Wow, a race meeting with emotion from both ends of the scale.
As I'd used the Honda when I first came back to racing a couple of months ago. Then to the Vauxhall when it rejoined, I thought that as the Vectra was being removed for being "unbalanced" I'd go for one of the slower cars. The Pug 407 sprung to mind straight away. I obviously wasn't expecting too much and thought I'd be fighting to get near the top 10 in Qual!!
Warm Up: Didn't go as smoothly as I would like. Only because I was a bit late joining (help the wife and kids to get to club). Rushed myself to get up to the pace I was running yesterday offline. Not sensible at a track that requires rhythm to be fast. I did get down to the low 1.13's towards the end when I stopped pushing.
Qual: Took the fuel out for Qual and decided to go for a more measured approached than the last 2 meetings where I've pushed hard and ended up going slower. I was very pleased (and a little surprised) to do a 1:12.6 with a relatively cautious lap!! Good enough for 2nd behind Oliver and only just ahead of Ryan. Much better than I expected for my first run in the Pug 407
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Race 1: The other end of the emotional scale was reached in race 1
. All the promise that Qual had shown did not translate well to the race. I got a very poor start and then over cautious in the first couple of corners and got well and truly mugged!!! Down to 7th I was then pushing like in practice too hard too early and I was getting very messy. Had one big off that I got away with, then another I didn't. Damaged my suspension, but carried on until my planned pit window. Pitted with the hope of getting a bit of space and closing some time back. After the stops I was back out among the top 6 and in with a shot of decent result. David Zafiu was behind and I had a horrible moment coming through and out of the first chicane. The car just pitched of to the left and into the barriers sustaining a puncture. As I recovered David was waiting for me. I gathered at that point that there may have been contact, but I didn't feel it and I highly doubt it had much to do with the eventual outcome. Thank you for stopping though David :good:. Pitted again and returned in 13th with about 8mins left. Pushed on and got a nice rhythm again and finished 11th.
Race 2: Got away better this time, but there was an incident down at T4 and I had to take evasive action and got a gentle tap from behind. Gained a position from it though and up to 10th. Got involved in a couple of nice battles behind Simon who was running 5th I think. Then whilst right on the tail of a Seat I got too close coming into the amazing flatout chicane towards the end of the lap, had to lift mid corner and lost the tail and slid into the wall
. Had a couple of untidy laps and was caught by James. Settled myself down again and set about fixing my mess. Started to close back on the group again and wanted to take pitstop early to get some clear track. Had to wait a lap until window opened and Simon went off anyway. Pitted and returned out in 7th. Pushed on, until into 6th, but couldn't close the gap to 5th.
Great racing at times and a fantastic little track. Just can't help, but think of the wasted promise that Qual had shown, but happy to be competitive in the Pug and getting more comfortable with my new pedals.
Thanks Ryan and RD for another gr8 sunday mornings racing
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