Guess I should also put my report up, if there's anyone left still slightly interested
Logistic dictated that for the second event in a row Jonathan shared my Roadsport A for the Fintray hillclimb, this allowed one of us to transport the car and the other to driver the team "motorhome" (My folks camper van to be more precise)
We headed up in convoy on the Friday evening, Jonathan pulling the 7 along on Kevin's trailer getting admiring glances from the other road users whilst I received only glares and glowers for being a threat to free flowing traffic. Finally we get to the location for the camping to find Fergus & Nikki already there with there tent set up and Fd revving the engine ready to make a quick getaway to the local curry shop. This being my first "away" event thought that there would be plenty of opportunity for takeaway curry the following night - I now know that it's curry on Friday followed by a trip to an Asian resturant the following night in the company of at least a dozen other hillclimbers.
So I decline the offer of curry and set about cooking some dinner - It's been a while since I cooked on camper van equipment and was soon wishing that I had taken up the offer of curry, more so when Fd & Nikki arrived back with said curry. Still I managed to russell up some food and the four of us had a pleasent evening talking about this, that and the next thing.
A good nights sleep then followed, probably assisted by the refreshements consumed during the evening.
On to business, we arrive and find a very small, tight and busy paddock, Fd helps us unload and move the trailer out of the road, and I pull up in the parking spot allocated to me. We've been quite lucky as the "team" has sequential numbers so that means we can share a bit of space, if fact we have been very lucky as the event organisers haven't realised that my car is double entered so we have an extra parking space that's not going to be filled, so we spread out and enjoy the extra room afforded to us. Signing on we get the numbering system sorted out, I keep my primary number of 37 and Jonathan goes to being 137. As newbies we need to walk the hill escorted so that we get an understanding of what's going on around us - unfortunately they do this walk quite late on, there's a large number of new folk and you don't actually get to see the lie of the track, but it's all done in a very friendly and relax atmosphere with a good number of experienced drivers walking with you to give pointers.
It's time for first run and being the car owner, I send Jonathan out first so I have warmer tyres. Change over takes place in the queue for the start line and we are getting pretty slick at this now.......a bit too slick as I arrive at the start line with my head still in pax mode, still I do my run and there's not much between either of our times. The track is very slidey and the car is very tail happy - something I'm not a big fan off, prefering a neutral car.
2nd pratice and I'm starting to understand the track more and my times come down a bit, but it's still slippery under wheel. I'm starting to feel a bit "off" with a sore head coming on and my painkillers back in the campervan a mile or two away.
Lunch is called and instead Jonathan and walk the track, for information but mainly, for me, to try and take my mind of the now thumping and nausating headache that I have. After walking through I hide in the car with my balaclava over my head and ears and the tonneau cover acting like a half roof/ half windscreen. To make matters worse it starts to spit with rain, then as lunch draws to a close it's starts to drizzle. Oh Joy, as if the start wasn't slidey enough! The only ray of light is that Fd has some painkillers in the boot of his car! 2 taken with some energy drink and I head back to my darkend recluse. All to soon, and far too soon for the painkiller to kick in, it's time for the 1st timed runs
Again Jonathan is acting as tyre warmer - but has this plan backfired on me now? Any delay and I'm setting my time in different conditions to the rest of the class. Jonathan posts his time and brings the car back for me to change driver. Fortunately there's not much in the way of delay and the additional rain that's fell wouldn't make much more than a 10th of a second difference to the overall times. With headache receeding I do my first timed run, in the damp. I'm slower than Jonathan, by nine hundreths of a second which puts me into 5th position. Lovat Fraser splits Jonathan and I's time by 4 hundreths of a second. Over 600m of track and we are split by roughly what would equate to 300mm with the gap to Lovat something like 150mm (thanks to Fd for the off the top of head calculations)
I'm not a happy bunny, and I know that the rain is getting heavier and heavier and that the chance of beating my previous time is slim, so there is not hope of me improving my place - not happy at all, and this bloody headache is back with reinforcements. Fortunately pain relief isn't too far away!
2nd timed runs (for some) I'm standing down near the start line watching the cars in our class depart the start line, next up is my car with Jonathan behind the wheels, he gets a reasonable start and disappears down the track, I watch the clock on top of the timekeepers hut 33.....34.....35.....36.....37......38.....I think the track must be really slippy......39..... the klaxon goes and the timekeeper displays a little cardboard sign in the window of his hut - "red flag" This isn't a nice time. I know there's been an incident involving my friend and my car.....40.....41.....42.....43.... My stomach sinks and my headache vanishes.....45......46......47...... some of the guys in the next class up ask what' going on, all I can say is that my car's gone off, don't know where, don't know how serious.....48....49...50....51. The clock stops.
Much to my relief the clock has stopped on a fractional number, something has stopped the clock, not someone. Coming from the top paddock I can see the car and driver come towards me, I head up to make sure Jonathan's ok and to assess the damage. Number plate has gone, nose cone has a nasty crack on the bottom right, the grills resting against the radiator and there's paint and gell coat missing there the nose has "wrinkled" during impact with the earth bund at the side of the track. Jonathan reports an issue with the steering which is quickly diagnosed, Fd is now on scene having finished his run. We try to patch up the car in the p!ssing rain but it soon becomes apparent that all we are doing is getting wet as the car won't be fixed in time for me to have another run.
Soggy we put the car back onto the trailer and take it back to base camp to assess fully what's happened.
<end of part one>