alternator packed up on the way there, so had to return and swap it, so with help from Blue sold my sign on for friday to Glyn
got there about 3 pm and set up camp by Dusty and made sure of space for Stu and jess
Picked up my son daniel from wellingborough station and on my return had a few beers
invited to join an unofficial NSS bracket by Mr Goodale, ultimately quite stressful for a bloke who has done RWYB badly for the last 20 years.
so down at the line by 9:30 saturday to do qualifying runs.
pushed back from the line because i wasn't wearing a fire-suit, so that qualifier went down the pan, had to run a single as RWYB even though we were all running in RWYB had queued in the RWYB lane, as the event was not official... kinda frustrating as this wasn't a bracket run and i would not have been anywhere near my competitor for most of the track.
pulled off the best run of my life at 13.86 and 96.8 MPH PB very pleased with that.
behold my slightly faster slowness way more impressive if you run the video at 2x speed
mad dash to try to borrow suitable suit
Big thanks to Stu Floyd and Chris Goodale for assisting with sartorial and safety needs
next run, line up 11:30 2nd qualifier all suited and booted sat in the queue from 11:30 until 2pm
oil down, after oil down, after jet car, after oil down, after ranty people complaining that NSS always get in first, after lunch and a snooze and...... well a very long wait.
determined to repeat the morning's run i left the line...... and didn't leave... almost as if i had dowsed my tyres in diesel..Ice rink springs to mind, 3 attempts to go forwards and i gave up backed off and drove the track like a grandad... no idea what the problem was 19 seconds. Expected rubber spattered rear arches after start line shenanigans. nothing....very odd
need to check the footage to see if the fella after me had a problem as well.
timeiting ticket now shows personal best and personal worst side by side.
first proper bracket race, queue at 4:30, i was crappiest qualifier so obviously i race the best qualifier who had hit his dial in perfectly.....
at about 6:45, actually get on the track
all going well until I miss a shift. stone cold transmission oil probably didn't help
17 seconds, rubbish, way off the mark
end of daves racing
beer
so 5 hours queueing, 6 if you add in lunch and tea break, out of my saturday at the HRDs and 2 trips up the strip for £45...
No way could you just go round again because there was a great chance you'd miss your next call.
the usual evening entertainment and beers, rounds it all off
had a good time and will be back next year, but may pay close attention to who is invited to race at an event before signing on, some cars just seem a bit prone to dumping coolant and oil all over the place, it can happen to any of us, but a few seem to do it every time they are called......
pairing, tractor, pairing, tractor, pairing, tractor.... something is wrong.
if you like tractors with brushes on the front and the squeak of rubber on gluey concrete you'd have been in your element
Dave
