40th Anniversary Formula Ford Festival
A Weekend of Triumph & Tragedy
Last weekend was definitely a rollercoaster of emotions. I counted myself lucky to be at the Formula Ford Festival at all and it was only the fact that some of my great supporters were able to rally round at the last minute that I was able to take up the free entry I already had for winning the overall Euro-Cup honours in the summer.
Then on Friday my younger brother Jon was hospitalised with a really nasty bug that had seen him going downhill all week and this was very worrying. Although we naturally have our share of good natured sibling rivalry he is among my loyalest supporters and has worked as my kart racing mechanic and sometimes been my no.2 Formula Ford mechanic this year giving Tom a hand. As a massive fitness fanatic and gym goer himself he is also acts as my personal fitness trainer and loves giving me a hard time! Thankfully he now seems to be slowly getting better so I suppose he will be back to giving me some grief sometime soon!
The Festival itself couldn’t have gone much better for me. I qualified on pole in my group and led all four of my races of heat, quarter final, semi- final & final from lights to flag; sounds easy doesn’t it? Well sounding easy and actually being easy are two very different things. The tight Brands Hatch Indy circuit doesn’t allow anyone to build up any significant advantage and it was extremely tight amongst the front runners. Antti Buri & Steijn Schothorst in particular enjoyed putting me under pressure but I soaked it up when I had to, stood firm and took advantage of any errors they made to give myself breathing space when I could. We had fresh tyres for the final and I have to say they didn’t seem to work as well as the set we took off that had done qualifying and the three previous races and while I out there I found myself wishing we hadn’t changed! But never mind I prevailed and made it to the chequered flag in first place and what a great feeling that was. When I worked at the Festival as a mechanic for Jamun driver Tim Blanchard in 2008 I dreamt of coming back and winning the event and now I had done it and I was very proud to receive the Neil Shanahan Trophy for my victory as well as the John Nichol and Roger Pedrick Trophies for taking the top British & English driver places. In fact I retained these last two from 2010.
My supporters, my family and I of course were elated with what we had achieved which was the icing on the cake of an absolutely fantastic year which has at times tested our resilience but it has all been worth it. A massive thank you to everyone and of course not least to Jamun racing for giving me a great car all year.
I haven’t quite finished working with Jamun Racing yet though. We have another project that we are now working on together which is quite exciting and I am looking forward to the next instalment of that at the end of this week and I’ll definitely be updating you about it in my next blog. My next event will be the Henry Surtees Foundation Karting event at Buckmore Park on Thursday this week. This is an extremely worthy cause and one that I am proud to take part in. I have a tremendous admiration and respect for John Surtees who I shall be seeing at the event. Why the powers that be haven’t honoured John with a knighthood is beyond me and I’d like to see this situation rectified soon.
Very sadly, the joy and elation that I experienced when going to bed on Sunday evening soon disappeared early on Monday morning when I awoke to the shocking news that Dan Wheldon had lost his life in Las Vegas. Dan was somebody who was a real inspiration to me and no mean Formula Ford racer himself having finished as runner up to Jenson Button in the 1998 Formula Ford Festival. I always found it frustrating that Dan’s great achievements were hardly reported on in the UK except in the motorsport press. To compete in the Indy 500, arguably the most famous motor race in the world, is no mean feat. To win it is amazing. To win it more than once places you among the all-time greats, especially when combined with the Indycar Championship title that Dan claimed in 2005. How cruel that just as Dan’s career was getting back on track after a lean period that he should lose his life in such tragic circumstances. He will be sorely missed and my deepest condolences and heartfelt sympathy go to all of Dan’s family and friends.
The season may be more or less over for 2011 but I have a very busy time ahead in the coming weeks and I will be back blogging about all of that quite soon.
All the best,
Scott
I cannot believe that it’s the end of the season already. It feels like no time at all since heading out of the garage for the first time at Oulton Park back in April. Since then my first season of GT racing has certainly been very up and down, with bad luck striking far too often but when it’s come together it has been fantastic.
