Vaguely Porsche related newsHot off the press for 911virgin towers

We are putting to together a new page on the website to try and locate cars for people. This is going to work in one of two ways. If you are trying to track down your old Porsche then we need a description of the car and it`s (then) registration number. We`ll probably make a small charge to try and see if the reg number is still current and if not what the current reg number is then put the car`s details on the page. The second scenario is where someone is looking for a particular type of car. Again we`ll post the details and see if we can track something down. Try not to be too specific in terms of spec / colour as you vastly limit your choice of cars, and in the case of older cars you really need to buy on condition anyway.

Email details of the car you are looking for (put "Porsche wanted" in the subject box).

We had both the noble leader as well as his GT3 race car on the Porsche club stand this year. He spent the three days answering questions on Porsche club motorsport activities as well as chatting to people about potential Porsche purchases. By the end of the weekend the poor bloke was just about dead on his feet but it was all worth it. The club signed up lots of new members and publicised the August 29th-30th Brands Hatch Festival. It was also the first exhibition outing of the club`s motorsport / presentation trailer unit.

Round 6 on Saturday looked promising. A terrific drag off the line, Richard Chamberlain shattered a gearbox bellhousing our Noble leader is now in second place on the track ! Second lap and a little tap going into Riches sent the back of the car round but the lad managed to hold onto the car losing a couple of places, and then it slowly went downhill. Try as he might the times just wouldn`t come and the car was over steering. Braking from 145 miles an hour into the Esses the car felt particularly bad and sure enough the GT3 had picked up a puncture, either from Richard`s gearbox shrapnel or the debris at Riches. A DNF.

Sunday,round 7. New rear tyres, and once again a good drag off the line to slip in front of Gerald Harrison`s GT3. On the first lap he gave us a bit of a broadside going into Russell but in spite of a trip across the grass Henry managed to maintain position. After 4 laps or so Gerald slipped in front at Riches. The 2 GT3`s were never more than 20 feet apart for the whole race. Coming into Russell one of the class 4 944`s appeared to roll across the front of our GT3, Henry claims no knowledge of how that might have happened !! Henry finally managed to make it past Harrison`s GT3 at Sear when he missed a gear at the apex to take third place. A very eventful race and once again lovely close racing with Gerald Harrison`s GT3. To be continued no doubt.... Click on the photos for a selection of larger images

Romance is clearly alive and well in Didcot, Oxfordshire, either that or our chap thought forgiveness would be easier to ask for than permission. Having bought a lovely little 3.2 Carrera Cabriolet Geoff Cox decided to thank his wife for allowing him his boyhood dream. Unbeknown to Erika her husband had popped over in the week and left a lovely eternity ring in the glove-box for her to discover when they came to collect it on the Saturday. It was an emotional moment with our Tom and Dan close to tears, - we didn`t think car salesmen had feelings either !!  The car is already getting plenty of use with a recent trip to the "French" town of Reading en Thames to watch the 24 Heures Du Mans on their big screen. Erika is accompanied by children Beth and Charlie.

"Friday`s test day was bloody hard work!" Snetterton is quite a hard circuit to put in an ultimate lap and it was the first time there in the GT3. The data logger really earned it`s keep. Le Mans driver Piers Masserati put a datum lap in the car to work from and the rest was down to the noble leader. 1.17`s by the end of the day with the promise of more to come. 1.16`s in qualifying and a good race 1 managing to get ahead of Tony Brown`s 964 RSR to take 3rd in class, 4th overall, just failing to catch Nick Staveley`s GT3 before the flag. The second race centered around a thrilling 20 minute battle with Gerald Harrison`s GT3. The two cars were rarely more than a few meters apart, often considerably less! Once again passing slower traffic was the deciding factor and Gerald managed to slip past our GT3 when Henry caught up with a car mid corner. The two GT3`s were like Siamese twins for a couple of laps until Henry managed to carry a bit more speed into Russell, get the power on early and out-drag Mr Harrison`s GT3 to the line beating him by 7/100`s of a second, one more pie at lunchtime and he wouldn`t have made it! The was a 1 minute 15 seconds (just) on the fastest rolling lap onboard at the end of the weekend so a good effort. We won`t mention giving the pit wall a demonstration of how to cut the grass coming out of Russell in the first race !

