Round 20 - Shelsley Walsh, Saturday 12th August
The Master (Cylinder)
August 12th and it's TVRs at Shelsley Walsh, weather forecast looking ok and Blower in attendance so aiming for a dry day. Another good turn out with 11 drivers in 9 cars, a mix of models, but with a distinct bias towards Griffs.
First (and only) accident of the day went to Blower, rubbing the creosote off one of the "garage" posts with the wing of his Chimaera, nothing a bit of polish wouldn't put right, and in fairness the garages were probably designed in the era of the Cooper 500s that were parked opposite and a bit tight for TVRs.
August 12th and it's TVRs at Shelsley Walsh, weather forecast looking ok and Blower in attendance so aiming for a dry day. Another good turn out with 11 drivers in 9 cars, a mix of models, but with a distinct bias towards Griffs.
First (and only) accident of the day went to Blower, rubbing the creosote off one of the "garage" posts with the wing of his Chimaera, nothing a bit of polish wouldn't put right, and in fairness the garages were probably designed in the era of the Cooper 500s that were parked opposite and a bit tight for TVRs.
Attendees included Pete Watson, back in the "red racer" after it disgraced itself at Loton the previous weekend, and Captain Chaos in his recently acquired Griff, returned to road legal spec and replacing his previous sadly demised Chimaera. Paul Moakes in his V8S managed to join us despite the best efforts of the Shelsley organisers to lose his entry form! Championship organisers Steve and Jo, and competitor Rob with Sharon, chose not to enter this event but came along anyway to support the rest of us. They kept track of the times, drank cider and also provided the tasty Lemon Cake...thanks Jo!
Course duly walked looked pretty straightforward to a naive new boy like myself, until some of the more experienced members talked of past experiences here...oops I'd clearly missed something! Nice facilities at Shelsley with the tempting option of a full breakfast including fried bread and black pudding which I struggled to resist. Practice 1 an education to the first timers here as the view of the early corners is very much different to that when you walk the hill and takes a lot more nerve to keep on the throttle, nevertheless, reasonable times for all and no incidents. Fastest as expected was Moggy, followed by the good Captain and Pete W in third. (It transpires Mr W has a few interim events on the Shelsley hill...the old dog, but we all reflect on whether we'll be keeping this up into our seventies!)
On return to the paddock it turns out Hank has lost his clutch pedal (not in real terms , but no pressure in the system) and he sets to with capable assistance from Steve D and John Wade to try to fix it. Turns out to be a leaking clutch master cylinder and the guys promptly set of around the paddock to find a source of spares. |
Practice 2 sees most of us return to the hill and Hank set off to Coventry for a replacement part! Results this time saw the same top three in the same order with improved times from all, and even the weather improving. Meantime John W had rustled up some assistance from the Lotus camp and local Landrover repair shop to find some parts for Hank's master cylinder, beavering away and getting dirty hands and looking like they were enjoying the challenge.
Running in a high profile event with the British Hillclimb Championship cars attracts a good crowd of spectators, and builds an atmosphere, but the downside is there is a lot of waiting around between runs which allows the adrenaline to wear off. Pete W seems to have countered this by reading up on the latest Jack Reacher paperback while he waits, which clearly works cos he was consistently 3rd fastest in every run. The Ash's relaxed in the sunshine sipping on a cool (non-alcoholic) drink.
Running in a high profile event with the British Hillclimb Championship cars attracts a good crowd of spectators, and builds an atmosphere, but the downside is there is a lot of waiting around between runs which allows the adrenaline to wear off. Pete W seems to have countered this by reading up on the latest Jack Reacher paperback while he waits, which clearly works cos he was consistently 3rd fastest in every run. The Ash's relaxed in the sunshine sipping on a cool (non-alcoholic) drink.
Meantime CC was tweaking his Griff, whilst others adjusted tyre pressures and prepared for the timed runs.
T1 saw no change in the leaders, with Moggy still masterful, leading by a pretty hefty 3 seconds on scratch from Captain Chaos and Pete W, although all three lost fractions from their best practice. Pretty well everyone else improved slightly, with Normal Richard getting under the 40 second mark and dual driver Jim squeezing another second off his time.
The time lapse to the next run seemed to go on forever while the single seaters had top ten run offs and clouds gathered overhead. At least this delay allowed Hank to return and John W and co. to get his car running again and Hank duly managed to persuade the organisers to let him get 2 timed runs in, although still suffering from some loss of clutch pressure.
T1 saw no change in the leaders, with Moggy still masterful, leading by a pretty hefty 3 seconds on scratch from Captain Chaos and Pete W, although all three lost fractions from their best practice. Pretty well everyone else improved slightly, with Normal Richard getting under the 40 second mark and dual driver Jim squeezing another second off his time.
The time lapse to the next run seemed to go on forever while the single seaters had top ten run offs and clouds gathered overhead. At least this delay allowed Hank to return and John W and co. to get his car running again and Hank duly managed to persuade the organisers to let him get 2 timed runs in, although still suffering from some loss of clutch pressure.
T2 and it still stayed dry (just) further improvements from Blower, Normal and Chaos, and Shelagh meeting her target with a time under 40 seconds. Leader board still the same, albeit Moggy's lead slightly reduced.
Handicap calculations were applied to the final results by Steve and Jo and Moggy got the 25 points followed by CC on 23.87 and Cool Hand Pete on 22.12. Jim was well pleased with a nice 4th place and 21.63 points, reflecting on how much nicer it is when Steve, Jo and Rob are spectating (only joking guys!).
Jim “the Spin” (Photography: Bobbox, JimTheSpin, Shunter) |