We were coming into Silverstone 3rd in the GT4 championship, with our only hope of winning being a retirement for the championship leading KTM. Our aim of the weekend was to beat the ultra consistent Lotus Evora of Freddy Nordstrom and Leyton Clarke and take 2nd in the championship.
The weather all weekend was overcast and very cold and the track was damp for a frustrating first practice session, where a number of red flags meant only David was able to get out on track. He excelled in the slippery conditions, posting the 2nd fastest time outright in the session – certainly not a bad way to start the weekend!!
I got out in the second session, though only for the first 20 minutes in order to give David more time on the new Silverstone GP layout as he had less prior knowledge than me. In the now dry conditions our pace was strong, 2nd fastest in class only to the no 48 Lotus that was running on new tyres. This good form continued into qualifying, I went out first and got the car into provisional pole – about half a second ahead of the 48 Lotus. David got in second for what would be an exhilarating second half of the session, with David & Phil Glew in the Lotus constantly swapping pole times, lap after lap. Eventually it was the Lotus that took pole, just 6 hundredths of a second ahead of us.
We went into the race with championship in mind, knowing that the pole-sitting Lotus would have an extra 20 seconds in the pits following its win at Donington the plan for my stint was just to stick behind it as we could jump it in the pitstops. We had to win if we were to have any chance of winning the title. In the first half hour this plan worked well, as I was able to keep right on Phil Glew’s bumper . However just over halfway into my stint, the car dropped off a proverbial cliff-face with the car developing crippling oversteer all round the circuit causing the Lotus to establish more of a lead.
More problems came in the pitstop, as a safety car just after we pitted effectively put us a lap behind the leaders. With David still struggling for pace it was looking like we’d end up 3rd in the standing, but a change in fortune saw the 49 Lotus (sitting ahead of us in 2nd place in the championship) break down on the final lap, meaning we inherited 3rd place and what turned out to be 2nd in the championship – tied on points with the Lotus but having had more race wins than them it put us into 2nd place.
Whilst it’s never nice to beat an opponent due to a breakdown rather than racing on track, it emphasizes the importance of reliability in GT racing. I’m sure if we’d had better luck at a number of rounds this year we could have been higher than 2nd, but that’s the way it goes.
Overall it has been a fantastic season, and I would like to thank David and everyone at Scuderia Vittoria for being great all year. Would also like to congratulate Peter & Marcus on winning the GT4 Championship.
Now I must look ahead to next year, where the plan is to sell the Ginetta GT4 and move up to GT3. I look forward to seeing you then
Dan
Some were surprised to see me taking part in the final championship rounds at Silverstone last weekend. With the championship already wrapped up there was no need to be there except for the fact that it was a very welcome opportunity to race on the Arena Grand Prix layout and to add to my tally of victories for the season. To be honest I want to race at every possible opportunity so championship or no championship I wasn’t going to pass up the chance.
Before the weekend had even begun though I had another reason to celebrate when I learned that for the 2nd year running I had been picked as a finalist for the McLaren AUTOSPORT BRDC Award. This is a great honour and vindicates my decision to return to the Dunlop MSA Formula Ford Championship of Great Britain for a 2nd season. I had to put in a dominant performance with my level of experience and I think it’s fair to say that I did with the help of a great team behind me of course. But I wasn’t taking anything for granted and knew that I was taking a big risk especially after coming very close to winning the championship in 2010. I very much put my reputation on the line and if things hadn’t gone my way this year then that reputation could now be in tatters.
I am really looking forward to the McLaren AUTOSPORT BRDC Award competition. Of course there will be pressure but also a lot of enjoyment as well. I know from last year what a great experience this was for me personally and how much I gained from it and whilst I will draw on this experience I am not complacent enough to think that I know exactly what’s coming because I am sure that the organisers will rightly have one or two surprises for us up their sleeves.
So Silverstone at the weekend very much had an end of term feel about it. With the championship won I could certainly relax a little but not too much as I still wanted to win and if possible help my Jamun team mates Nick McBride & Jeroen Slaghekke to secure 2nd & 3rd places in the championship for the team.
