Porsche 944 S – Race 2 – Silverstone national

Race 2. It is amazing how different you feel for the second one – much more calm and relaxed as you vaguely know what’s going to happen (and Silverstone is a bit closer too). I started this race though (which we’ll get to later).

Car updates

After losing the front bumper at the first race we had that reapplied and the tow eye hook put on properly (well, we hope so anyway).

Apart from that, there’s not much to report on the car as there wasn’t a long gap. Once thing we did change (and created a lot of sweat doing) was the wheels before the start of practice. We did have some 17″ wheels on with big tyres and felt that we were struggling for pace. Add to that Kev from EMC and few others said we would be faster on the original 15″s so the went back on. They are on slightly more track as opposed to race tyres (Yoko AD08s instead of AO48s) though, which means they may have less grip as tyres as well as size.

Qualifying

Adrian started the qualifying and did well, noting that Brooklands was a little slippy feeling but generally the car felt good – less grip as expected but better pick up and acceleration. After all, it’s not just the smaller wheels that can accelerate faster, but they are lighter and that’s also less unsprung weight. I went out and also had two decent laps but then there was a big crash right in front of me (queue a big lockup and narrow avoidance of the crash!) that red flagged the session. Doesn’t look as scary from the car below but it was! So not much practice for me then or fast laps!

Race!

Always a giggle as I was going to start the race (first ever time) and I was nervous as hell! We were very delayed due to a Caterham making a big impact with the wall. Cue some car cutting and air ambulance and we could get underway. The guy was OK, few bits broken though!

An OK start for us ensued but due to not enough practice on the track my laps weren’t what they should of been – as we can see I was a good 2 and a bit seconds quicker by the end than the start and that would of made us much more competitive. Our next track though is Anglesey – another one that we haven’t done before and as a result I don’t expect to be much different apart from we have a test day the day before which is exciting! Can actually learn the track more.

Turn by turn

As always, a bit of a look at the track and corners:

OK so we’re flying along the pit straight and keeping over to the left for the first corner.

Copse: Fast 4th gear right hander. One of the fastest and ballsiest corner in the UK I believe. Taking too much speed into this corner of course a bad idea as we saw some of the Jags go off but too little and you can lose tonnes of time all the way to Becketts. Keep left and turn before you feel like you should getting to the apex early and then using the width on exit. Braking too early can also lose a lot time here.

Maggotts and Becketts: You can’t separate these two corners. The entrance to Becketts is Maggots itself. There’s a couple of lines. One is to turn at full power through Maggotts and break in a straight line to the turn for Becketts. This is the one I did as it was a touch simpler to remember! Keeping the line and turn in right though to not run out of track exiting Becketts is important, especially to get enough power for the long club straight.

Brooklands: This is a 3rd gear left hander and we found it to be lacking quite a lot of grip it felt very slippy. Once you knew this though going reasonably deep to get a deeper apex and this is the way to maintain as much speed as possible. Adrian took this in 4th and then changed to 3rd just before Luffield as another way.

Luffield: Don’t accelerate too much out of Brooklands or you’ll run out of road for this tight corner. I kept it tight and then as soon as it felt right piled on the power for the pit straight and to go through Woodcote.

Woodcote: Not sure this is a corner. You’re just powering down the straight out of Luffield!