A combination of factors, really..

Concentration. It's possibly the single most important skill one needs to race a car effectively. If you think you concentrate when you drive to work in the morning, think again. Most drivers are what's known as unconsciously competent (yes, I know, there are quite a bunch that are just plain unconscious too). This means they can drive without really thinking about it.


Driving at high speed around a race track requires an altogether different level of concentration, to the extent that I can often not remember anything about a race other than what happened immediately around me. Focus is everything. Without it, you simply do not go fast. Drivers call it their "groove". Once you have managed to line your brain up for the race, you are in your groove. 


This is important, especially in places like Turn 4 at Killarney, also known as Malmsbury Sweep. It's a scary place. On paper it looks fairly benign. It's a long sweeping right hander with a double apex. Get your turn-in right, hit the first apex and you should be able to hit the second apex dead on without moving the steering wheel at all. So what's the problem? It's the exit that is the issue. A lapse of concentration at the start of the corner with be punished at the exit. If you overcook the entry and spin off around the first apex you are ok as there is plenty of speed arresting, mole hill studded sand to stop you pretty smartly. You are also still fairly ok if you come off around the second apex. The real trouble is if you manage to make the first and second apex, but then lose it on the exit, which is more common. You see, the exit to Malmsbury is also where the tunnel under the track is located. This necessitates a narrowing of the run off areas and essentially creates a funnel of tyre walls leading onto the back straight. Your chances of hitting something unforgiving on either side of the track is exceptionally high if you muck up the exit. 

Malmsbury Sweep with the "funnel" effect at the exit

To make matters worse, the sweeping nature of the corner makes Malmsbury the fastest corner on the track. I usually enter the corner at around 140km/h and exit at around 165km/h. History is speckled with bum puckering crashes at Malmsbury. Bottom line is, you treat turn 4 with the utmost respect and you concentrate hard.

Which is what I neglected to do during the Saturday practice before race weekend. Reality has this habit of stepping in with it's swift sobering slap when you start getting cocky. I was starting to get cocky, drifting the car out of corners, squirming it into corners, it was feeling good. I thought I was getting the track nailed. So it should have been no surprise. I cut into turn 4 right on the limit, clipped the first apex fractionally late. The meant a little correction for the second apex which upset the car slightly. No matter, second apex clipped and fully onto the loud pedal. A glance at the speedo showed 168km/h. The tail was feeling a little loose, but that was ok, there is a little bit of curb to run up on at the exit. Problem is that the little bit of curb runs out soon after the exit. I ran up the curb with the rear of the car and then the curb ran out. After that there just sand, which offers not grip. The tail twitched left, which I instinctively corrected for. Mistake number one. By the time I had corrected for the rear wheel that had been on the sand, it was back on the tar. My not-required correction caused the tail to swing out right, again I corrected. Mistake number two. I over corrected. The car did a complete 360 at around 160km/h. Things happen very fast at that speed, but thankfully my skid pan training come into play and I had my foot on the clutch as the spin started. I ended up facing down the back straight directly in the middle of the funnel. The car was still moving, so I hooked third and shot off down the track. By the time I rounded turn 5 and headed into pit lane the adrenalin kick was in full swing. I could taste metal.

I pulled up in the pit and climbed out. Thankfully it was a quiet day and there were few spectators. Steve wandered over as I clung to the garage support wondering why my legs were so wobbly. He'd been working on his car in his garage and had heard the commotion. "Enjoy your spin" he asked, "I was waiting for the bang" he added encouragingly. Craig, who had come to spectate the day, also wandered up. He was blissfully unaware of the action as he had been on the main straight side of the track. We went over to take a look at the tyre marks. The rear of the car had missed the right hand side tyre wall by less than a metre! Talk about guardian angels!

So it was with this reality slap fresh in my mind that I packed my car ready for race day early on Saturday morning. The fact that is was pouring with rain and that I had a sinus headache from hell did not help my mood. Anyway, the forecast was for clearing showers and we were racing at midday so it should be fine. I donned my helmet and set off for the track.


Luckily I managed to skirt around the edge of the rain clouds and arrived mostly dry if somewhat frozen. Open top sports cars in Cape Town winter are a blast. It was around 8am and most folks were conspicuous by their absence. Louis was busy unloading his Lola T212 as was Godfrey, but there were few other Sports & GT folk around. I headed off to scrutineer. By the time I arrived back at the pit, Paul and his GT40 had arrived. He unpacked his massive set of wet tyres. We discussed the weather for a bit when the heavens opened and rain pelted down. We went off in search of coffee. Qualifying was at 9:30am and slowly the S&GT crowd filled out. The rain had stopped, but the track was still very wet. Craig arrived minutes before we were due to go out in his Type 5 sporting a shiny new body and colour scheme. A trip to the weigh bridge will reveal a 30kg weight saving over his old body, dropping his car just under the 700kg point. He scuttled off to scrutineer as we lined up. I opted for a slot near the back since I only had semi slick tyres for my car. Semi's are basically slightly harder compound slick tyres with shallow groves cut into them. The groves are mostly cosmetic and, at best, a mere nod towards wet usage. It was a good call. I tip toed around the track. With 390Nm on tap low down the curve it was ridiculously easy to step the rear out in the corners. Coming down the main straight I was treated to a fine pirouette by Paul's GT40 as he did a 720 into turn 1. It was hardly qualifying with virtually everyone having some kind of "excitement" during the session.


Back in the pits Craig set about tracking down the source of a top end misfire as I nursed my worsening headache. He quickly diagnosed a faultily ignitor and we headed to the clubhouse for the ritualistic egg and bacon roll. We only raced at 12:00 pm so had some time to kill. The weather taunted drivers as the rain and sun fought for supremacy. Wheels where swapped and swapped again until eventually around 11:30 the sun came out to stay. The track was drying and lap times were coming down. We were in for a decent race after all. 


