Thruxton was to be the start of my season, after the problems at Brands. Points had to be scored, preferably 16 of them (win plus fastest lap) to keep Jeremy Timms in sight in the championship. Being fast isn’t enough when your rival is happy to capitalise on any mistakes.
Practice
I had spend some time watching YouTube videos of Thruxton, as well as playing it on the PC with the rFactor game (I hesitate to use the term simulator, as it’s rubbish). Motorsport UK, on the television, also had some Thruxton racing from the BTCC meeting. I also ran the circuit on foot on the Friday evening. That was my whole experience of Thruxton until Saturday 8th May 2010.
We woke up to see grey skies and light drizzle; indeed, it was the worst type of weather as it wasn’t suitable for slick or wet tyres, but somewhere in between. Our general (but not cast iron) rule is that no spray equals slicks, so we left them on the car, and went out. In fact, given that I had no idea of the track anyway, we didn’t change anything on the setup at all.
My first few laps of Thruxton were cautious, but I had to push to learn the track and the conditions. It’s not like learning a dry circuit where you can warm things up whilst learning, or practicing on a track one already knows, as the conditions themselves take time to master, and time is in short supply.
As you might already know, my dashboard shows me my last laptime, my best laptime and the laptime delta (i.e. how much quicker I am on this lap than I was up to this point on my best lap). I knew that Jeremy’s lap record was 1m15.3 at the non-championship round in 2009, and my dashboard was saying that I was doing 1m25s to 1m28s, which seemed far to slow given the poor conditions. It was also suggesting that I’d done the final chicane really well early on, as my delta time kept going from 3 seconds better to zero seconds better. I pushed and pushed, trying to find the elusive laptime, knowing that I’d be fifth or sixth on the grid if I didn’t. Okay, the car had quite a lot of understeer (a Dallara trait in the wet I think, but I’m gradually learning how to drive around it – I hate understeer), and out of the slower corners we had a bit of a misfire (that some on the pitwall thought was traction control! I’ll confess our ECU can do traction control, and that we’d thought about fitting it, but it requires 4 wheelspeed sensors, lots of wiring, lots of expense and with only ~190hp probably not worth any benefit. All are welcome to check our car for wheelspeed sensors!) so I can’t claim the car was perfect. My pole time was a 1m25.4, but my datalogging says that if I’d done my best sectors on the same lap I’d have done a 1m23.1, so clearly I wasn’t getting the most out of myself or the car.
Soon the safety car came out (for Jeremy Goodman’s incident I think), so I tried to keep what little tyre temperature I had by weaving around like a maniac, but it was all in vain as the chequered flag came out before the SC boards were removed.
Parc Fermé was waiting for us, and I got out of the car a bit despondent. Martin (my Dad) came over and said he’d been to race control to look at the timing and that I was on pole. By seven seconds! Jeremy Timms was next, with Ian Hughes popping up in 3rd (he must be good in the wet/damp!), followed by Arty Cameron, and Neil Harrison rounding out the top 5 some 11 seconds per lap slower than me. I was as surprised as anyone!!! Tony Cotton seemed to think that I was joking when I mentioned the understeer and misfire…….. Chris Woodhouse was adamant I’d driven the circuit before – I wish!
Race
We were due to be Race Two, just before the lunch break. Sadly on the GT Ferrari racers was involved in an accident that delayed the whole meeting by about 4 hours as police, ambulances and crews worked their magic. I don’t know any details of the outcome of the accident, and I’m not going to add to the speculation here.
So it was about 4:50pm by the time we got onto the circuit, taken on the lap to the grid behind a Lotus pace car. It went so slowly that my water temperatures were rising whilst moving (I’ve never driven a race car that slowly before!), so by the time the whole grid was ready my dash was shouting 110°C at me – sometimes I’d wish that the marshals and officials thought about what single seaters need!
The green flap lap went cleanly, although I was more concerned with lowering my coolant temps than warming tyres or brakes. Only once I’d got it down to 70° did I start to weave around, as well as jumping on the right and middle pedals now and again. In fact, I think I overdid it on the warming of the rear tyres.
