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Rockingham

With a new car, bright sunshine and a circuit not visited for a few years things were sure to be challenging, but that is what makes motorsport so addictive, so Gary and the team were confident of a great weekends racing.

Friday testing

With the first session getting underway early at 9.30, Gary needed to have a seat fitting so he never made it to the circuit until midway through session 2. This was Gary’s first time in a Radical and his first time on a car with slicks and wings, so take it easy was the buzz phrase and with good reason!

The first 20 minute session went well, with Gary learning how the car reacts to different inputs and getting used to the extra grip from the slick tyres, something that was sorely lacking in last year’s Porsches.

After a couple more sessions, Gary started to push and eventually was finding some of the limits of the car, getting under steer in the slow to medium speed corners. This is a good sign and meant the team could try to improve the setup to gain better performance.

The final session was just used to scrub in a brand new set of tyres ready for the qualifying tomorrow.

Saturday Qualifying

With new tyres and a perfect dry track, the grip levels were fantastic, but Gary’s limited experience in the car was evident and he managed 19th out of 28 for the line up, well over 3 seconds off the outright pace. Gary knew the main areas he was slow and could work on these to improve his position, so he was confident of a reasonable finish.

Race 1

It was soon very evident that Gary had not made any practice starts and the Radical is far more tricky to get going that the Porsches he is used to starting with. Traditionally, Gary makes great starts and often gains 3 or 4 places into the first corner, but this was not to be as he promptly stalled the car as the lights went out, demoting him to last place!

After that it was a fight back, which he did a great job at, passing car after car to eventually get back from 28th to finish 17th, passing 2 cars on the last corner. Not the best finish, but given the start he made he was very pleased.

Race 2

Now starting from 17th, Gary was hoping to try and break into the top 10, an aim he has for the main part of this season. With another bad start he dropped to 20th though and had a fight to battle through the pack again. The car was suffering under steer worse than race 1 as the team made changes that had not helped (they are learning the car as much as Gary is), so Gary could not make the progress he wanted, but he managed to finish 15th, which was respectable in his 2nd ever race in a Radical. After checking lap times, Gary had closed the gap to less than 2 seconds on the outright pace, so he is confident that more time in the car will soon see him challenging at the front.

So a productive weekend, with lots learnt and much more to learn. Onwards to Snetterton now to try to break into the top 10!