Our race was finally called and we rolled out to form up on the holding grid. I caused a bit of chaos by parking up in the wrong slot forcing Paul to take my slot two places up. I could have sworn I was in the right place. Anyway, we quickly sorted out the placings once on the track and duly lined up for the rolling start. The lights went out and the race was on. Although my brain appeared to have other ideas. My headache, which I was later to discover was the start of a bout of flu, was seriously impeding my ability to concentrate. I have already eluded to the importance of being able to concentrate during a race. It quickly became apparently that I was not really in the race at all. Try as I might I was unable to break the 1:30 barrier. Brake makers were off and lines were all over the place. I was scarcely able to hold off the two class E cars and the end of the race could not come quickly enough. It was not enjoyable at all. My average lap time was a full ten seconds slower than my best ever time. Not an ideal result. 


Back in the garages I commiserated with Paul. I had managed to beat Paul in the end, but only because he had run out of petrol. Craig, on the other hand, had come perilously close to lapping me and had taken the win in Class D. Theories where presented covering all possible excuses for my lacklustre performance, but in the end it was simple. My mojo was missing. Ah well, we had a couple of hours until the next race, maybe lunch would bring it back.


It didn't. Race two was a factionally faster version of race 1 with me clocking a best lap in the 1:27's. Not exactly stellar. We were not amused. By this time my throbbing head coupled with my dire performance had eroded any vestiges of the fun factor for the day. Not even my chance second placing in Class D could lift the day. I do prefer to achieve results by skill rather than other's mechanical misfortune. Both Hennie and Steve had suffered punctures resulting in them only completing once race each.


It was time to call it quits so I packed up my goodies, bid the others farewell and headed home. 

A grumpy driver heading off into the sunset

Sunday morning brought a gloriously sunny day and shone a good deal of light on the events of the previous day. I had full blown flu and felt like somebody had stuffed my head with cotton wool while I was asleep. Chats with other drivers yielded sage nods and stories of similar illness induced concentration lapses. 


It just goes to show how important a fit mind and body is to any sport that requires a high degree of concentration. There is a lesson in that for sure.

Still, the Type 6 has contended and completed every race of the season so far, so while the driver might not have been holding up his end of the bargain, the car certainly was.

Sadly, also due to a lapse in concentration, I forgot to charge the camera so there is thankfully no video of me driving Miss Daisy around the track. 


We race again on the 7th of July. I seriously plan to be back on form by then and ready to kick some Harper butt!

Spin doctors

I'd like to say that the morning of our fourth regional race day dawned crisp and clear, but that would be considerably more than poetic license. I woke around 5am to the pitter patter of rain drops. There was a strong compulsion to stay in bed, but I managed to fight it off and got myself going. Thankfully Cape Town is built on the confluence of around 4 weather systems so the one I was experiencing at home was entirely different to the one at the track a mere 20 odd kilometres away. Something to do with the mountain people say.

Table Mountain trying to hide behind a rain cloud

At any rate, I arrived at the track to crisp clear air and blue skies. More importantly the track was dry and clean. The clean bit, it turns out, is quite important. You see, we had had the mother of all rain storms the previous couple of days and this had effectively served to wash the track surface. I though this was quite a good thing. Surely a clean track is a happy track. Actually, it seems a clean track is a slippery track. But more of that later.

I pulled into my pit bay next to Paul's GT40 and set about getting the documentation sorted out for the day. Scrutineering passed without incident and it was time for coffee and a catch up. Ant in the Turbo Type 5 was present as was Haydn in the red supercharged Type 5. Today would be his last race in Fine Cars before he upped the stakes and joined us in Sports & GT's. Conspicuous by his absence was Craig who was busy making a new light weight body for his car. He tends to follow the Colin Chapman approach of "adding lightness" to the problem of going faster. Myself, I tend more towards the American view of adding cubic inches rather. Craig had promised to bring his pom-poms and come and cheer-lead for us later in the morning. 

I stood for a while and chatted to Paul about his GT40. It's a wonderful machine and he has been getting steadily faster all season. Tweaks to his brakes coupled with more confidence had seen him come very close to the 1:24 Class D barrier last race day. We chatted about breaking out since I had snuck in a 1:23 during our track test the previous week. We both decided that sandbagging would be a good idea lest any of us end up in Class C.

Qualifying was called and we all hustled to the grid to get a feel for the track surface we would be playing on for the day. It still amazes me how different the track can be from race to race. There were only 25 competitors entered in Sports & GT's, a rather depleted field with many folks away, taking advantage of the short three day week we had just had. I lined up behind Paul and we headed out. The track was cold and seemed to be a little more slippery than usual. Still, with the tyres warmed up I managed to pass Paul and get in a couple of quick laps before the front runners started lapping me. At this point clear track is a thing of the past so I pulled into pit lane behind Steve Humble's Mallock which had suspicious wisps of steam coming from the engine area.

Back in the pits Paul seemed quite happy with his performance, he had put in a concerted effort just after I had passed him and was feeling good about qualifying high up. Thus, it was quite a shock to him when he discovered he had qualified second last...in Class C. The silly chap had posted a cracking 1:23:3 instantly punting him up to Class C. He grumbled a bit, but I think he was secretly quite chuffed, as well he should be.

This, rather surprisingly, left me on pole for Class D with Hennie and Martin breathing down my neck. My car was now feeling fantastic. The brakes were working exceptionally well and my new approach to the gears seemed to be having the desired effect. Ant was still plagued by his miss fire from last week so had qualified second last in the field and was considering sitting things out.  

About this time Craig and the crew arrived and he set about assisting Ant in sourcing a new set of plug leads which cured the miss fire. This effectively meant I now had Hennie, Martin and Ant breathing down my neck for turn 1. 

