Time to go racing.

If you have read my blog last year I did a few track days and ended up thinking that, whilst I love track days, I feel that I need to move on. The problem is that I have no idea whether I am actually improving my driving because there is no timing allowed or any element of competition.


I think I need an element of comptitiveness to make things more interesting.

So it's time to go racing!




First problem - the cost. How do you go racing with no money?

Well, the short answer is you can't. But I might be able to do a few rounds of a relatively cheap series for the same budget as a season of track days.





Well I am writing this having jumped in at the deep end.


I have done my ARDS test so I have a licence.


I have bought all the gear (suit, helmet etc etc...)


I have had the car sorted out to make sure it holds together.


I have joined the 750 Motor Club and entered the Road Going Bike-Engined car series.


So several thousand pounds poorer, I am ready for my first test day.





I have lots of things not exactly in my favour in this venture - lack of money, talent, spare time to name a few, but I do have one card up my sleeve. My nephew is Oliver Bryant. Unless you read Autosport every week from cover to cover you may not have heard of him but check out his web site - oliverbryant.com. He is only twenty and already in his 2nd season of the British GT series. He is a serious talent and I'm not just saying that because he's family. He will win Le Mans one day you just watch.


Anyway, for some reason Oliver is happy to help his old uncle with a bit of guidance, and if you happen to be reading this Olly, I can't thank you enough.





So Olly agreed to come on a test day at Brands, on Friday (my first race is on Sunday).








So we turn up at Brands. Amazingly the car get through the noise test no problem - I was a bit worried about that - and Olly suggest that I take the car out first to bed in the brakes and find my way round (I have never driven at Brands before).


Olly runs the stopwatch on me.


The brakes are a bit spongy after it had all new disks and pads, and I haven't a clue about the right braking points and how hard I can push it. So I'm not expecting too much to start with.





I do about 10 laps or so, and then Olly takes over.


My best lap was 56.1.


Olly goes straight out and does a 54.


Actually I didn't think that was too bad!





We asked around the paddock. There were a few other cars in the same series as me testing as well. Another Westy with a fireblade engine (900cc and a class below me) was doing 52's! We found out that a good lap for a 'busa should be in the 51's. That put me in my place!





Anyway, Olly rekoned that the brakes were not at all right so we had to bleed them. Of course I didn't have any of the kit to do that, so we started asking around. It has to be said that everyone is so friendly and willing to help out (not that I'm much of a threat to them!).


We also had an electical problem. The starter button fell apart and shorted whilst Olly was driving. He didn't know what had happened exept that there was a cloud of blue smoke, as the car still ran, but as soon as we went to swap drivers we noticed the button hanging off. So we had to borrow some wire and a soldering iron (actually a very kind chap did the repair for us).





I finally got some more laps in with some firmer brakes, but we had developed an odd problem where the engine seemed to cut out under hard left hand corners. Despite checking as many connections as we could, we couldn't find the problem.


Anyway, even with that problem, Olly went out and did a 53.5.


I did most of the last session of the day. I was just starting to get braver with my braking, and work out the lines a bit better. After what I thought must have been some real improvement I came in to see my times. My best of the afternoon was a 55.9.


I was really dissapointed. I thought I would have knoocked at least a second off my earlier times, but in fact it was only about 2 tenths.





Olly talked me through a few areas where I can probably improve.


I reckon in the heat of a race I should be able to improve.


Well we'll see - the race is Sunday. Watch this space!