Bayford Meadows December 4th 2005
Round 1 Club 125 Winter Series
The only question on the weather was how wet it was going to be. Thomas took an early look at the track and decided it was going to stay wet, whereas James looked at the sky and decided it was going to dry out eventually.
Thomas was right in the end but we got a new set of slicks ready all the same.
At the start of practice there were twenty one karts ready to go out. Thomas joined them in the Gillard and did a few laps before coming back in to put in the front bar. This improved turn-in but the tyres were more or less stone cold and the track was very slippery. The next change was to take the pressures right up and this resulted in a very nicely handling kart.
Before sending James out in the last 15mins of qualifying we changed tyres to a slightly newer set of worn wets which we then planned to race on.
James got a good qualifying time of 64.785secs which was enough for 5th on the grid and justified our decision not to race in the Clubman Class.
At the start James held position and then moved up to 4th as he took a struggling Titan on the inside of the carousel.
It was short lived as he then lost it on the entrance to the pits bend as he failed to find the grip on the outside of the track. As it was he took a detour onto the grass and by the time he got back onto the tarmac he was down in seventh.
Determined to make up for the mistake, he caught and passed Kartmasters and then Titan again before taking over 4th once more from Oh No Racing.
For the next twenty or so laps James circulated in a bit of a vacuum staying comfortably ahead of the pack behind him but not getting near enough to 3rd place to be able to see them.
Unfortunately things then started to go wrong as he failed to read the subtly altering track conditions properly. The track wasn't really drying out and it was still very greasy, but the grip points were changing and James was still going for the wet lines instead of the tighter line.
Another lawn mowing expedition on the pits corner let Rapid Logic through, a spin on the infield lost him a good three seconds and his place to Titan and a final pits bend excursion gave Dogz an opportunity they couldn't turn down.
That dropped us down to 7th and destroyed James' speed as he struggled to work out what he should be doing.
But by now it was nearing the half way stage and Thomas brought him in during a clear period in the pits for the only stop and re-fuel.
Thomas had again changed the lead seat fixing system and this worked well giving us a good out lap of 119.508 seconds. Not bad but we should be able to knock a few more seconds still off this time.
Thomas very soon got up to speed and benefiting from having watched the line the leaders were taking in the first half, began a long slog up the field.
We had descended to 11th with the changeover but within a couple of laps Thomas' speed was down in the 63s and we had moved back ahead of Oh No Racing and Options Motorsport.
Four laps later, he overtook Auction My Igloo to take 8th and then began a long period as he caught, shadowed and finally overtook Titan to give us 7th.
He now had a spot of bother lapping a back marker but managed it without a disaster and then took off in pursuit of Rapid Logic for 6th.He managed this well on lap 79 and then on lap 81 he got our best lap of the race at 60.927secs.
He was desperately trying to catch Dogz for 5th and was taking up to 3 seconds a lap off their lead but there just weren't enough laps left.
We finished just four seconds adrift of them in 6th place.
It was a good race which we both enjoyed a great deal and it was very good that the kart was doing so well against the opposition.
Jo and Zoë were in attendance to provide moral support, so perhaps it was their influence. Many thanks to Jo at least - Zoë slept most of the race out on the back seat of the Galaxy.
Full results are here.
R e d S t r i p e R a c i n g