Ant in full race trim

The day was warming up nicely as race 1 was called. We rolled out on our usual warm up form up sequence, and I made sure I was close behind the car in front of me when the lights went out. Twenty five cars thundered into turn 1 and I managed to keep my place fending off a serious attack from Hennie. Turn 2 was much of the same, but then as I blocked Martin on the outside both Hennie and Ant shot past on the inside down to turn 3. "The buggers" I thought and set off in hot pursuit. The field stretched out and they left me a couple of car lengths back. Finally I managed to get my rhythm going and started to reel them in. Because they were battling each other they were slowing down allowing me to catch up. I bided my time. It was bound to happen. Hammering into turn 4 Ant spun after the first apex. He did a graceful pirouette off to the inside and neatly reversed back across the track. This required Hennie, who was close behind, to spear off into the farmlands of turn 4 to miss the reversing Harper. I sailed passed the mayhem and set about putting as much time between them and myself as possible. 

We would later discover that Ant had done slight damage to his right rear wheel, giving it some negative toe, which resulted in him spinning off again later and also adding his own brand of "lightness" to the front of his car by removing sections of the fibreglass nose.

Hennie, thankfully, remained a slightly growing silver dot in my mirrors while I rather surprisingly passed Paul with ease on the back straight of the final lap. The race ended with me managing to secure the win in Class D. It was only when we pulled into the post race holding area that I noticed a couple of cars missing and some others sporting trendy new paint markings. Seems the racing had been quite close, and possibly a bit too close in cases. Eric's rotary Lotus 23 was parked up on the exit of turn 5 looking a little worse for wear after a coming together with a Porsche. While a couple of other heated discussions were on the go regarding rights of way etc. Paul had some fetching Mallock orange down the side of his car too. Steve had touched him while trying to avoid a Lotus during a lapping manoeuvre, in the process folding Pauls mirror back. This left Paul with a serious blind spot, not difficult with a GT40,  and together with a gear selection problem had seen him call things off and coasting home.

I arrived back in the pits to find Ant busy shovelling sand out of the front of his nose cone. The ever useful duct tape was employed and he pronounced his car fit to race. No one had noticed the odd toe out of the rear drivers side wheel at this point. While we headed over to the clubhouse for some lunch Steve decided to change the head gasket on his Mallock. Its amazing what some guys can do in the couple of hours between races.

I had drawn third on the grid for the second race so would be starting behind Martin with Hennie next to me. Ant and Paul would bring up the rear of Class C ahead of us. You could have covered all five cars with a dainty hanky. We were that close. A mere 3 tenths of a second covered all five drivers. This was going to be a close one. Provided everyone stayed on the black stuff of course. I was determined to repeat my race 1 performance and was glued to Martin's rear as the light went out. I knew I could out drag the two Lotii on the straights, but the twisties were a different matter. I bolted ahead of Hennie into turn 1, but he emerged next to me on the exit. I out dragged him into turn 2, but was slightly distracted by the odd snaking actions of Ant ahead of me. Hennie managed to sneak passed me and then, narrowly missing Ant, dived passed him too into turn 3. Something was not right with Ant's car and as I went wide to pass him on the outside of turn three he slowed to pull off, a victim of the ragged handling induced by the rear wheel toe out.  

The two Lotii were now a way down the track and I set off after them. A lap later I had managed to catch up and I passed Hennie on the main straight only to be passed by him again coming out of turn 2. I pulled out to pass him again on the back straight, but almost collected a slow moving Porsche on the right of the track. This was not going to work, I needed a better plan. About this time we were joined by Arno who had spun in turn 2 and for a couple of laps he mixed things up with us until he passed Martin and made a break for it down the back straight. 

By this time I had figured that the only way to stay ahead of these two was to pass them on the back straight and make up as much time on the front straight so that I could stay ahead in the twisty bits. I figured that as long as I could get to the back straight again ahead I would be able to pull out a lead and be safe. As Arno passed Martin going into turn 4 I saw my chance, we were all bunched up and as we exited turn 4 I unleashed the V8 and swallowed Hennie whole. Martin has a turbo rotary in his Lotus so was having none of that, but I did manage to dispatch him down the main straight and slithered into turn 1 on the hairy limit almost throwing it all away mid corner. Still, they were both behind me which is what counted. Now to keep it that way. I hauled the car around the back of the circuit braking as late as I dared and powering on as early as I could. I made it to the start of the back straight in front and the rest was history. Once I had the two straights to my disposal I managed to put a good number of car lengths between us. 

I could now see Paul's GT40 ahead and I seemed to be catching him. New target then and I set my sights on his twin tail pipes in the distance. 

The rest of the race was spent chipping away at his lead. I realised that I could out brake him into the fast corners and was gathering much distance on him into turn 5 and 1. But I was running out of laps. On the last lap we entered the back straight a couple of car lengths apart. I cooked up a crazy plan to out brake him into turn 5 and then sprint to the line ahead of him. In the spit second it took to formulate the plan it seemed perfect. I drifted towards the inside of the track and waited for his brake lights. Once they came on I waited some more and then climbed onto my brakes and headed for the inside of the corner. "Fortune favours the brave" rang through my mind. Turns out I waited a little to long. The cliche says nothing about the timing of the brave. Thankfully Paul is a gentleman of a driver and saw me coming.

I hit the corner way too fast and vainly tried to get my tyres to both steer and stop beyond their limits at the same time. I failed, losing the rear, catching it again, losing it again and ending up facing the corner viewing things from the curb. I swear Paul waved as he shot past. Suddenly I thought about Hennie who could not be far behind. Paul was Class C, but Hennie was Class D. I would have thrown the Class D win away if he passed me now. I hooked first and skidded back onto the track the engine bouncing off the limiter, hooking second just left the rear wheels spinning and finally third got me going again. I crossed the line to take the win in Class D berating myself for almost tossing it away. In the post race holding area I went over and apologised to Paul for almost taking him out.  He told me that he had seen me coming and was wondering how he was going to keep me behind him until he heard the screeching of tyres. Then he figured he just needed to stay out of the way and I would do the rest for him. How right he had been. 

