings, and so was being rather conservative with my changes to harden it up.
I pulled up to my spot right at the back of the grid, but when the lights went out it all got very strange as nobody else seemed to move! I sped away and then eased off seeing a couple of slow and stationary car, assuming I’d missed a red flag.
I still picked up a few places into Redgate, and settled in to feel how the car was going to handle.
I had a brief tussle with new racer John Hartin, pulling alongside him down to the Roberts chicane. Truth be told, I sold him a bit of a dummy there! After the qualifying crash there was no way I was going to risk taking anyone out on that corner again, and unless he’d hit the brakes very early I was always going to let him go through first. As it was, he braked late in defence – too late – and locked up, leaving me to dive back down the inside and take the corner.
Being honest, my driving was pretty poor. I was being far too cautious, and nowhere near as committed as I was last year on the GP circuit layout. I was easing off the throttle at the bottom of the Craner Curves, where I should have been keeping it pinned.
The revs were spiking as I changed gear – something that’s never happened to me before, and not necessarily from my shoddy gear changes! After my Drive Of Shame earlier behind the pace car I did notice the revs stuck at 3000 rpm when I went to switch off – and my car doesn’t normally idle at all. This could also simply be the clutch pedal, as we literally got the car back together the night before, and so hadn’t had a chance to test anything.
I was carrying more speed through Old Hairpin then last year, but was still nowhere near the edge.
My favourite corner was still Coppice – you jab the brakes quickly and hard about halfway down the curb on the left before throwing it hard right over the blind crest. You have to be brave. I also found that keeping a tight line through the double-apex seemed a lot faster, but the back end starts to swing around, and you just balance it there, letting it bring you around without any opposite lock, hard on the throttle all the way out to the exit curb.
Even then I was too hard on the brakes for too long. The same problem at Redgate, where I was also fast last year…
There wasn’t a single corner where I wasn’t well away from how hard I should be pushing it – how hard I KNOW I can push it – and still be within my own safety zone.
I managed to go from 24th up to a 14th place finish – which was pretty good, considering, but a bit disappointing when I’d been hoping for top 10, and I never even got close to catching Snarey and Harrison and my usual playmates.
I was lapped by the leaders at Old Hairpin, seeing them nice and early and getting well out of the throttle and offline to wave them all through.
Paul Smith lapped me a full lap before the gaggle fighting for second place, and unsurprisingly demolished the rest to win, with Graham Gant and Craig Pollard finally securing the rest of the podium. James Harridge got 5th overall to win the B Class ahead of Mari Snarey and Colin Gregory after Jack Wilkinson had problems and couldn’t capitalise on his fastest lap in class.
Race 2
Starting from right at the back again, as soon as I pulled away from the start I knew something was wrong. I got a few places, but the rest of the field simply drove awy from me into the distance even before I’d made it to Redgate!
I drove a bit better, pushing harder through the turns and knocking 2 seconds off my lap times as I tried to make up for the loss of power.
A few laps in I head a sound that I thought was the power cable to my camera hitting the roll hoop… then it got bigger and louder, and with everything else seeming normal (and no smoke) I figured the exhaust had come loose somewhere. That would explain the power loss and why the sound only seemed to be when I was at certain revs in 4th gear.
There was no way I was going to rock the headlines in this race, so I latched onto the back of Francis Twyman (having his own issues) and decided to just bring it home behind him, changing up nice and early and pressing on as much as I could through the corners.
In hindsight, that’s where I should have pulled into pit lane for Glenn to have a quick check of things, but I stayed out one more lap, and inevitably I saw smoke in my mirrors as I crossed the start line.
The first part of the track is very fast and flowing, and it’s very hard to find anywhere to pull off safely that won’t affect everyone else’s race! I cruised through Old Hairpin and pulled right onto the grass to park it up by the wall, shutting it down and jumping out for a look and to make sure nothing caught fire.
When the car was put on the back of The Wagon Of Shame and taken back to the pits, we found a big bloody hole that definitely wasn’t supposed to be there!
Paul Smith dominated the race with another clear victory (so much so that I thought he’d had problems as he was so far ahead of the rest!), with John Hughes a distant second after an amazing scrap, and Harridge 3rd overall and taking the B Class victory again. Jack Wilkinson claimed 2nd in class (and 5th overall behind Harry Webb), with Colin Gregory claiming another 3rd in class.
As bad as my weekend may have been, there was a huge and scary incident for Tim Probert. There was a lot of oil on the circuit from several cars, and Tim went into the gravel at Roberts, and then Ian Buxton also went off in the same place, head on into and launching over Tim, giving him a good clout on the noggin as he did so. Luckily Tim was shaken up but ok – the car not so much so…
New racer Harry Webb also had a scary incident as his steering arm snapped at high speed, and Martin Snarey had his own brown trouser moment when his wheel bearings collapsed!
Hopefully my engine issues will be a simple fix, and we should be out for Brands Hatch in a months time – and this time I’ll keep reminding myself that if I’m not on the edge in every corner then I should be pushing harder!
The original plan was to do this before jumping in the Vee, and then I would have a benchmark for driving a single seat racing car. I couldn’t book the day up until AFTER I should have had my first Vee race, but as it turned out, this all righted itself.