I’m sure by now you have read the race reports already published so I won’t rewrite those, but race one on Saturday produced my third DNF of the season, ironically at the same venue (but different circuit) where I had the previous two non-finishes at the start of the season. But I’m not going to get a complex about it. I love coming to Silverstone and have to accept it was one of those things.
This time my non finish occurred when my engine decided to expire on lap six which was a shame as I was in the thick of a highly enjoyable six car battle for the lead. To be honest though I can’t grumble at all. The Duratec engine is usually fantastically reliable and if I was to have some more bad luck this season then this was definitely the time to have it with the championship already won. It made for an interesting talking point for the commentary team though as the engine actually caught fire and I quickly grabbed a fire extinguisher from a marshal’s post to put out the flames.
Massive credit has to go to the Jamun Team and especially my mechanic and friend Tom Huxtable who worked late into the evening on Saturday and to Scholar engines for all their efforts to get me out for Sundays two races the first of which allowed me to record my 18th British Championship victory of the season and my 22nd in total. I was very pleased to rack that one up as it gives me a 75% victory ratio in the championship. Not bad by anyone’s standards. Although I led from lights to flag it was far from easy. A downpour shortly before the start of our race made it a close call between wets and slicks. I went for slicks although a couple of my team mates were on wets. Conditions were very tricky at first and my team mate Jeroen was certainly keeping me honest in his bid to secure the runner up position in the championship so it was a hard earned win.
With the meeting running behind schedule race three late on Sunday afternoon was staged in twilight. We should have fitted headlights! This was a typical last race of the season with everyone just going for it which was great. I found myself shuffled back to sixth with a lot of ground to make up early in the race but make it up I did as I set fastest lap in my bid to get on terms with Geoff & Jeroen at the front. It was a great final lap and I almost stole it as the three of us were almost inseparable at the chequered flag but in the end I had to settle for third. Great drive by Jeroen to take the win and well done on securing the runner up spot in the championship and also really well done to Nick McBride for taking third place to make it a fantastic 1-2-3 in the title race for the Jamun Team.
After Silverstone we now head straight to Brands Hatch for the Formula Ford Festival and it’s very special one this year being the 40th anniversary and one that I would definitely love to win. Whilst I would give myself a great chance I realise you also need a bit of good luck to win this type of event so I’m hoping that mine doesn’t desert me this time out. Either way I expect it to be very close and very competitive on the tight Brands Hatch Indy circuit amongst all the front runners. Bring it on!
All the best,
Scott
Images courtesy of Jacob Ebrey Motorsport Photography
My last two rounds for 2011 were at Donington Park and Silverstone and both tracks I had gone well at in the past and was looking forward to hopefully rounding the year off on a high as I still had a chance of getting 5th place in the overall championship.
Testing on the GP track at Donington went well and the team really found a sweet spot with the car that meant I could drive it quickly and Saturday qualifying proved this by me being 3rd on the grid and the first Golf too. The weather left a little to be desired on Sunday though and the rain came in for the day. For race one I started off hopeful that I could be on the pace as I had had good pace in the wet earlier in the year but this changed shortly into the race where the car started to handle extremely badly and I dropped to 7th. A few laps from the end I had a small gravel excursion dropping me down to 17th, but the worst was yet to come. I was excluded at the end of the race for a technical infringement as my wheel rims over hung the wheel arches. I lost all championship points which was a huge blow to my efforts to attain 5th place by the end of the season and I had also opted to play my joker (which doubles any points) after my brilliant qualifying. This also meant I started last (24th) for race 2 and even my best efforts to move through the pack didn’t quite pay off. I carved my way through past 10 cars and finished in 14th place but I was disappointed and down in 7th place in the championship. I looked on to Silverstone where 5th place was still possible but very optimistic.
