In the thick of it.
This was my 4th or 5th time racing at Mildenhall as I have raced here in the V8 a few times before. I absolutely loved the track in the V8 so I am excited, but I do know that it will be completely different in the F1!
I lined up at the front of the yellows in Heat 1 and looked around at the rest of the grid, I realised how much smaller the track looked compared to when I was lined up in the V8s! As soon as the green flag dropped I could tell that something wasn’t right with my car. It wasn’t going into the bends properly and I struggled to get it around, then a few laps in my brake pedal was just going straight to the floor… no brakes! I managed to finish the race in 12th which I was quite pleased with considering that I had no brakes the whole race however, it meant that I didn’t qualify for the Final so I would be in the Consolation.
In the Consolation I started at the very back of all 9 yellow tops so the blues were straight on me from the word go! It is really difficult starting where I did because you just don’t get chance to get going until all the blues, reds and superstars have passed you. The car felt much better as I actually had brakes – thank God! and I was going a lot better than in my heat. Again I finished 12th which is a place so I was happy, but only 8 went through to the Final so I just missed out!
Going out for the GN….. carnage!
The Grand National was carnage! The F2 British Championship had caused lots of holes to be dug up on both bends making it very rough and meaning lots of popped tyres! A yellow top had gone into the fence which caused a yellow flag, they allowed the driver to get out but left his car there! I remember thinking “Well, that’s got my name on it!” Low and behold, a couple of laps later, I got put straight into the back of the parked car, bloody hell did that hurt! But I got my car straight into reverse and carried on. I finished the race without a place, but I was happy that I finished and was on pace towards the end of the race!
Afterwards I realised how much damage the car had got from hitting the parked car, my engine had come forward which caused the engine mounts to move, this then chopped through the clutch pipe meaning I had no clutch, so we had to load it into the truck with one of the track’s tractors.
Lots of work this week to get the car ready for Birmingham and Hednesford…. eww, tarmac!
Phoebe
Thanks for the pics… Dave Murray, Colin Casserley, Paul Greenwood, Carl Hesketh.
