Well, well, well… what a weekend we had at Oulton Park. I’m writing this on the way to Pau for the next round of the British Formula 3 Championship, and I think I’ve just about dried out from the horrendous weather we had on the Easter weekend.
Round one of British GT was crazy and we’re expecting more fun and games next weekend at the legendary Nurburgring circuit – rain is always an option there.
At Oulton the racing was dominated by the sheer amount of water that was leaking onto the track, and the guys driving the cars did an incredible job. I think there were only two retirements all weekend!
I arrived at the circuit with the crew on Saturday and conditions weren’t too bad. Then after the free practice session, as we were recording some interview segments for the TV show, it bucketed down!
When it came to qualifying the spray led to awful visibility problems; I didn’t realize this, but a number of the cars don’t have heated windscreens, so they have a spot of visibility the size of a golf ball to navigate a 500 bhp GT car with – crazy!
On Sunday, it was more of the same. After we’d had some breakfast at the circuit we made our way back to the truck to have a briefing for the day ahead.
Once we’d finished it was raining hard. For any car not at the front it was a nightmare. This was perhaps best seen at the start of race two with a fountain of water kicking up at the green light as the cars saw exactly how much heat they had in their tyres at the rolling start.
For the drivers it was a really physical and mental challenge because of the rain, for me it was a learning experience too! I’m just glad my waterproofs kept me dry-ish!
It was very exciting working in the pit lane. A busy pit is good fun, but watching the driver’s change over was fascinating; some of the teams literally yank the departing driver from their seats like a sack of potatoes!
I’m going to try and do a blog after each event, and I’ll pick out the three drivers who made an impression on me, the move of the weekend, a lesson learnt, and then thoughts about the next race. Here goes:
Duncan Cameron stood out at Oulton Park, picking up where he left off at the end of last season. His performance was made all the more impressive due to him suffering from a nasty virus.
It was great to see Tim Harvey return to the GT fold. His passion and experience for racing is a real bonus and he adds value to any paddock he races in.
Richard Westbrook was another stand out for me. Some fantastic driving coupled with being a very decent guy with a good sense of humour.
The move of the weekend for me came from Allan Simonsen. At the end of race 1 he snuck up for an inside double overtake which put him in place to boss the front of the pack and ultimately take 2nd place.
The lesson I learnt this weekend is that you can have the best mechanics in the world, but if you don’t have enough petrol in the car, it won’t mean a thing. I was gutted for Audi, but I’m sure it’s a mistake they won’t repeat!
We’re off to Germany next and I can’t wait; the myth of the circuits, the history, the crowds. It’s gonna be epic!
I hope you like the programme, feel free to leave me a comment below.
Formula 2 – Rounds 3 & 4, Portugal
So for the second time this year, I made it on to the grid! I think the go ahead on this one was actually later than at Silverstone two weeks ago, but who cares?! I made it, and that’s all that matters.
Rounds 3 and 4 of the FIA Formula 2 Championship took place at the beautiful Algarve circuit in Portugal. I’d been round the circuit before in a Formula Renault, about 3 years ago now, so I kind of knew my way about.
We had testing on Thursday and Friday, followed by the qualifying and races on Saturday and Sunday. After testing on Thursday I felt good. It was wet to start off with, so it was quite tricky to feel my way back in to the circuit with a far more powerful car than I was previously used to. But by Friday, I was feeling confident. In the first practice I posted the 2nd fastest time in the wet. For the second of the practice sessions on Friday, which was dry, I struggled with a mystery set-up issue… which unfortunately would never be cured throughout the rest of the weekend.
Saturday came and qualifying was looming large. Despite my best efforts at doing a rain dance in the morning, it was dry. I was praying for rain as my mystery set-up issue was still there in the dry but not in the wet. I qualified in a disappointing 10th place.
For the first race, once again it was dry. Woo! We made some changes to the car, but yet again, it had no impact on the balance. By mid-point of the race, I had climbed up to 7th and was on the back of the leading six. Then, slowly but surely, my rear tyres started to go off and I was defending for the rest of the race.