Silverstone saw us take to the new Arena track and I hoped for dry weather so that I could really prove my pace again and the weekend started off well as on Friday I finished the day being 4th quickest on a drying track. Qualifying was also dry and I knew that I had a strong chance of being on the front row of the grid but to my dismay hitting traffic on my last lap left me just 5th but with a theoretical best time of 3rd which I knew I could repeat consistently, I was confident I could turn it into solid race results. Race 1 was difficult as the track was damp so I decided to put 2 slicks and 2 wet tyres on the car hoping that I would be able to at least hold my position but I found myself dropping back and although I had a good battle I finished in 11th place and made it extremely hard for myself for later in the day. Race 2 however was dry and I had a lot of work to do but I loved the track and knew it was a long race. I made a good start off the line overtaking 2 cars and as I lined up another in the Maggots/Becketts complex, the competitor I was side by side with slid as his rear tyres were cold, coming across the front of me therefore forcing me into a slide which resulted in me hitting the tyre wall and causing too much damage to continue with but I guess that’s racing for you!
I have had a great year and proved my raw pace in qualifying and I finished 8th overall in the championship out of 32 cars. The support from my sponsors Supagard, Awesome GTI, Geometric Manufacturing and Fadal CNC have been a key part to my success this year and I cannot thank them enough. I hope for 2012 I will be back out racing but now is the waiting game whilst I try and raise the money I need to continue. Keep your eyes peeled for press releases when all may be revealed for next year’s challenge.
Until Next Time,
Zoe x
www.zoewenham.com
Images: Jakob Ebrey and Marc Waller
Round nine of the championship took us to Spain and the circuit of Valencia. Last year we raced here in the DTM for the first time but I know the circuit very well as it is regularly used as a winter testing venue for Formula 1 teams.
At last year’s race we struggled against the Audis in the hot conditions and this year we were determined to be more competitive. After two disappointing races for the team in the wet at Brands Hatch and Oschersleben the weather was forecast to be dry for the whole weekend and with temperatures rising to the high 20s for the weekend it was going to be hot.
The single biggest battle this weekend was for the Championship between my Mercedes team mate Bruno Spengler and Audi’s Martin Tomczyk. After Bruno’s retirement at Oschersleben he was now nine points behind Tomczyk with just two races to go. He had to beat Tomczyk this weekend to keep his hopes alive.
In the first 90 min test session on Friday I was determined to get on with things and due to the wet conditions at the last race all of the tyres I had to use were new as we have to carry over two sets from the previous race weekend.
I pushed hard from the very first lap and set a time of 1:31.811 which put me second fastest just 0.04 behind local hero Miguel Molina. The car balance felt good but the grip level was poor. It seemed that the new Hankook tyres for this season were not working well on the hot track surface at Valencia and as the session went on as the temperature rose it was impossible to get close to the times we had set at the start of the session. I finished the test in P2; 0.04 behind Molina and an unusually large gap of 0.2 seconds back to 3rd placed Ekstrom. Championship contenders Spengler and Tomczyk finishing up 6th and 10th respectively and with the four works HWA Mercedes cars in the top six it was a good start to the weekend for the team.
In the second test on Saturday morning Molina continued his good form by topping the timesheets once again; setting a time 1.3 seconds quicker than he had the day before. I finished the session in 8th position; just 0.1 seconds behind Bruno who was 0.3 back from the quickest. Tomczyk only managed a time quick enough for P11 but with Audis in the top 5 positions it seemed we were slipping back down the order a little. I was however happy with the car balance once again and we just seemed to be lacking overall grip in the hot temperatures. The four HWA cars were separated by just 0.2 of a second showing that we all had a similar speed in the car, but we just couldn’t match the times of the quickest Audi cars.
For Qualifying, the temperature went up even more and the track was getting very hot and slick.
In Q1 I set a really good time on my first run which put me 2nd initially just behind the Audi of Albuquerque but I was knocked down to 3rd by the end of the session; just beaten by Ekstrom on his second set of new tyres. A lot of drivers struggled and had to do a second run to get through to Q2. The session ended with Engel, Vietoris, Frey and Stoddart being knocked out. Coulthard and Van Der Zande just made it in to Q2 in 13th and 14th positions.
