8/9 Sept Britcar 24 Hours of Silverstone

[Paul Thompson 'Hooligan']

Sunday Time 07:15
Meeting resumes - there is a 15 minute warning to all teams of the intended 07:15 start time, so a chance to wake up those sleepy pit crews and drivers. As you can see from the 1st picture, the track was quite foggy during the stoppage, a time when all cars on track were assembled on the grid and all cars in pit lane/garages were pused in front of their garages so no work could be carried out during the delay. A restart of 2 laps behind a course/pace car then preceeded the actual full on restart.

As 7:15 came, the pits were a fury of busy teams, the Clonis Porsche was quickly pushed into the garage and work commenced on changing the engine. I must say that the crew seem to operate like a well oiled clock, each knowing what is required of them both individually and as a team. 4 crew were busy below the car, one on the spare engine and another was dashing to and from the tool chests.

Talking of crews dashing about, whilst all was quiet during the delay, I took a walk about pitlane to view other cars, including the RollCentre Racing Mosler GT that was in the next pit. All crew were dozing, but I could not have predicted the sudden frantic awakeing as I mentioned to one of them that I had just noticed one of their front brake caliper pistons had popped out if its bore, leaking brake fluid and whilst they could not work on the car till the evernt resumed, fore warned is fore armed!.....
Photos: A foggy Pit lane, rear of the Mosler GT, a push back in to work and 'all hands on deck!'

ps - 07:55 and Malc's back from the land of 'zzzzzzzzzzzzzz'...

[Pete.]

Riveting stuff, I feel like I'm there. Wish I was in fact, best wishes for the rest of the race.

[I LOVE GT40- Paolo]

GO MALC GOOOOOOO, and too great footage by Paul surely one of the best part of malc staff.
We are all with u man..

when team owners touch the car ALWAYS something happens.
Momo Moretti and his red F333 sp was too famous for this. Ruined too many 1000km races in Monza for that (he owns all...he wanna play too..LOL),pilots usually make the pole and fastest lap....Momo destroy all...after..ihihihi

Feel as jackie ickx malc!!!remember u are a gt40 man!!

[I LOVE GT40- Paolo]

p:s. btw..who is winning and how about the italians?

[Ron Earp]

Great updates Paul, Wendy, and crew! Nice spot on the Mosler too Paul, I'm sure they were most appreciative if a little embarrassed. I know I'd be both!

How are things finishing up now?

Ron

[Paul Thompson 'Hooligan']

Sunday Time 13:25
Well - what can I say....? Engine went in, but was reluctant to start. Once started it
seemed to be running rich and would not happily idle. Much tinkering later (dedicated
engineers!!) - they got it running again and so out Malc went. Unfortunately he only got
100M up pit lane before it died and refused to start again....

Pushed back to the garage, Malc sat in it for an eternity as the crew worked on it again and
about 10 minutes ago at they got it running again. Off he set and has now completed at
least a couple more laps.... Fingers crossed..... more pics to follow, car permitting!

Photos: Engine and box mated, back in the car, Malc's face says it all, this bit looked a
bit worrying!, out into the pit lane, and back again....

[Ron Earp]

Great pictures! Wow, that is some tough luck. The team is dedicated, that is for certain. But those P-cars.........

How long does it take the team to pull a motor/transaxle out?

Ron

[Paul Thompson 'Hooligan']

On a really good day I'm told 60 mins out and in.....

But they were being very careful....

A few 'on track' pics before my phone batt goes flat...

Malc is in the car till he turns off for refuelling, after which red tank tape appears on the nose.... I'll let him explain that one later....

[Malcolm]

Paul you are a bloody hero with those updates! Thanks and thanks again.

I'm knackered having just rolled in at home so pleased to say we did finish and car owner John Clonis took the flag in 46th place (out of 62 I think). I will post more tomorrow assuming I wake up! And report on those Italians for Paulo.....

Great weekend! (already thinking about next year.....)

[Paul Thompson 'Hooligan']

I'm off t......

ZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

[Paul Thompson 'Hooligan']

One for 'Paolo'

and they got a podium position - 4th overall....

More to follow - once I'm fully awake.

[I LOVE GT40- Paolo]

eheh, grazie grazie guys!!
Too nice report for this too cool event!

[Malcolm]

My story of the race goes like this…….

4pm.
Paul White takes the car to the grid for the form up. I stay in the garage. We are 35th on the grid. 34th on the grid is my friend Matthew in his BMW E46. Only comments made here of note are by my sponsors. “You need pit girls for next year!”. Does that mean they wish to be involved again? John the team owner says that it is no problem to organise and for only a little extra money they will do favours too! The sponsor in question had his wife there so perhaps no sponsorship for next year now after all.

