Round 11 - Stowe, Sunday 3rd June

​One of my favourite rounds of the TVR Speed Championship, being June the weather is usually kind to us. The March snow and biting winds are a distant memory. 
​The MG Car Club hires the Silverstone circuit, for the weekend. With entertainment, and classic car racing on the full circuit over both days. Our entry fee for the sprint includes a pair of weekend tickets to the
venue, so is good value if you have time to come along on the Saturday prior to our Sunday sprint.

​Our sprint got off to a late start, as the 
​trackside Medic didn’t have the appropriate certificate. The event organisers had to scramble around to find another suitable volunteer. This delayed start had repercussions later in the day, when we lost
our third timed run due to time constraints.

​First practice, found us all a bit rusty and fumbling around. Steve Thomas, in a BRG Vixen a bit more rusty than most.  Not
​having competed in the TVR Speed Championship since 1995. Welcome back Steve.

It was also Paul Moakes’s first visit to
Stowe, so practice was a must.  Jes Firth, keen as usual, spun on first practice. I, and a couple of the other competitors, had trouble seeing where the entrance to the chicane was.
​
Second practice, saw most of us improve, with the exception of Jes. ​Who tried braking
​later for the chicane, but found he was going far too quickly to make the turn and aimed for a gap in the barriers instead. The gap (as evidenced by the orange witness marks on the wings) proved to be too narrow for the Frankengriff. If you haven’t seen Jes’s in car video, it is worth searching for on YouTube. In fact, all of Jes’s in car
videos ​are worth viewing. Steve in the Vixen was remembering his sprinting days of old and carved a whopping five seconds off his P1 time. Paul was getting to grips with Stowe and had improved by 0.64 second. The rest just improved by small increments.
Richard (Blower) Bream called by to offer his encouragement, I am glad to hear that repairs to his Chimaera are progressing well. I hope that Richard will be out sprinting again in the not too distant future.
​
The sprinting stopped for lunch, and we all were flagging a bit, in the heat. Richard kindly offered to search for an ice cream vendor. But on one of the hottest days of the year so far, the caterers at Silverstone circuit in their wisdom didn’t provide any for sale! Pretty poor I thought, and to top it off, the lunchtime sandwiches from the café
sold out before everyone (read me) had their fill.

​Back out for T1. Boy is it hot in a race suit, complete with helmet and gloves!
T1 saw Jes on a flier, causing the marshals to gasp, locking his front wheels under heavy braking for the first right hander. I later found the skid marks a handy indicator of where the braking points were; Mel probably found Jes’s in the laundry basket later. Despite the ragged driving, Jes had first place, Hank enjoying his return to Stowe and beating his PB to grab 2nd,
Harry 3rd, Shunter 4th, Jo 5th, Paul 6th and Steve 7th.

T2. Jo was out first, followed by Steve, Jes, Harry, Paul then Steve. Whilst I waited at the start, the two start line marshals gave a running commentary on Jes’s progress. I heard “goodness that’s quick, will he get through the chicane?” “He made it, well done”, “if only he can keep out of the gravel”. “Wow that was a clean lap!” So I then knew, Jes had the red 25 in his pocket. Fired up by Mr Firth’s performance, I managed to shave a second off my time.
​Paul was equally fired up, and knocked another off his. Paul and Steve kept knocking chunks of time off as they learned the layout of the circuit. When Shunter crunched the numbers, Jes was confirmed his the red 25, Hank 2nd I had improved by 1 second to grab 3rd.  Jo improved by a second and knocked Shunter back to 5th.

The TVRCC sprinters next outing is at Abingdon, I hope to see you there!

​Harry
(Photography: Jan, Mark Tickle)