A very early start in the morning come race day is never particularly welcome but testing had gone well and by the end of the day we`d managed to get the data logging system working on the car which should bear fruit in the future. Testing had been very busy on track and that set the scene for the weekend. A very large grid assembled for qualifying and we ended up on the 4th row of the grid behind the class 1 cars. We started 4th in class behind the more experienced GT3 drivers and ended up 5th when Tony Brown, the runner up in the Porsche Club championship last year managed to find a way past coming out of Luffield after Henry had to brake hard mid corner to avoid spinning of onr of the class 4 944`s. "There was a massive amount of traffic to negotiate and when you bear down on a group of 3 or 4 cars involved in their own battle you have to remember the guy at the front of the pack won`t have a clue you`re coming so diving up his inside is a bit risky." All that said the noble leader is getting faster, lapping the Northants circuit in the 1.02`s almost managing to lap the next placed GT3. Click on the photo for larger images.

You can tell an awful lot about the state of the economy and how people spend their time at work from our website statistics. For instance: peak viewing time is around 1pm when everyone is having a break for lunch and there is another peak at 5pm when people are finishing off for the day. Main viewing is between 8am and 10pm with a bit of traffic outside those times but in essence you`re all keen to use the boss`s telephone line! Numbers are rising with usually between 1,700 and 2,000 different "sites" visiting us daily. A "site" may have several users so if different people from the same company visit us we probably count you as one. We normally send out between a billion and a billion and a half Kb of information per day - one can only assume you don`t get much in a Kb these days! The most popular page is our stock page which was hit just over 45,000 times in April. In terms of geographic location most of our traffic is UK based although amongst the more remote places we`ve sent 318 web pages to Finland and at 358 web pages to Saudi Arabia!

First in class / 4th overall for the first race and first in class / third overall for the second race. You can`t ask for more than that. It was an odd weekend, Saturday`s qualifying was cut short twice with cars spinning off the circuit and even the noble leader took an excursion onto the grass when he span on another car`s oil at Tower. Sunday`s race was a wet affair, a good start ensured a class lead from the off and it was just a case of keeping the car on the track from then on. The GT3`s wet weather ability meant class 3 and 4 cars were caught fairly early on in the race but mindful of conditions everyone stayed out of each other`s way. Next round Silverstone May 15th.Click on the photo for more images from croft. (Thanks to Dave & Gill from db racing for the photo).

The 2004 season kicks off at Croft in North Yorkshire on 17/18th April. We were up there early for a test session. The weather was lovely, the car ran well and the locals most hospitable. The circuit it`s self is fairly memorable in a GT3. A couple of the corners are bumpy to say the least and the car gets thrown around a bit. You need to get a good grip of your Jacobs as you take the back part of the circuit flat out and then you need to calm down through the technical complex finishing with a hairpin at the top of the straight. Click on the photo for larger images. Images taken by Stuart Baines - http://www.whatnonegatives.com 

The lady on the left is Gina Alsford, you should have married her. A bold statement and I`m sure you`ll be putting up a strong argument for your current spouse, but you`re wrong, and the reason ? Your missus didn`t secretly buy you a 911 supersport for your 50th birthday. The happy bunny on the right is John Alsford. 15 minutes earlier he was driving back home from a day out at the Hendon air museum when Gina told him she just had to call in somewhere and quickly pick something up. A boyhood dream fulfilled he could have cleaned his ears with the corners of his smile ! Congratulations and enjoy the car.

It won`t be long before the racing season kicks off again and we`re looking for potential sponsors. The GT3 is already in the middle of it`s winter rebuild, the noble leader is trying to get fit and we`re finalising dates. In particular keep the bank holiday weekend of 28/29th August free. There is going to be a massive Porsche festival at Brands Hatch and we`ll be racing. There are many ways in which sponsorship could benefit your business. Click on the link below to find out a little more or speak to Henry.