Anyway, it had been a good days racing, with my first outright class win where I had actually passed people and beaten them as opposed to winning because there was nobody else in the class. I was happy with the car and now knew for sure that I could not brake at the 50m marker on the back straight. On the up side I did manage to record my highest ever top speed, 221km/h. Not surprisingly it was going into turn 5 on the last lap of the race.

A sweet victory at last

Unfortunately I did not have the camera mounted for race 1, but the clip for race 2 can be viewed from the link below. The middle bit is a little boring, but the finale is worth the wait.

5th May 2012 - 4th Regional - Race 2

One twenty one

Goals. Good things to have in life. Not something that should define ones life particularly, but good none the less. I tend more towards one having a direction in life. Goals can then be useful to make sure you keep heading in the right direction.


One of the numerous self help authors (I forget which one) once said that your goals need to be achievable and realistic else they tend to cause anxiety and depression. The depression I guess is owing to the continual missing of said unrealistic goals.


I tend to have many small goals that get modified as things change or they are achieved. One such goal was to have brakes that were up to the demands of racing. A goal that was recently achieved by Craig. A second goals was to not arrive at the next race meeting with untested brakes. Another one that was recently achieved.


A third goals was to go faster. We are talking lap times here, not outright speed. This too was recently achieved.


Bit of a bumper week when it comes to achieving goals you might say. 


Here's what happened.


Craig, been the jolly nice chap that he is, offered to spread some of his considerable racing skill and experience around by taking us on track for one on one training sessions in our cars. The plan was to book the track for a couple of hours. He would then set a bench mark time in our cars with us as passengers. We would watch closely the lines and driving style during the benchmarking and then spend some time trying to emulate this on our own. He would later check back with us, this time as a passenger, to see how we were progressing. 


I was first up. My brakes had finally been sorted and this would be the first real speed test. We strapped in and Craig caressed and slid my car around the track to yield a number of 1:24 laps culminating in a 1:23.646. A time that would have car and driver bumped up to Class C had this been a race day. Luckily in race conditions one seldom has the entire track to oneself and times like these are unlikely...hopefully. Anyway, it was Craig driving not me, so I was worried little.


Now it was my turn. I had been furiously taking mental notes as I watched Craig driving. First off, he was braking much later than I had been. I put this down to the now much improved brakes. Possibly more telling was that he was driving the entire track in a higher gear than I usually do. Where I had been hooking third to take corners, he was staying in fourth. This resulted in less gear changes and, significantly, less power induced oversteer out of corners. The torque of the V8 combined with the relative lightness of the car made this approach both smooth and quick.


I was keen to try.


It took a couple of laps to get used to not changing gears as I had before and then a few more laps to get used to the fact that the brakes now actually stopped the car pretty well. I was braking later and later into the scary turn 5 at the end of the back straight. It was time to push the limits.


Pushing the limits in a race car results in a somewhat predictable outcome. You tend to spin. Craig had told us to find the limit then dial it back to 99.95%. Percentages have never been my strong suite.


I did manage to find the limit, three times actually. Twice in turn 1 and once in the notoriously difficult (for me anyway) turn 2. This is all part of the process, however.


It was the best fun I had had in the car to date. I could dive into corners with confidence and slide the car out the other side with ease now that I was not over powering the rear wheels with too low a gear. The laps were feeling quick, if maybe a bit inconsistent.


Pulling into the pits to let driver and car cool down a bit produced an opportunity to check the laps times. I have a nice little bit of software that runs on my phone and connects to a high accuracy external GPS mounted on the roll bar. You start the software up and put the phone in your pocket. It then times each lap as well as eleven sectors I have setup around the track. It's very accurate, coming to within one hundredth of a second of the official lap timing transponders we use on race day.


My times proved to be both surprising and erratic. The erratic part was understandable given all the "finding the limits" I was doing. The surprising bit was, well, surprising. Amongst the 1:30's and other assorted spin induced slow laps were a number of 1:24's. I was suitably chuffed. But then there was one that stood out. The software actually highlights it in green so that you don't miss it. It was a 1:23.493. Faster than the bench mark Craig had set.

Results of training day

 As they say in the classics, "that is a result!"


Which kind of brings us to the whole goal thing again. One of the goals that was achieved on the day was the going faster one. I had a goal of doing 1:25's in the car by the end of the season. I had maybe underestimated the car's abilities somewhat. A 1:23 was pretty much a shattering of said goal. 


Of course, this kind of goal is an ongoing one and needs to be re-calibrated when its met. But what was next?


Well, this was made fairly easy by my nifty bit of software. It has a feature that calculates a best theoretical lap by adding together all the best sector times from all the laps to create a "perfect" lap from the session.


This time is displayed with a T next to it. If you have not already glanced up at the screen shot above, I can tell you that the next goal in the "going faster" category is 1:21.401.


To put this in perspective, that's near the top end of Class C. A somewhat rarified space normally populated by racing machinery of german descent.


That's a little scary, but testimony to the level of car that Craig has built.


Of course this is all much easier to achieve when one has the racetrack all to oneself and lots of laps at hand. Our races are only ten laps and are pretty busy in the Class D bit of the field.


We race on the 5th May. Tune in thereafter to see if any of this transfers to the actual race environment. I'm really hoping it will, but then I don't really want to break out of Class D just yet. Fine line? Maybe, maybe not. At least I now know where the problem lies if I fail to achieve this particular goal.

On going and stopping

Race cars have two main purposes in life. One is to go as fast as possible and the other is to stop as quickly as possible. There is also a handling thing, but we will gloss over that for now since it would dilute my point here.

Diving into turn 5. Photo courtesy of Quintin Smit.

