Cadwell Park
28th September
Round 12/13

I have never driven the full circuit at Cadwell. I had thought about doing a test on the Friday but decided not, figuring that I already knew half the circuit and with the possibility of 4 races on Sunday I would learn the other half by the end of the day, if not before. On the Saturday night I walked around the bit I didn't know to get a feel for what the circuit does out in the countryside. Come practice I gingerly picked my way around, learning the circuit. To my surprise the Mountain wasn't second gear, it was third gear and the car could be thrown in quite hard. Then after that the next few corners became a blur of missed apexes and turning in points. I survived to the end of practice and couldn't wait to see how slow my times were. 1.46.81, a clear 10 seconds slower than the fastest man, meant there was plenty more speed to be found around here.

For the race I lined up 14th and I made a reasonable start. Around the first lap I nipped down the inside of Nick Brown on the brakes going into Mansfield. Starting the second lap I spot Steve Glasswell going slow and pulling off. As I turned into Charlie 1 I spot a nose cone out of the corner of my eye and then a split-second later something hits my car. The next thing I knew there was a car going over the top of me. The rear tyre clipped me on the helmet as it flew past. I go off the circuit onto the grass and I look across at the other car on the circuit. Nick Brown was in the middle of the circuit with his car minus a rear wheel. I look in my wing mirror expecting to see a wheel missing or at least bent. Everything was still attached and pointing the right way. I fired up the engine and toured around. The race had been red flagged.

Going back to the startline I checked the handling - seemed ok. I also checked I wasn't dropping any oil when I reformed up the grid. All systems were go. I was still 14th on the grid but with Steve not taking the start and I had unfortunately eliminated Nick in our collision, I was now effectively 12th. With no Nick Brown in front on the grid I made an average start (didn't lose any places) and with Phil going off at Barn and Tim Probert behind me in last place (what happened ?) I started the second lap in 10th place. Phil's car was parked (!) a bit precariously on the exit to Barn. and the yellow and black flag came out. We toured around at 50 mph in tight formation. As we rounded the next to last corner I started thinking "How do they signal the end of the yellow/black flag" and "would they warn us they've taken it in". I figured it would be removed at the start/finish so as we rounded the last corner and I built up some speed. Sure enough the flag had gone and the guys in front had figured the same as me (or perhaps they knew) but I managed to pull away from Jonathan Storer behind me. I gained a few places with people dropping out and I closed up on Warren Smith towards the end of the race to finish 8th.

Climbing out of the car I could feel my neck hurting and it was painful to push the car. There was a dirty big tyre mark on the bodywork and my helmet but nothing looked broken.

The first part of the final I cant remember (I must write up these thing after the race although I do have the excuse of going straight on holiday after the race. Check out Mike Jenvey's site if you want to know what happened (well what happened at the front anyway...))

The final was not long so we just had enough time to fuel up the car. I noticed a pattern affect on my helmet, possibly where it was cracked. I drove the final without the adrenaline of the heat and with a stiff neck I was glad it was red flagged after 3 laps. I finished flat last.

I had qualified for the heat in 6th place with the 21st fastest time of 1:43.88, a bit of an improvement over the morning but still 6 seconds off the fastest lap so far. There was easily another second to come off that time by just keeping my foot on the gas through Coppice and into Charlies 1 - would put me well in contention at the front. But alas I decided not to. With my neck quite stiff and a questionably helmet I decided to call it a day. Shame really but Cadwell had whetted my appetite as being a real testing/drivers circuit. I encourage anyone to go race on it.