I was so much slower than everyone else because my rear tyres had just overheated and gone off. The reason that happened was because my set-up gremlin meant that the rear of the car was getting kicked out at every corner and thus it was sliding the rears and overheating them. So whilst I managed to climb up to 7th from then on in, I was going to have to defend my position like the Italians used to defend a one goal lead in football.
After 22 laps, I stumbled over the line in 8th place having fended off multiple attacks from several different competitors. Whilst 8th place wasn’t what I was hoping at the start of the weekend, it was damage limitation and I was in the points.
For Sunday, we had another qualifying session in the morning and then another race in the afternoon. Guess what happened in qualifying? It rained! Well, it was sort of drying up after rain all night but the track was still wet enough for wet tyres and that was a good situation for me. I went out, did a warm up lap, and then started my first two laps. Just as I was about to push for a good time, the clouds above opened a monsoon of water onto the track. It was so bad that I couldn’t even make it back to the pits in 2nd gear – I aquaplaned at 20 mph! So did a lot of other people actually. Luckily most of us managed to get back to the pits unscathed.
The session was red flagged until the clouds passed and we got back out for the last 20 minutes on a track that wasn’t going any quicker. My 3rd lap was good enough for 5th place on the grid.
For the race, it was dry. Oh no…
I knew my car would still have a rear-end that was as happy as Larry. I forgot about that and got on with the job in hand.
I got off the line well and held my position. For the first 6 laps everything was OK. The car felt good, I was right up there with the leading quartet, and the gap to 6th place behind me was quite big. I hadn’t used any of my boosts and I was just about ready to go on the attack. And it was at this point that my set up issue caused me grief.
Like a stone hitting the floor, my lap times dropped. I lost touch with the leaders within three laps and was under attack from 6th place within two laps! I looked at the pit board… 15 laps to go. 15 laps?! 15 laps to defend 5th place with a car that was trying to spin on every corner and they were queuing up behind me.
I got my head down and concentrated on making no mistakes at all. If I was going to lose the position, I was going to make sure the guys behind me knew it wasn’t because they were faster than me. I made them fight for it. Amazingly, the next time I looked up at the board, I had only three laps to go. The race went pretty quickly and I was still in 5th place. I kept my lap times constant but the train behind me was huge. I got overtaken on the last corner with three laps left, but on the main straight I snatched the position straight back in what was probably the best move I’ve ever made.
I crossed the line 5th place but was still unhappy. If I had a set up that would have allowed me to fight, then I would have been happy. Instead I was defending for the entirety of the race.
We had a debrief and then left the circuit. I left Portugal feeling somewhat disappointed with the result. I couldn’t be disappointed with my performance, because I think I drove two of the best races of my life.
Now, I’ll go away and reflect on what went wrong and try and work out what the problems with the set up were. Then, I’ll recommence fund raising for the next round in Germany at the end of May.
Until then… Ciao.
Dino
We kicked off our first race of the season at Snetterton on 15th April running in Class C of the CSCC Tin Tops Series. We had got the car ready a week before the event and were raring to go knowing we had a new engine and gearbox to help us on our way. We sailed through scrutineering and were then called to the assembly area for qualifying. The weather had been a mix of dry and wet all day; as I got there it started to rain, but by the time they opened the gates for our session it had started to dry up again and out we went.
On my stint in qually there was still the vibration we thought we had cured by changing the wheel bearings and hubs. At the driver change we checked the wheel nuts, which had come slightly loose due to the new studs seating themselves properly during my session. Toby said he couldn’t feel the vibration, so we thought we had cured it…again.
Lining up on the grid for the green flag lap it started to hail. I took this into consideration and checked grip on the launch but there wasn’t any and I just wheel span as I tried to get off the line. Green flag lap done, we lined up for the start – still hailing. I thought I would launch at a few lower rpm to give myself a good chance of getting cleanly off the line. This seemed to work as when the lights went out I had a great launch and got up to 4th overall by the first corner while everyone around me seemed to stand still. I stayed in 4th (and 1st in a class of 4) for 3-4 laps as the 2 litre cars struggled to get grip! We were lying 6th by the change as it dried out and the 2 litres managed to get their power down finally and chased me down!