Q2 was cut short after Eduardo Mortara, who was looking pretty strong, put his Audi in the gravel on the exit of turn 12 which brought out the red flag. All cars would now progress through to Q3 to battle it out for the top four places to get into the Q4 pole position shoot out. I was half way through my fast lap when the flag came out so managed to save an extra bit of life on this set of tyres for the race tomorrow.
In Q3 you are only allowed to use one set of tyres and I made a few small mistakes on my fast lap and only managed a time fastest enough for P9. I was obviously very disappointed with the result after being 3rd fastest in Q1 and having a well-balanced car I was just under one tenth of a second off 5th placed Rockenfellar.
The rest of the Qualifying result was also a bit mixed showing that the track was proving to be difficult and inconsistent.
Ekstrom scored a dominant pole position with Albuquerque continuing his good form in P2. Van Der Zande and Coulthard who had just made it through to Q2 did a great job and finished up 3rd and 4th respectively.
I did finish up as best HWA 09 Mercedes with Schumacher, Green and Spengler in 10th, 12th, and 13th positions. Martin Tomczyk had qualified in P11 just ahead of Spengler in the Championship fight.
On Sunday morning we did some setup work for the race to try and extend the life of the tyres as in the hot conditions they were having a tough time. We set pretty good lap times but still struggled to match the form of the Audis at the front of the field.
As we prepared for the race the temperature really increased. You would never think that it was the start of October. Standing on the grid pouring ice cold water over my head while sitting in the shade it felt a lot more like the middle of summer. With just over five mins to go I got in the car and prepared for what promised to be a hot and tough afternoon.
I got a good initial start but had to lift slightly to avoid Jarvis who had pulled over in my direction and by the time I had pulled across to the right Tomczyk had got alongside and just in front before turn one. I tried to go round the outside of him into turn two but I ran wide losing a place to Green in the process. On the run down to turn four Spengler had a look down the inside and I didn’t put up much of a fight allowing him to try and chase after Tomczyk. Just behind me was the Audi of Mortara.
As the race progressed there was little movement. The whole field was still closely packed and it wasn’t until the first round of pit stops that thing changed.
Jarvis and Mortara pitted at the earliest opportunity and made good use of their new tyres to make up places; Jarvis getting ahead of Green and Mortara getting a jump on both me and Bruno.
At the second round of stops Bruno managed to beat Mortara in the pit lane and on lap 30 I passed Mortara into turn two and then started to pull a gap while closing in on the back of Spengler once again.
While we were sitting in the lowly positions of 10th and 11th Tomczyk had managed to make his way up into 3rd position with good speed and a good strategy. This was disastrous for Bruno’s Championship chances and with the race nearing its end only a mechanical failure for Tomczyk would save his chances.
There was no such failure and he came home in 3rd place, taking the DTM title as well as the six points. The only other drama on the last lap was Jamie’s enthusiastic passing attempt on Jarvis into turn two which saw him lock up and run wide through the gravel losing thre places in the process.
Ekstrom romped home the winner 16 seconds clear of Albuquerque with Tomczyk 3rd. I finished up in 10th positions but was promoted to 8th pending an outcome of an appeal by Coulthard and Van der Zande’s teams as the rear wings on their cars were found to be outside of the regulation measurements after Qualifying. Although this would give me a point it would be a shame as they both deserved the 5th and 6th places in which they had finished.
So the 2011 DTM champion has been crowned and Martin Tomczyk really has done an amazing job this year. Relegated from a works car to a 2008 spec, no one expected him to be fighting for the Championship but with the 25kg weight advantage and some very consistent fast driving he has beaten all and become the first person to win the series in an older spec car. Well done!
With just one race to go in three weeks we are going back to where we started the season; the Hockenheimring where all drivers will be pushing to go into the winter break having won the last race and there is still the teams Championship up for grabs in which mine and Spengler’s team are currently in 2nd position just five point behind the Audi Abt team of Ekstrom and Rockenfellar.
Follow Gary on Twitter @garypaffett