The Harper Type 6 has no issues with going fast. At 850kg and 205kw you can do the sums, but to help you out, that gives a power to weight ratio of 252 Watts/kg, close to a Porsche GT2. Quick it certainly is. Of course it could be, and will be, quicker later on, but for now it does of fine job of scaring the willies out of me on the back straight.


What it is not so good at right now is the stopping bit. Now, this is no real fault of the car. No, we decided to fiddle with the brakes. The obvious question of course is why, to which the simple answer is "they were, quite frankly, crap for racing". Even Craig was less than impressed on driving the car at speed a while back.


In actual fact the brakes originally worked well, perhaps too well. The car was fitted with boosted brakes. The disks are large 275mm vented jobs off the Toyota RunX and when boosted could lock all four wheels up with ease. This made driving fast a little tricky since there was not a whole lot of feedback prior to the afore mentioned lock up. Cars don't steer well on locked wheels, in fact they don't steer at all, and instantly convert driver into passenger. Not a great scenario when you are pretending to be a race driver. Somehow "race passenger" does not have the same cool ring. But I digress.


I said we fiddled. We removed the booster for a whole lot of good reasons and the car was faster, well actually I was faster with the car since I could now brake with more confidence and hence later. But the brakes required inordinate amounts of pedal pressure. Leverage ratio was diagnosed as the problem here. The pedal operates a shaft since the master cylinder is offset to the centre of the car for space reasons. This shaft creates the leverage to transfer the pedal pressure to the master cylinder and hence the brake pads. A new shaft was made with adjustable leverage, the master cylinder was dropped in line with the actuator shaft and everything was generally beefed up. The brakes felt infinitely better, maybe a little spongy, but my right leg was very happy with the improvement. 

Now much stronger and lower MC location. Previous holes were for the late booster.

So, it was for the second time in a row that I arrived, bright eyed and bushy tailed, at race day with untested brakes. I was starting to get used to testing out new developments during qualifying. Four Harpers where running again, Craig in his orange "original", Ant in the Turbo dragon (it spits flames!), Haydn in the supercharged, and by far best looking, Harper and me in, what the kids have nick named, Toothless (after the night fury dragon from the Train your dragon movie). Well at least I hope that's were it comes from and is not related to my driving style!


The Sports and GT field was a little thin. Around 25 cars were entered, way down from the 38 at our previous race meeting. It is a busy time of the year with Easter and all, but the consensus along pit lane was that is was the impending rain that had scared folks off. Especially the ones who race on slicks.


We were racing in a late slot so qualifying was at a leisurely 9:30am. Craig opted for an even later start and was due to join us around 10am. We were all casually getting dressed and ready when the PA system surprised us and announced we were on 15 minutes early. This was to become a bit of a trend for the day.


Mass panic ensued as cars bearing half dressed drivers burst forth onto the holding grid. The marshal blew his whistle for us to leave and more chaos ensued as drivers feverishly tried to attached helmets and gloves while trying to maintain their place in the first come first serve qualifying grid. Eventually we all ended up on the track. The Sports and GT folks are generally a considerate bunch with the quali grid being "understood" to go on a "fastest first" basis allowing the fast classes to qualify together. However, with the rather abrupt start, the field was wonderfully mixed, making for some really interesting action as sub 1:20 cars who had been sitting with tyre warmers humming away all morning mixed with slower folk on ice cold rubber. In the end nothing serious happened, but the session only lasted 5 laps and a clear lap was as scarce as the preverbal rocking horse poo. 


I was not particularly phased by all this since my primary goal was to feel out the new brake system. Things were looking, or actually feeling, good. The pedal pressure was now matching the expected rate of deceleration and the car was feeling stable under hard braking. The pedal was a bit more spongy, but the car was certainly stopping consistently. 


This was a good thing! 


Back in the pits it was good to see Craig had decided to roll in, not only because he's a nice chap and fun to have around, but also since this meant he would be bringing up the rear of Class D and not me for a change.


We grabbed some coffee and stood around discussing the possible cause of the spongy pedal. Craig had taken the entire brake system apart a couple of time in search of the cause, but to no avail. Theories were floated and discounted in vast number until we decided we had no idea and headed off for a bacon and egg roll breakfast. 


Race one was called 45 minutes early. We had learnt from the morning qualifying session and were all ready in time. Management was furiously trying to move things up to miss the forecasted lunch time rain showers. We were not particularly concerned about the rain, its actually quite fun racing in the wet, but apparently the guys that race on two wheels don't have quite the same view. 


The race proceeded without much excitement while I tried to adjust to the new brakes. The track was a bit cold and slippery. My brake markers from the last race were all wrong with the now better brakes and I found myself braking too early for the first couple of laps. This saw me pretty much out on my own at the back of Class D. Finally towards the end of the race I started to get the hang of things and managed to squeeze out a 1:25.6, my fastest lap ever.


Back in the pits drivers were all abuzz with excitement. Slippery track aside everyone had had a good race. 

Ant and Craig mixing it up with the GT3's. Photo courtesy of Quintin Smit

All, that is, except for Ant who had broken a drive shaft. Tools emerged and willing hands appeared resulting in the quickest removal of a drive shaft I have even seen. It was summarily dispatched for repairs.


Lap times would later confirm things, with virtually everyone posting their best lap times to date. Sadly, or not, for some this meant they broke the hallowed 1:24 barrier and were summarily shunted upward into Class C for the rest of the season. We lost both the leading Porsche drivers in this way thereby shrinking Class D regulars down to myself, Craig, Hennie in his blistering Lotus 7, Martin in his screaming rotary 7 and Paul in the grand (and indecently fast) GT40. I might even score a couple of point this season if things carry on this way.


We all stood around chatting, kicking tyres and listening to the tick of cooling engines until hunger drove us to the clubhouse for lunch.


We now had a rather drawn out wait until a scheduled 4:30pm for our next race.