Toby took over halfway and had a good race with another class car, the Honda CRX of Hancock/Spencer, that had done a really slick driver change and managed to get on his bumper within a lap or so and eventually overtake. Watching from the pit wall we could see Toby slowing around Coram and eventually leaving the circuit to park up behind the barriers. I was hoping it wasn’t the engine, but had an idea what it might be. I could feel the dreaded vibration was still there when I jumped in at the start, I knew as soon as I was going around the green flag lap that there was a possibility we may not finish, I was right: it was the CV joint that failed 6 laps from the end when we were running 8th overall and 2nd in class.
I’m hoping our luck will change soon! The new engine and gearbox were spot on and the car felt the best it ever has, now we just need to finish! All drive shafts have been removed, CV joints repacked and broken bits replaced. I don’t think there is much more on the car to change as most of it is new now!
Next event Brands Hatch at the beginning of May.
Thank you to David Stallard Photography for the photo. For more please visit www.davidstallardphotography.com
Yours in racing,
Lisa
Hello Again,
It’s been a while since we last spoke! I spent my time after the F1 Young Drivers’ Test in Abu Dhabi last November back in California with my family and it was a brilliant time to be able to reset everything in order to be completely refreshed for a new attack on the 2012 World Series by Renault season. I spent some time up in Alaska with friends and also had a couple of trips to New York and Las Vegas for sponsorship meetings as well as a bit of fun. With that being said, the off-season did seem to go on for quite a while and when I returned back to England in February 2012, I was really anxious to get back in a racecar.
Having signed with the newly formed Arden Caterham motorsports, as well as acting as the Caterham F1 test driver for the year, the expectations are high and the goals of the entire team are to deliver a championship winning campaign as I finished 3rd last year – as a rookie. World Series by Renault has launched a new FR3.5 car for this season and I have to say that it is nothing short of mind-blowing. The amount of downforce available is staggering; it rivals that of a Formula 1 car and it is very apparent in the lap times, pulling nearly five seconds clear of last year’s car. It is an absolute joy to drive and I am thrilled to be returning to the series and look forward to the opportunity that I have with the Caterham family.
When we arrived at the first test at Paul Ricard in France, you could feel the excitement throughout the paddock. It was great to see some of the drivers that I knew from the previous year or the FIA Institute Academy and it quickly became obvious that the competition was going to be at a level that was not yet achieved, as Formula Renault 3.5 becomes the leading junior formula in the world.
Leaving the pit lane for the first time in a new car is always an exciting process because the fact that you have a blank slate in front of you and the chance to completely develop the car around you is not something that you get to do very often. Unfortunately, I only made it to turn three before the car came to a silent stop and we had an electrical failure. This would mark the first of Many problems that we would experience throughout this test and while it was disappointing to get very few laps under our belts, especially as a new team, it was understandable as, like I mentioned before, this was a completely blank slate. Not only a new environment for the team, but a completely new car is certainly going to result in a fair share of teething issues.
With that said, we took what we could from the test and went to the second pre-season FR3.5 test Barcelona looking to get some proper laps done and begin our massive test plan. To our dismay, the weather on the south coast of Spain was incredibly wet and with an engine detonation, the number of laps that we racked up was minimal at best. To be honest, this put us on the back foot going into the last test as we still had yet to figure out a baseline for the car and considering the team is new, we have no background data to work from. We went to our final test at Motorland Aragon last week with our fingers crossed hoping for a test that was positive in the sense that we were simply able to put kilometers on the car.
Fortunately, the weather in Spain this time around was the definition of perfection and the car reliability was at its best. We spent the two days finally going through the key set up points that we had questions on and while the pace wasn’t exactly there, we closed the cap to the leaders by about 70%, which was encouraging considering this was our first two days of proper running. The position that we are in at the moment is certainly one of playing catch up, but if we can keep the development rate the same as it was in Aragon, then it won’t be long now until we are fighting at the front of the grid.
While the mountain still left to climb is big, I have complete faith in the Arden Caterham team surrounding me and based on the progress that we made last week in Aragon, the confidence and morale are high. The pace is coming and not a moment to soon, as I will be heading back to Spain in two weeks time for the FR3.5 season opener. I have great memories from this track last year and will be looking to match that and flip the script on pre-season testing.
Thank you for your support and I am looking forward to an incredible year with all of you.
With warmest regards,
Alexander