Well after nearly a full week of watching Metcheck, BBC and any other weather websites I could think of to try and guess what the weather would do, last saturday was the day of the Great Western Sprint at Castle Combe, the first event of 2009 for me and the rest of the Bristol/South-West sprinting gang. I was very keen to get to Combe and see what effect, if any, the upgrades over the winter were going to have, but I knew full well that a rainy day would take away almost all of any advantage I'd managed to grab over the winter, especially over the usual 4wd suspects of the Lancer of Dave Greenslade and the Mazda 323 turbo of Graeme Palmer.

    

So I was hugely relieved when I woke up (at 5:45am to watch the F1 qualifying before I went - well done Jensen!!) to find a cold, blustery, but dry morning. After getting pipped to 1st in class by just 0.19sec at last years end-of-season Pegasus sprint, I'd been mindful the night before when filling the car up with Tesco 99 fuel, only putting in 20 litres to cover the drive to Combe, the days running and the trip home, so the drive down to the circuit was about 45 minutes of full on economy running. By the time I arrived, most of the other guys from class A3 were there, so I pulled up between a very tidy Clio 182 and an Elise and wandered off to find sign on. Scrutineering went as uneventfully as usual but there was a longer wait than usual until practice as the British Sprint Championship was in attendance and they were off first. It was hugely impressive to watch the enormous V8 engined Gould Single seaters pound round the track, and their undertrays sparking as they clambered up Avon rise reminded me of watching Nigel Mansell's F1 car as a kid, although the massive Audi TT shaped V8 car was perhaps the most impressive. Last years event had apparently struggled with timing issues, so a few of the guys from A3 (it's a friendly bunch!) sat and watched the big-guns go out from the pit lane, but before long it was time for our practice run as the excellent organisation of this years event got into full swing.

 

I was quite nervous sitting in the pitlane in a car which, in its current guise at least, I hadn't driven in anger but it turns out I needn't have been. The VX, considering it's best-guess setup, was absolutely outstanding in practice on a dry track. The tyres and suspension came together to create faintly ludicrous cornering speeds - Quarry was well into third gear, and the two chicanes were 3rd gear rather than 2nd as they were last year. The only problem was that I got confused in how many laps we had in practice, and after seeing Dan Trotman in his clio pull in, I assumed it was over and followed him. As it turns out I could've had another lap, but I felt comfortable with the car already so I wasn't too worried. When I saw the times I was elated, I'd posted 159sec for my practice over the 'sprint' distance, a nearly 6 seconds quicker than anyone in my class, but on closer inspection it appeared that the Lancer hadn't had his sticky tyres on, so the gap certainly wasn't as big as it seemed, and last years winner and 'Combe specialist Pete Goodman in his Clio trophy is always one to watch. I didn't want to get complacent after getting mugged on the last run of the Pegasus sprint in 2008 after being P1 all day.

 

After lunch I took a ride down to Quarry with some friends to watch the single seaters. Some oil was dropped causing a short stoppage but in general the afternoon was going without a hitch when we were called for our timed runs. I was nervous sat in the pitlane once again, waiting and hoping for a decent run in a car that I had full confidence was capable of winning the class. My nervousness wasn't helped by a timing equipment failure immediately before my run, meaning that I was sat on the start line for a good few minutes before I could get going, but once I was on the move everything flowed quite nicely. It was in the back of my head all day that the T1 run was going to be important, as showers were all over the place (you could see them blowing past on either side of the circuit!) and any dry run could potentially be the only one available. With this in mind I pushed a little harder than I normally would on a first run, and other than missing a gear coming out of tower, and breaking a little early into the esses, it was a good run. The time was even better at a 157.87sec, nearly 2 seconds quicker than my practice run. The lancer and 323 improved, as did all the clio's but I still found myself nearly 5 seconds ahead. I was ecstatic, but still wary of losing it in T2.

    

That was the thought which clouded my head as I lined up for the second timed run. I was pretty sure I'd done enough, and didn't want to push too hard. However, you don't know how everyone else has done, so I had to go for it. I lit the tyres up off the start, which wasn't great for my acceleration, but my approach to Quarry was much neater than on the T1 run. However, as I tried to slow down for the Esses, I locked both front wheels and ran wide. I was confused by this as I thought I hadn't braked that hard, then I saw the answer: rain, and lots of it! By the time I got back to Bobbies I had my wipers on full, and the car was slipping all over the place - I even had to lift through folly as there was just no grip! In my head I knew that it was over, I was out before any of my close rivals, and on a wet track nobody was going to find the time they needed to nick my win, so I just enjoyed the second lap at a pretty slow pace, drifting where I could and just breaking with loads of room to spare. It turns out I was still quickest in the second run, but everyone was the best part of 20sec slower than their first run, so the win was mine, along with a full maximum haul of ASWMC points and a decent amount of Bristol Speed points too. I was pretty happy to say the least and got a pretty nice glass trophy for the mantle. Most importantly the VX has proved it was a car capable of winning, as I thought, and hopefully this will continue in 2009.

 

The next event is in 2 weeks at Clay Pigeon raceway, which is an outdoor cart track, and then we move onto Colerne and Llandow in May. I think that Castle Combe suits the VX better than any of these venues, so I don't think that the advantage will be as great as it was on Saturday in the future, but it looks like it might be a competetive season ahead!

 

Results for saturday are linked in the top left of the page, sorry the pictures\video above is poor quality, it was from a mobile.

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Thanks for reading. Tim