Find out about sponsoring our GT3 Porsche race car & see how it could help you promote your business

The Porsche club GB had their annual Christmas gathering at the magnificent Cornbury house headquarters on Sunday 7th December. There was the usual selection of Christmas stocking fillers to buy from the club shop including the stunning motorsport calendar, (in which we feature on the corner of some deserted month !!). They have a permanent display of cars and memorabilia on site and we were honored to be asked to display the GT3. Mince pies and coffee rounded of a lovely bright December day.(click on the photo for more images)

The Bill Taylor race is the last race of our season and is a one hour, 2 driver event. I was racing with Chris Egginton, a fellow GVR driver with GT3 experience. This year had not gone well, a particularly bad accident at Silverstone earlier in the year when he was collected by another car, not his fault but it was a skeleton he was going to have to put in the cupboard. Friday testing went well, Chris set the marker and we ended the day fairly happy. I started Saturday`s race and off the line Paul Howell`s 993 RSR and Paul Hogans very quick 996 Turbo managed to sneak past into the first bend. Howells took an odd line through Maggots (backwards !), and I eventually managed to take Hogan going into Copse.

Click on the photos for images from this race

It`s handicapped race with a diverse field of cars and drivers so there was lots of overtaking the slower cars to be coped with who were in fierce battles themselves. A potential recipe for disaster but thankfully avoided. Barring mechanical gremlins Rupert Lewin doing a solo drive in his GT2 was always going to be favorite, so handing over to Chris 4th overall was satisfactory. Chris did a sterling job behind the wheel putting in very consistent lap times. There was some drama towards the end when the Young/Healy GT3 took a trip onto the grass whilst overtaking a slower car then slowed down a lap from the end as they ran low on fuel. They finished the race in the pit lane for third place so we just missed the podium. As predicted Rupert Lewin took overall honors with the British GT pairing of Phil Hindley and Tom Shrimpton taking second place.

Our noble leader came back from the recent Porsche motorsport dinner claiming to have been awarded some prize for his driving and clutching a big trophy. We humored him assuming said trophy to have been purchased by the man himself but no ! Believe me no one was more shocked than us as we read in Autosport that he was indeed telling the truth. Not only that but the magazine was scarred by an image of the ugly Mr Firman. Seriously - well done, 2003 has been a steep learning curve that is set to continue into 2004 with the acquisition of the GT3.

I`d forgotten just how quick Donnington was, the bad news - it was going to get a whole load quicker ! Donnington is one of the best circuits in the UK. There are a couple places where you just have to grab hold of the family jewels, take a deep breath and keep you foot down. I was conscious we were still only really settling the GT3 in ready for the 2004 season but a little gentle racing wouldn`t harm anyone. The weekend was a double header spread over 2 days. Saturday`s race was actually fairly uneventful, I found a hole in the field and started to go to sleep. I got a rude awakening when I let Mark Butler, a fellow GT3 overtake me on a blue flag thinking he was another car !! That won`t be happening next year ! 

Click on the photos for larger images of this race

Sunday`s race was a bit more of a battle. John Griffith`s 935 cut in front of me at the bottom of the Craner curves and we shared a few laps. He was quicker on pace, I had the edge under braking and cornering. I was struggling to get past when he overcooked the power coming out of the old hairpin and took a trip across the greenery. That let me get my foot down and make up some ground on Mark Butler hoping to repay the favor from the first race. Sadly it never quite happened, the rain that had held off all day started to fall on the last lap and I backed off. Sadly Peter Cook`s GT2 embedded in the pit wall greeted me as I rounded the esses onto the finishing straight. Thankfully Peter walked away. Once again not too disgraceful for an early outing in the GT3, it`s certainly a bit quicker than the 993.

Oulton Park on a damp October morning may not be the best place to try out your new 380bhp Porsche GT3 but who said racing was easy. For those of you unfamiliar with the Cheshire circuit it`s fairly technical with lots of blind sections and virtually no run off! The air hissed as the car lowered off it`s jacks, there was a crackle from the exhaust, a deafening resonance inside the cab, reverse engaged, tight lock out of the garage, first gear, creep down the pit lane, second gear, head down towards cascades, floor the throttle. Wow...........(click on the photo)

We`ve acquired a new race car for 2004. It`s a 2001 year GT3. The GT3 in it`s various guises is pretty much the industry standard for current Porsche racing. The GT3 R is the daddy and used in FIA races including Le Mans. Our car is a GT3 Cup and is used in races such as the Porsche cup which supports the British touring car championship (all be it in a slightly different 2003 guise). The car is currently with Team GVR to be set up and checked over. Click on photo for larger images