I thought some of you might be interested in this as we have just held the "Lady Wigam Trophy" race meeting for F5000 at Powerbuilt Tools Ruapuna(the same track that Ross Nicol and hopefully Russ Noble will be racing at in 3 weeks time)and what a great weekend it was until the RAIN!We had 20 of these great machines(another 5 should have been there but the container was offloaded somwhere else) in action and did not dissapoint not even in the rain.I know I should have been helping out Russ with his tight schedule(will be there during the week Russ) but I had the chance to work with Graham McRae on the Sunday who was helping running Jay Esterer from Canada with his McRae GM1(Blue number 29).
The weather was perfect all weekend until 1 hour before the main race with a liitle down pour of rain,then it dried unitl they went out on the warm up lap and the heavens opened up so they were give the option of running wets.Jay didn't have any wets so they hand grooved some slicks which would have worked great if the track started to dry which it does quite quickly normally but not quite this time.10-12 Cars took to the track for the 15 lap man feature as some didn't have wets and some just don't run them in the wet(don't blame them as these machines are worth quite a bit now)for the start and were running some 15-20secs a lap slower of course.It did start to dry a little bit but then rain again and 2 laps from the end the heavens really opened up with a little hail as well(we have not had rain for about 20 days so it was pretty dry) so the race was red flagged.It was won by Ken Smith Lola T430,2nd Tony Richards Lola T332,3rd Ian Clements Lola T332,4th Stan Redmond Lola T332 and 5th Jay Esterer McRae GM1.....I think all cars that started did finish.
The following link is to one of the photographers site so take a look.The first couple of shots are on the last lap.
So you did pack your wets Ross,just in case?
Cheers Leon
Lady Wigram Trophy Race, Ruapuna, 18.01.09 - a set on Flickr
The weather was perfect all weekend until 1 hour before the main race with a liitle down pour of rain,then it dried unitl they went out on the warm up lap and the heavens opened up so they were give the option of running wets.Jay didn't have any wets so they hand grooved some slicks which would have worked great if the track started to dry which it does quite quickly normally but not quite this time.10-12 Cars took to the track for the 15 lap man feature as some didn't have wets and some just don't run them in the wet(don't blame them as these machines are worth quite a bit now)for the start and were running some 15-20secs a lap slower of course.It did start to dry a little bit but then rain again and 2 laps from the end the heavens really opened up with a little hail as well(we have not had rain for about 20 days so it was pretty dry) so the race was red flagged.It was won by Ken Smith Lola T430,2nd Tony Richards Lola T332,3rd Ian Clements Lola T332,4th Stan Redmond Lola T332 and 5th Jay Esterer McRae GM1.....I think all cars that started did finish.
The following link is to one of the photographers site so take a look.The first couple of shots are on the last lap.
So you did pack your wets Ross,just in case?
Cheers Leon
Lady Wigram Trophy Race, Ruapuna, 18.01.09 - a set on Flickr