After the lunch break the clouds that had until then been hanging around and taunting the organisers finally decided to join the party and gently sprinkled the track with just enough wetness to really irritate those trying to decided which tyres to use.


The Fine Cars race after lunch, and on said damp track, was carnage with some seriously shortened versions of the cars returning on flatbeds after the race. The bikes who ran a bit later miraculously missed the isolated showers and had a pretty dry track, much to the joy of the riders.


As expected our second race was called early. Craig and I had bled my brakes again just for the hell of it and predictably produced a no firmer pedal. Ant's newly welded up drive shaft had also arrived during the down time and a reverse of the disassembly process produced a running car in record time. I swear Ant works on his car in his dreams at night. He could put some of the F1 crews to shame, but then he does tend to take his car apart quite often. 


Rain had fallen just prior to our race being called which left Paul and his 500hp of slick tyres sitting things out. In typical Cape Town style the sun broke through as we sat on the grid waiting to start. I had drawn second on grid in Class D for this race so was keen to try and keep a respectable place in the field, buoyed of course by my just achieved fastest lap.


This was not to be.


The lights went out and turn one loomed large and .... oddly shrouded in a cloud of dust. Mike in his Nardini was doing a fine impression of a farm implement on the inside of the corner while a Porsche was trying to outdo him on the outside of the corner. 


One thing you don't really want on the first corner of the race is a lack of visibility. I plunged into the cloud of dust praying feverishly that everyone else was doing the same and facing the same direction. Brake lights loomed very large and bright in front of me as I almost rear ended Martin in his Lotus. It would have been just revenge for him punting me last race day, but that  would really have been childish and expensive so I jump hard on my squishy pedal. I was vaguely aware of a black Porsche spinning off to the right and the rest of the field filing through past me on the left. By the time we all emerged from the dust cloud Martin, myself and the Porsche were virtually last. The Porsche quickly rectified the situation for himself, however Martin and I then proceeded to have a nice little battle for a couple of laps. He's normally much quicker then me so I was wondering why I was catching him. I finally concluded it must be my sudden new found driving skill and eventually blasted past him on the back straight. He disappeared into the distance behind me. Of course, I was to discover later that he had opted for a set of intermediates thinking it might rain and was being heavily penalised for his choice with his rotary powered 7 trying desperately to exit every corner in reverse. I do so despise reality some times.

Me about to subdue Martin for the final time. Photo courtesy of Quintin Smit

Once I was past Martin there was no one in sight ahead of me. Memories of my days in Class E flooded back as I circulated all alone in no mans land. Still, it was a good time to try some new lines and wave to the family who were watching in the stands. The race ended without incident or excitement and yielded a couple of 1:26's. Not as good as race 1, but still decent times.


Craig had turned out another fastest lap leaving him just 4 tenths shy of the all important 1:24 Class D barrier. With the two Porsches having been evicted up to Class C his times now put him at the sharp end with Hennie and Paul. 


My car goes back to the doctor again this week to finally remove the sponge from the brake system after which I seriously plan to go and give them all a flippen good hiding.


Famous last words!


Next race is scheduled for 5th of May and if the current Cape Town weather cycle remains (hot weekdays, rainy weekends)  we should be racing in the rain. Bring it on!


The rather mundane race videos are available on the links below for those interested.


April 14 Sports & GT - Race 1

April 14 Sports & GT - Race 2

Be careful what you ask for

Race day again! They were coming thick and fast at the start of the season, but there were no complaints from me. The previous Monday had seen us on the track doing some testing on three of the cars. Haydn was having some overheating issues when his car was being driven in anger and Craig had just completed a complete rebuild of his pedals. I was primarily there to try and sort out my brake bias. 

Our race weekend playground

After a couple of hot laps I had mostly got things balanced, but was still locking the brakes up with ease going into fast corners. At least now I was locking up all four wheels instead of just the front ones. 


Just before the hour session ended I convinced Craig to take my car for a spin. I hopped in to the passenger seat and was treated to a exceptionally fine display of driving skill. The boy has talent that's for sure! He managed to drift the car effortlessly out of corners and drove on the limit almost all of the time. This in a car he had only ever driven once before on the track.
We arrived back in the pits and Craig climbed out declaring my brakes crap and the suspension too soft. Ah well, that's why I was so slow! Of course, I knew that!


There is an old adage in racing, not only motor racing, that says "never make major changes just before a race". So with this ringing loudly in my ears I arrived at the track on race day sporting a new stiffer set of springs and a brake system minus the booster. I had collected the car the previous evening so to all intents and purposes I might as well have been driving a new car. Qualifying was going to be a "seeing if the mods have worked" kind of affair. I hoped no expensive Porsches were near me when I came out of turn 5 backwards...


As it turned out, qualifying was not that bad. I managed to keep pointing forward and ended up third on the grid in Class D behind Hennie in his Seven and Paul's GT40. 


The race start was called and we rounded turn 5 and formed up for the rolling start. I had the GT40 directly in front of me and Matthew's GT3 next to me. The lights went off and 38 cars roared into turn 1. 


At this point I should recall for you a comment I made some time back about wanting to be in the mix of things. I had lamented the fact that my days in Class E had been fun, but rather lonely, as I often circulated on my own. I was about to experience the effects of close racing first hand.


Turn 2 is quite tricky. Its virtually a hairpin, but has a wide sweep so can be taken quite fast when your tyres are warm. However, being only the second corner of the race most folks' tyres were still cold. Add to the mix a car that was starting to dump its entire oil load due to a failing oil cooler line and things are bound to go pear shaped.


The first warning I had was the sound of screeching tyres in my right ear. This was followed by a solid thud at the right rear of the car just as I committed to the corner. A split second later I was facing the rest of the field, watching folk expertly duck and dive to miss the carnage. I  managed to roll the car off the track to avoid any serious front end damage and got a sheepish wave from Martin as he limped past in his soon to be three wheeled Lotus 7.  Well that was racing in the pack for you. Class D ain't for sissies!