For 2010 we have Launch Control. This isn’t as clever as it sounds, but is just a second rev limit that cuts in when I press a button on the steering wheel. I’d set it to 4500rpm. As the red lights went out I dropped the clutch and released by button. And the engine died.
By the time I’d restarted the whole grid had gone by and was out of sight around turn 1 (and thankfully everyone missed me). I was cross. If ever there was a red mist moment, this was it. I set off in a cloud of noise and smoke signifying nothing, but before I arrived at the first chicane I had come to terms with my error and determined to drive as hard as I could but without taking silly risks.
By the 3rd corner I was no longer last. By the end of lap 1 I was 16th (out of 29 starters) and was 17.5 seconds behind Jeremy. By the end of lap 2 I was 8th and 21 seconds behind. Next time I was 5th and 22 seconds behind. Then 3rd and 19 seconds. On the sixth lap I passed Arty for 2nd and was 14 seconds behind Jeremy. The gap to Jeremy was still coming down, but soon Jeremy would respond. At the end of lap 7 it was 10 seconds. 7.5 seconds. 6 seconds, 1.5 seconds.
To get here I’d thrown caution to the wind to an extent. I’d never driven Thruxton so had no preconceptions about where one can pass. As such I was happy to drive around the outside of people through Church corner (150mph on the entry, flat out in 5th, scrubbing off 7mph in the corner), as well as anywhere else. Indeed on a few occasions I went round the outside of someone whilst they went around the outside of someone. Peter Bragg forced me onto the grass at 140mph on the first lap, but I still kept my foot in.
Jeremy was quick, but wasn’t confident enough to pass people around the outside like I was. But he was looking for that pass, and thus blocked my line around the outside. I had to wait until after Church to get a run on him, and was easily quicker on the ‘straights’ (partly due to less wing angle and partly due to more power from our Toyota engine), but I missed a shift and lost momentum in the heat of the moment. 
I knew the race must be nearly over, so I had no time to lose. As Jeremy hit the brakes for the final chicane, I waited. I aimed for the outside, and hit the brakes later than at any point in the race. I sailed around the outside of him, and so very nearly made the chicane. At any other circuit I’d have been fine using a bit of kerb to get away with my over enthusiasm, but at Thruxton they launch you into the air, which is what happened to me as I ran out of talent (or as Martin Brundle might say “Ambition overcame adhesion”); I clattered off one kerb (all four wheels in the air as captured on camera apparently), into a second kerb, and bounced my way back onto the circuit. Jeremy kept his head, kept out of my way and nipped back to cross the line 1.2 seconds ahead of me. I’d led for a little over 20 metres. Thankfully I didn’t hit Jeremy, which would have been the worst outcome – I apologised to him for my silliness as soon as I got out of the car.
I was cross with myself. I’d driven my little heart out, and thrown it away with a bumbled gear change and a rubbish outbraking manoeuvre. Only later on the lap did I guess, from the marshal’s and crowd’s reaction, that it had been a cracking motor race, and one that I should actually be proud of. Tony Davies, Monoposto’s quickest Welshman (I think) has described it as the best motor race he’s ever seen at any level, which is quite a compliment.
My best lap was 1m12.4, a smidgen under 3 seconds quicker than Jeremy managed in 2009 (1m15.3), and 1.3 seconds quicker than Jeremy managed this year (1m13.7). And my datalogger suggests that the ‘perfect’ laptime for me would have been 1m11.4, which isn’t slow I don’t think. The current F3 lap record is 1m06.8 and ClubF3 were doing 1m13’s a few years ago in damp conditions (but how damp is another matter). Next time we’ll take more wing off and go even faster.
Apologies to Andrew, Martin and Emma for not converting the pole into a win yet again. When is the driver contract up for renegotiation? 2 races, 2 poles, 13 points out of a possible 32… Racing employment isn’t looking too good for me anymore!