4:28pm
Safety car leads the field off for a single lap formation rolling start, next time past the safety car will have pulled off the circuit into pit lane and the race starts as the whole pack thunders past. Team Top Gear start from the pit lane after technical issues made them late for the grid form up.

4:33pm
What the f***? Paul brings our car into the pit trailing a river of fuel! We lasted a damn sight longer last year! The garage is evacuated as there is so much fuel about. The fuel rail has split. What are the chances of that? A replacement rail is fitted in just under 6 minutes and we are in the same place as last year……last!

4:40pm
No longer last as the other 993 Porsche retires from the race. In fact 6 cars retire within 30 laps. Bad luck? In motorsport there is only Motorsport, not bad luck, that is just how it is.

5:27pm
Motorsport strikes us again! Paul is recovered back to the pits by tow truck with a broken throttle linkage. The ball has popped out the ball joint. We lose about 10 minutes being recovered and 8 minutes affecting a repair. However Paul is lapping at a pace of 2 mins 9 secs to 2 mins 12 secs per lap.

6:06pm
Paul sets the team’s fastest lap of the race at 2 minutes 7.95 seconds.

6:34pm
Paul pits, was due about now anyway but there is a bad noise from the engine. Goes straight into the garage. Rumours fly about that he got hit up the back side but later I find out that as he was passing the pit exit a BMW came out and neither driver was prepared to concede the first corner. As Paul was on the left (left hand corner but with a right hander immediately next in sequence) he found himself with a choice of hitting the BMW or taking to the grass. He took to the grass. It is bumpy there and the car was launched up into the air and came down with a bit of a bump! This moment caused longer term trouble than was first realised but for now he pitted with a dragging exhaust, loss of sixth gear and a damaged drive shaft. When I say dragging exhaust the picture says a badly dragging exhaust! The cross member in this picture is the gearbox mount that the team carries as a spare.

[Malcolm]

Just over 50 minutes are spent changing the exhaust, fitting a new driveshaft and with realignment of the engine/gearbox 6th gear comes back into play.

7:32pm
David Smith takes over the driving and stays out for 2 hours without interruption. It is fully dark now and we are using a serious set of HDI lamps on the front of the car. We have great apex lights and it is important to turn them off as you come into pit lane otherwise you blind everyone in sight. When David pits we have completed 93 laps. We are moving back up the order and now we are in 48th place.

9:40pm
I have taken the hot seat. As I pull away I hear some awful clunking under the car. To me it sounds as though the engine or gearbox is loose. It is on throttle application that it thumps the chassis so I radio it in. This doesn’t seem right to me but I get the ok to go on out. Engine sounds good, steering ok so I accelerate down the pit exit onto the circuit. There are plenty of rubber marbles out there now. I turn in trail braking for the first corner and before I know it I am off! That was a really quick spin with no warning. Lots of dust and it takes just a second or too to work out all is ok so I rejoin. I radio in I had a spin and say I am coming in for a check over. Has something broken? I go round slowly but suspension wise all seems fine. I go straight into the pits. Up on the air jacks and the mechanics crawl around under the car. They check all they can but find nothing. I am talking with Kieran our very experienced crew chief/team manager. We agree it could have been cold tyres. When the new exhaust was put on it aligned differently and that may be bumping the chassis. Also I get told it could be pickup on the tyres. Take it easy for a few laps and see what happens. Let the tyres come to you I am told. David Smith leans in and shouts that he too had the thumping but nothing came of it. I am the novice here so I go out a bit embarrassed that it could have been cold tyres (what a daft thing to do if so) but not convinced that the thumping is just an exhaust knocking the chassis.

However I lap for another 100 minutes without incident (thumping away). I had expected to be slower at night than during day time so had agreed a window of times to aim for of between 2 mins 15 secs and 2 mins 20 secs. I achieved this quite nicely typically turning 2 mins 16/17 seconds. And I passed Team Top Gear for position on the track! We had lost 15 laps to them with the exhaust saga but now two stints later we were ahead again. Their problems were about to get worse!

Just before the end of my stint I was just getting onto Hangar Straight. Way down at Stowe I cold see some headlights which basically I shouldn’t see. Someone was off but on a straight? Then as I approach the bridge over Hangar Straight I see the Top Gear looking very sorry for itself. It had the front left side all staved in and possibly wheels pointing in odd directions. Then much, much further down the road I came across the owner of the headlights, a Mosler with its front clip detached. Clearly there was a connection!