First of all before I write anything else about the weekend, I would like to wish Will Blackwell-Chambers a very speedy recovery after his crash in the first race of the season. Hopefully see you back at a circuit soon!
Onto the the weekend and it really was a weekend of learning and preparing for the rest of the season. Truth be told, going into the weekend, I wasn't expecting to be challenging at the front of the field straight the way having had 11 months out of the race seat, and with a couple of improvements on the car scheduled to come in for round 2 at Snetterton, this weekend was all about getting the chassis handling as well as possible, starting from scratch all over again!
The Friday test day only consisted of 3x30minute sessions compared to the usual 4 sessions we get at other venues just to make preparing for the weekend that little bit more difficult. Add to that the changeable conditions with the first session being full wet and the 2nd session being a mixture between the damp and wet conditions, it left the team with only 1 session to get the car working on the brand new Kumho tyres for this season.
Fortunately having managed to get a dry day before the start of the season, we had some base knowledge as to how the car behaved, and tried some pretty extreme set ups on the car for Silverstone to get a balance I was happy with, and with Tuckers expertise. I went into Saturday happy with the progress we had made despite the times showing us as being well down on the front pack.
Saturday morning was a very sunny morning, and a dry Qualifying session was on the cards once the damp of night had passed. Being the 2nd session of the day, some of the corners still started with damp patches making the opening lap a challenge, before settling down to normal dry running. Throughout the opening half of the session, the task was to punch in some lap times in clean air before going hunting for a slipstream.
The opening laps were consistently 1:18.6's which was a big improvement from Friday times, finding over half a second over night, but it seemed everyone had found similar pace. However, with a quick run through the pit-lane to find the leading pack to slipstream, the lap times started to tumble, eventually getting down to a 1:17.6 with half a tow down the main hangar straight. Progress and a P9 start for race 1 and P13 for race 2 with a poor 2nd fastest lap that was set without a slipstream.
Race 1 got off to a difficult start, losing 3 places off the line to 3 Hills Motorsport cars, and being shuffled back another 2 places on lap 2, before losing out to Colin Turkington following a mistake on lap 3. That would be the last position I would lose though, as from the start of lap 4, I was back on the attack and took the place back from Turkington on the run down to Stowe corner as I set about closing the gap to the front pack despite dropping out of the tow. Lap 5 was my fastest lap of the race and on that lap I actually was the fastest car on track, showing some promise for the season ahead, closing the gap to the pack in front by nearly a second. On lap 7 I gained another place from Wilbur Tiley and started chasing down Nic Grindrod, only for the red flags to come out after Will Blackwell-Chambers was turned around in the middle of club corner due to a chain reaction of events, and Wilbur having now where to go but into the door of Will. The race was ended there and both drivers were looked after by the medical staff on site and for Wills case in hospital later.
Sunday morning was anything but dry as the heavens well and truly opened as we arrived to the circuit. However, by the time the race started, the rain had stopped and the track was beginning to dry, but not fast enough to prompt anyone to risk running on the dry tyres... A first race on the new wet tyre was on the cards!
Once again the start was average, losing a place to Grindrod, and by the end of lap 2, having got a run on several cars coming out of club corner, I found myself on the dry racing line with 0 grip and ended up losing a spot to Turkington just before the safety car boards and flags appeared. On the restart I immediately gained one place due to Grindrods reliability issues and then proceeded to get stuck behind Griffiths with no real opportunity to pass, with the tow seemingly not working behind his car. Lady luck would eventually strike again, this time with Turkington retiring with a mechanical issue, but I would have to wait till the final lap of the race before eventually dispatching Griffiths into Village corner and then taking advantage of Cossins and Britten fighting to take Britten across the line out of Club corner, finishing 8th overall, and despite the overtakes, being the fastest on circuit on the last lap of the race. A promising result with a feeling of what could have been if I had started higher up.
The final race of the weekend was once again dry... apart from my grid spot, that was anything but dry! Between the races as well, we decided to try and do some set up changes to improve the car in the dry conditions from Saturday, however from the warm up lap it became very clear we had made a fairly big mistake and I knew I was going to be in trouble and struggling to hang on to the front pack.
Initially the start actually worked out well despite the damp grid spot, only losing 1 position through the first sequence of corners, but with the issues I was having going through Chapel corner and the straight line speed deficit to the cars around me, I was a sitting duck.
It became a race of just hanging on as best I could until some of the front cars started to struggle and fall out of the front pack, which eventually lead to 2 laps of working with Jack Sycamore to try and catch back up, but as soon as it was clear that wasn't possible and a fluffed gear change from Jack, I made the move stick, only for the red flag to come out a lap later and the results counted back a lap, leaving me in 11th place.
After 11 months away from driving in a competitive environment, it was always going to be tough to come back into the Supercup with how competitive it is. I set myself a top 10 target in all 3 races and I may have missed that on 2 of them, but the progress we made as a team was very encouraging ready for Round 2 at Snetterton. Some improvements on the horizon to the car, and the cobwebs dusted off, we move into the rest of the season with cautious optimism that results can improve.
Till the next race weekend
Ciao
Jack.
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