The net result was that I was now stone last by some way. There is nothing like a unscheduled "off" to focus the mind, especially when you had started well up and with great expectations. It was hammer time!


I dusted off my tyres, wiggled the car around a bit to make sure no serious damage had been done and blasted off down the track. Two turns later I caught up with the unfortunate Martin, a shower of sparks emanating from the rear of his car as he pulled off the circuit. I was later to discover that he had collected my rear quarter panel with his front wheel and had sheared off his lower suspension bush. Low swung Lotus 7s do not race well on three wheels. 


As I rounded turn 4 and entered the back straight I could see no cars ahead of me. This meant I had at least 500m to make up before I arrived at the back of the field. At least I still had 9 laps in which to achieve this somewhat lofty goal. I put the hammer solidly down. Or at least I thought I did. Lap times would show otherwise, with me only managing to lap in the 27's. Still I though I was going really fast and I did seem to be catching the Class E guys slowly. Around lap 6 I caught and passed Cyril, who was piloting his LS1 engined 944 for the day, and then Di in her Lotus 23. Just ahead I could see Martin in his JPS coloured Seven chasing down William in the second LS1 powered 944 on the track for the day. I snuck up behind Martin at the exit of turn 4 and unleashed V8 power all over him. He didn't stand a chance. The red Porsche was a bit of a different matter having some V8 power of it's own. I managed to haul him in under brakes at the end of the straight and we exited turn 5 almost side by side. I somehow out dragged him down the main straight and took turn 1 first. I was getting cocky now, four cars in one lap, oh yeah!


It's usually about this time that reality is sent along to give you a swift little slap to keep you in your place. Today was not going to be any different. I could see Matthew's GT3 disappear into turn 2. That was the back of Class D and where I needed to be. Two or so laps left, what could possibly go wrong. I flew into turn two, cut towards the apex on my usual line and suddenly remember the oil. It was too late. The rear of the car let go and I slid sideways off the track amidst a shower of stones and sand. I did manage to stay pointing roughly forward so hooked second gear and booted the throttle just as both William and Martin shot past, no doubt chuckling to themselves. 

For the second time, out of the same corner, I dusted off my tyres and checked the car for damage. Everything seemed to be fine so it was hammer down again as I filled my helmet with blue air. I had just over one and a third of a lap to catch and pass the two cars again. Turn 3 greeted me with a cloud of dust as Martin involuntarily parked his Lotus up against the wall on the exit, no doubt filling his helmet with his own brand of blue air. The red Porsche disappeared around turn 4 ahead of me. I managed to chase him down over the rest of the lap and we finally exited turn 5 nose to tail on the last lap, but as I pulled out to try and take him he expertly squeezed me towards the wall. We crossed the line as we had left the corner - nose to tail.


Back in the pits the damage was assessed and declared cosmetic. Thankfully the Harper is designed with wide side pods that act as crumple zones to protect the driver and chassis rails. My side pod had take the full force of the impact and sustained minor damage that would be easy to fix.

A Lotus 7 wheel shaped imprint

We headed to the club house for some lunch and a chance to calm the nerves. Ant had lost his clutch in the closing laps of the race while Craig had had a fantastic dice with Hennie and Matthew. Paul in the GT40 was the star of the class disappearing into the distance and leaving us all in his dust. I must ask him what he has for breakfast.


Race 2 was no less frenetic, except this time without the spinning, sliding and full contact aspects of race 1. We started in our "lucky draw" grid placings which saw me fourth on the grid with Craig right next to me. Hennie, Matthew  and Paul were up ahead. The race started and immediately Craig snuck past me into turn 1 while Paul bolted off into the distance. I managed to keep up with Craig as he traded places with Hennie all the way around to turn 4. At this point I unleashed some V8 goodness onto them and passed them both on the back straight only to be immediately passed again by both of them into the corner. I really need to sort my brakes out, oh and maybe find some talent somewhere too.


After a couple of laps it became apparent that they were simply quicker than me on the twisty bit of the circuit and they progressively shrunk into the distance. At this stage I had a stern word with myself and decided to settle down and focus on hitting apexes, braking late and generally driving properly. I spent the last five laps of the race trying to get the basics right. This saw me slowly catch the trio in front of me to the extent that I finished half a car length behind Craig. Now if I had just done that from the start of the race ...


Ant had managed to join the race clutch-less and somehow pulled out his quickest laps of the day. He does seem to rise to a challenge!


All around it was a great day of racing with some hard lessons and good close racing. My brakes are infinitely better than before, but still need a little tweaking. Things are definitely moving in the right direction as I managed to break into the 25's, a target I had set myself for mid season only. Next up, 24's !!


For those who want to watch the complete races, grab some popcorn, a bucket of broadband and click on a link below


Killarney Sports & GT Race 1 - 17 March 2012

Killarney Sports & GT Race 2 - 17 March 2012

Tracking straight and true

It was the first regional race of the season. This was for points so I had to get serious now. The last time we had raced was at the Historics day three weeks back where we had all returned home medium to well done due to the heat. The Type 6 had only had one outing since then and that was to take my youngest down to Hout Bay for an ice cream the previous weekend. I had forgotten how much attention the Harpers attract as I watched folk crowd around the car in the beach side parking lot. We had sat on the low stone wall eating soft serves and solving world issues after which we had enjoyed the fabulous Chapmans Peak drive. It really is a road best experienced in an open top sports car.

On Friday evening I decided I had better do some race prep. In the garage there was disappointingly little to do. I checked the oil (it had used none), check the tyre pressures and torqued the wheel nuts. That was pretty much it. I then decided to make a new shift gate since the last one had flown off during a race. It would seem double sided tape is not as robust as I had hoped it might be. I had been having some issues with gear selection. The centring spring on the Toyota shifter we were using was not up to the job of pulling the lever back to the middle. This caused me to grab 6th from 5th instead of 4th. Not a major problem on the road, but a little hairy when diving into turn 5 at 200+ on race day. Craig had made up a new spring which had transformed the shift and made the whole driving experience much more pleasant. You see, like I said before, its the small things.