So I was up bright and early yesterday to be at Silverstone for 08:20 am.
The ‘Experience Centre’ is easy to find at Silverstone (just follow the signs to the right and over the bridge), and presenting a valid road license for signing on was quick and easy.
I’d taken my full race kit, but didn’t want to look like a Tit-Head, so decided to sign in and check out what everyone else was wearing/carrying. Nobody had anything at all with them, so I decided I’d use my own helmet, gloves and boots, but my three-layer race suit would be overkill. Silverstone provide gloves and helmets free of charge – but if you’ve got your own kit, you may as well use it!
There’s a half hour driver briefing with a video covering all the essentials like racing lines, flags, the track and braking and turning points/cones. It’s very good for novices, but if you hold a race licence you should really know this stuff already! The main difference from the ARDS test briefing was probably that you’re expected to do all your braking before you turn in to the corner.
Also, you can’t overtake anywhere on the track apart from on the straights and only on the left. The marshalls will show a blue overtaking flag to the car in front, who is expected to accelerate ‘more gently’ out of the corner to allow the car behind to pass safely. This does work wonders for safety, as you know nobody is going to try to come past you on the brakes, or pull a block pass mid-corner. The day works incredibly well because of this.
Next you go over to the Stowe infield circuit and meet the cars.
They’re special ‘Formula Silverstone’ cars – a 1.6 litre Ford Duratec engine and four gears on the right hand side, with treaded tyres and wings. They look the part, and I noticed the bodywork was pretty heavy duty, which I’m sure is part of having reliable cars that any old numpty can jump in and thrape around a circuit!
The cockpit was quite spacious, and much easier to get into and out of than the Sheane Formula Vee, but you felt very safe and secure even just using a four-point harness.
It’s a full racing clutch – so pretty much an on/off switch! You need to rev to around 5000rpm and very gently ease the clutch out until it punches you in the back and away you roar!
When I first slid into the cockpit I realised how much confidence I’d lost after spinning the Sheane. I had a bitter metallic taste in my mouth from adrenaline, and realised I’d put myself under serious pressure not to cock this up, and to prove that I actually CAN drive a racing car. I was much more nervous than sitting in the Vee for the first time.
All the cars went out in small groups, following single file behind an instructor in a Renault Clio. I was the lead car in my group, so headed out at what felt like a very slow pace.
Much like a Vee, you only really use first and second gears to get going, and the whole of Stowe was third and fourth gear.
After a few laps slowly building up the pace, we came into the pits, a different lead car went behind the Clio, and we went out again.
This pace was actually pretty perfect for all levels of driver. If you’re brand new to it all, you won’t be intimidated, and have plenty of time to learn the track and racing line. Even for me, once again having my Tom Cruise ‘crisis of confidence’, it settled me right down so I could concentrate on getting the feel of the grip and the responsive throttle.
Once more we came back to the pits, and then were let loose for the last 20 minutes on our own!
When you push the throttle down properly, it all gets a lot more hectic.
With the revs up you’re instantly lapping the circuit in less than half the time, and having to really stand on the brakes coming off the straights.
Out the pit lane you come down to an awkward entry to a left hairpin, with a late apex meaning you feed the power in onto the longest straight. Then you realise you’re being a wuss and squeeze the pedal more.
It’s a fair feeling of speed and a very bumpy journey as you ease the brakes on before you get to the ‘Brake Now!’ board, kicking yourself for not leaving it 50 metres later even as you slam it down to third gear and turn into the corner.
As you exit you drag it back to the left and dab the brakes again for a right hander, leading into a complex of corners all in third gear, some requiring a dab of brakes as you get later on in the session and pick up speed.
There’s another really awkward entry to the other hairpin, and it’s begging you to turn in too early, so you hold off and look for the yellow apex cone and bring it in to that, building power through a lovely left hander that snaps right onto the pit straight as you scream the revs up to fourth gear, braking hard but keeping as much speed as you can through a right-left s-bend back down to the first hairpin.
I was there to have fun, and pushed a fair bit with a few wiggles, but don’t think I ever strung a decent lap all together without hitting traffic (or missing a gear!), which I wish I’d concentrated more on, because in the debrief they hand you a printout of all your lap times!
I did ok, and I’m happy with my performance because I know there was a lot more to come.
As mentioned before, it ironed out some confidence issues both with driving itself, and also the big fear mentioned in previous blogs that my braking would be a major weak point. It wasn’t, and I was very comfortable with it, and willing to push much further than expected.
On about the only clear lap I had, I put in a 1:04, and although I did get caught in a fair bit of traffic, it looks like I got lucky with a very fast group, so didn’t get held up nearly as much as I’ve seen watching other peoples videos. That’s the chance you take with arrive-and-drive things.
So I’m feeling good about driving, and that should get me through to next years Formula Vee campaign. Shame there weren’t any spaces in the next session, or I may have had another go…
The full experience is available from Silverstone for around £199 – but you’ll find loads of vouchers, offers and cashback around to bring that down to around £140 – I bought mine through www.buyagift.co.uk. Then there’s the £20 damage waiver (it means you pay nothing if you kill the car), CD of top quality photographs for £20, and £30 for a full video of the day on a USB stick (plus you get £5 off the photographs with this). Not cheap, but welcome to motor racing!
James Cater Racing 