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Zolder, (Belgium) October 22/23rd 2006
Zolder was the last round of this year`s Britcar series and a return match for Belcar`s visit to the Brands Hatch Grand Prix round earlier in the year. Having never raced there a test day was needed and so we set off late Tuesday night for a Thursday appointment with the Belgian circuit worryingly famous for the number of people who didn`t get to use the return part of their ferry ticket. We arrived Wednesday to a lovely still evening, got the car ready and went to bed. Thursday dawned, the heavens had opened and the track was wet but at least the sun was shining. By lunch we were still running a wet set up and it wasn`t until 1.30 that we finally got some slicks on the car. Ominously we were the only Britcar entrant to be testing. All the other cars were from the highly evolved Belcar series. Take a decent car, fit a turbo - no make that 2 turbos, lighten it, sort out an aero package and you`ll be able to join the Belcar grid !
Friday came and went with more rain and by the time Saturday rolled round we weren`t too surprised to find it had rained yet again. We had 3 long practice sessions, the first a free practice, then 2 timed sessions for qualification. After the first timed qualification we were 1st in class and 3rd overall due to some early hot laps, it rained yet again mid way through the session curtailing the people running faster second drivers. We sat out the second timed session to save risking the car. As it was the track dried and a couple of people set quicker times putting us on the 3rd row of the grid behind the Bo McCormack / Callum Lockie Ferrari 360 & alongside Keith Ahlers` British GT winning Morgan.
Around 26,000 people turned up on race day and worryingly so did the sunshine. The track was still wet for the morning warm up but it looked like it would dry in time for the race. We could use a bit of rain to keep the Morgan and Marcos` at bay. Very quick in the dry their stiff chassis and lack of ABS meant they struggled with the 5 heavy braking zones. We had a secret weapon - the Brussels airport radar on our side. So it seems did half the other teams. Everyone knew someone at the airport. Apologies if there were long delays that afternoon as the air traffic controllers and ground crew were all arguing over our predicted weather for 3.30 pm rather than sorting out your flights! In the end the predicted downpour for 3.30 - 4.00 never materialised and we had our first dry day of the week.
The rolling start was controlled by poleman Richard Martin in his British GT Porsche. He led us up to the start line at a painfully slow speed allowing the cars behind to get a huge drag on us. The Mercer / Fores Marcos shot past like we were stood still as we came up to line as did David Cuff`s BMW and the Morgan. At the first chicane Richard put his & partner Julian Westwood`s Porsche into the wall. We all pushed on until the final chicane where Bill Cameron spun his and partner Barry Horne`s GT3 in front of me. I managed to narrowly avoid him but others weren't so lucky and he got tapped on the door. All of a sudden we were in with a chance.
Willie Moore`s circa 440bhp BMW E46 GRS was sporting a recently revised aero pack and was never going to be in our sights. Mick Mercer`s powerful Marcos was also going to be a tall order in the dry but there was a distant chance of a podium 2 hours down the line if we played our cards right. One of the joys of endurance racing is different drivers sharing cars so there was some frantic radio work whilst we established just exactly what we needed to do. In the end I handed the GT3 over to Pete at exactly mid point. The skies were still clear as far as the eye could see, (so much for the weather radar !), and we elected to take both of our mandatory stops together. Barry Horne was flying in the Parr GT3 but a door flying off during Bill`s stint had lost them vital seconds. Would he be able to do enough. The Morgan hadn`t stopped yet and it was going to be touch and go as to whether he would re-join in front or not. With 25 minutes of the race remaining Keith put us out of our misery and rejoined behind us. In the end we managed to put a lap on him. Barry Horne was never going to quite play catch up finishing a minute of so behind.
Third place was better than we could ever have hoped for in the dry against some very strong car and driver line ups & we took our place on the podium with big smiles all round. The Belcar party afterwards was a lively affair and much to our disapproval had a free bar all night. To round the evening off Bill Cameron, magnanimous in defeat treated us all to dinner. The perfect end to the perfect weekend. And as for the rain ? 10 hours at the wheel in torrential conditions and a 2 hour ferry delay because of the weather later we finally arrived home on Monday night for a well earned sleep !
Many thanks to Peter May for taking these images http://pmimages.net