Anyhow, there was still the issue of not knowing if you had selected first or reverse. The Audi six speed box has reverse and first next to each other up and to the left. In normal cars there is a complicated lock out system that stops you inadvertently selecting reverse and careering into the car behind you at the stop street. We had looked into all manner of lock out mechanisms for the Type 6, but in the end I decided on a simple shift gate that would show you visibly which gear you had selected. The first one I made worked well, but I had attached it to the centre console with double sided tape just in case I needed to removed it for some reason during the racing. As it turned out it decided to remove itself. I just caught a flash of aluminium as it exited the car. The new one would be screwed down for sure.

About an hour later I was done and happy with the result. It's no Ferrari gate, but does the job and I think suits the car, which is all that really matters in the end.

Thus, race prep was done. I packed in my tool box and headed off to bed.

Saturday morning was clear and calm. Predictions for the day had us only enduring around 25 deg C which would be great. I packed in my race bag and headed off to the track. The new covered area opposite the Harp Motorsport workshops had been completed at last and I arrived at my pit bay to the sight of four other Harpers parked and waiting for the days festivities to begin. Craig was going to have five of his cars racing on one day. An all time record and proud day for dad.

New covered pit area

Ant was of course present in his 2.0l Turbo powered Porsche killing Type 5. Haydn was doing his first race in his supercharged and beautifully prepared red Type 5 and Didier the frenchman was racing the white factory car. Lastly, Craig had managed to finish the rebuild of his engine and fired his car up for the first time only the night before. He said he was going to run the engine in during qualifying!

I grabbed my documentation and when to scrutineer. No issues where found so back at the pits I attached the stickers of our new sponsors for the season (thanks BigFoot Express Freight and Execuline Insurance!!). Qualifying was looming large so I suited up and when off to the holding area. There were a lot of cars lined up. Thirty five to be exact. This was close to a record field for Sports and GT's and certainly the largest field of the day. It was going to be busy out there.

Qualifying was a blur of Porsches, Nardinis and other assorted fast machinery. It was over far too quickly and I had managed to qualify second from last in Class D. Not great, but I was still battling with the car under heavy braking. It was squirming about causing me to brake far to early on the two fast corners. This was costing me seconds per lap. However, brake bias is not something you setup during a race meeting so I was going to have to drive around this for the day. 

The family had arrived so we wandered over to the clubhouse for and egg and bacon roll to calm the nerves before the first race. Race 1 was called and I saw the family off to their view site before heading to the pit to get ready. Parked up in the holding area I was again struck by how many cars there were. The holding area was almost full. I had Paul in his GT40 parked next to me and the two V8's idling away sounded superb.

The marshals signalled us to leave and we threaded onto the track for our warm up lap. Sports and GT's do one warm up and one formation lap with a rolling start. The field entered the main straight in close formation. I was in 3rd gear and had my eyes on both the start lights and the car in front of me, out of the corner of my eye I could see Craig's orange Type 5 just next to me. The lights went off and I floored it. The car shot forward and Craig disappeared from my peripheral vision only to appear a split second later when I hit the rev limiter. What a noob error, to forget to change gears, for goodness sake!

Craig made full use of my stupidity and snatched the corner from both myself and Paul's GT40. He then spent the rest of the race dicing it out the Steve Humble who was wringing the preverbal neck of his Lotus Europa. Steve normally drives a scary quick Opel powered Mallock, but was in the Europa for the day and I could swear he was having more fun with us in D than he does when threading the needle at the sharp end.

I spent my race locked in a titanic battle with the GT40. It had more grunt than me on the straights, but I was quicker in the corners. On the second last lap we came out of turn 5 side by side. The sound of both V8's coming onto the power at the same time gave me goose bumps. I can only imagine what it must have sounded like to the spectators. We crossed the line a couple of hundredth apart. 

This was racing! For my previous season in my Lotus 7 I had spend most races sprinting around the track all by myself at the back. Class E was a lonely class and often there was only one or two cars racing. While this was great for getting to know the car and the track, it was not very exciting. If my first race in Class D was a sign of the season to come, it was going to be a brilliant season!

Grid positions for race 2 are drawn from a hat per class. This helps to mix things up a bit and creates more of a spectacle for those watching. I had draw second last on the grid again, but had the rather quick Lotus 7 belonging to old hand Hennie behind me. The race started and I managed to get the drop on Hennie....briefly. By the third corner I could hear the buzz of his Lotus in my right ear. I tried to make my car as wide as possible, and managed to keep him at bay for two laps. On the third he had clearly had enough and dived past me under brakes in turn three. I decided to use this as a learning experience and tracked his racing lines for the rest of the race, well at least that's my story and I'm sticking to it. Again, it was fantastic racing with cars around you all the time. I was going to enjoy this year very much.

Back in the pits I collected my kit and packed the car. Ant had a fantastic day and was lapping consistently in the 24's giving him a great battle with his Class C Porsche friends. Haydn, who was racing in Fine Cars for the first few races of the season, had had a great day out too. Sadly Didier, also racing in Fine Cars, had spun while in 4th place and damaged his rear suspension while Craig 's car had developed a short and was continually blowing the fuse that fed the fuel pumps so he had not raced in the second race. 

I arrived home late in the afternoon, tired but happy with the outcome. The Type 6 had now complete five full pace 8 lap races with no apparent ill effects. Long may this last!

The next race day was on 17th of March and I still had the brake bias issue to sort out. Some track time has been booked so, all things being equal, I should be able to start braking much later next time around. Hopefully this will show in the results!