Racer's Diary
- Formula Saloons - Round 1 Mallory Park April 27 -
Leicestershire, England
Chris
Hermann, smiling too much for my liking... (Ed)
After my last minute
decision to enter my Mazda RX-7 in the fledgling
Historic Group 2 series this year back at the start
of March, I was rewarded with a win first time out in
my (new to me) car. The much more important Formula
Saloons championship was always going to be an
altogether more challenging prospect.
The weeks leading up
to the race weekend have been cold, but dry.
International readers may not be award that Britain
is already facing what it calls drought conditions in
much of the country, but sure enough the weekend
started off with heavy rain.
It is an odd
situation, but in all the years I have been racing,
on and off since 1977 in fact but more off than on
due to a lack of money, I had never yet had a wet
race, so I was half looking forward to it and half
fearful.
Certainly, on the plus
side a wet race would have given me more of a
fighting chance with my 320bhp Rotary engined Mazda.
On the negative side, the short Mallory park circuit
with its relatively narrow track, 120-130 mph
approach to the 30 mph (no run off) Shaw's hairpin
and 'killer corners' such as the very fast 190 degree
Gerrards Bend and aptly named off camber flat out
Devil's Elbow might have be a bit iffy for the
Brutish Formula Saloons - some of which now have well
over 600 bhp.
Qualifying started on
a slightly damp track, and I immediately found that I
had a reoccurrence of the brake problems which left
me languishing in 17th in the Group 2 race in March,
but completed enough laps to qualify and 17th again
was not too disheartening under the circumstances.
Of much more concern
was the incident which red flagged the session. Simon
Dickinson, who had only recently obtained his 1994
Mallock prepared ex South African Super Touring Car
Vauxhall Cavalier put the car onto its roof at the
hairpin. Because I had returned to the pits with my
brake problems, the first I knew of it was when an
official told me the session was red flagged. Shortly
afterwards I saw his father and crew chief (himself a
former British Saloon Car Champion) and his mother
and brother looking very worried some time after the
session had stopped.
As I write this on
Monday afternoon, it now looks like Simon is very
bruised and has stretched tendons, but is otherwise
OK and is expected home tonight, good news as up
until quite late on Sunday afternoon there was real
concern that he had broken his back and neck. It was
only after 6pm that he was removed from the
braceboard.
Simon remembers the
incident well. Apparently his throttle stuck open as
he went into the braking area for Shaw's. I was told
by Simon's mother this morning that he says he had
lots of time to prepare for the impact, switch off
the engine and relax for the impact and that he
recalls rolling at least three times.
None of this did much
for my peace of mind as I contemplated whether to
race, knowing the brakes to be 'iffy' or to just call
it a day.
In the end, the lure
was too great. I suspect that anyone who actually
races does so as much as anything because of the need
to challenge and push themselves and I am no
different. The start money was an added temptation,
but one the lights changed all thoughts of simply
circulating went out the window.
When you're hot,
you're hot as they say - and I definitely was not on
a roll this weekend.
On lap two of the 15
lap race I picked up a driveline vibration - itself a
reoccurrence of the events of the Silverstone Group 2
race. Unlike that occasion, I was not to win, but I
had worked my way up to third in class - which I held
in sufficient comfort to make way for the much faster
Class A cars dicing for outright victory as they came
through.
Similarly, when the
third and forth placed cars came through, I again
made way, only this time they were a little slower
than I expected, forcing me to run wide onto the
marbles on the exit to Gerrards. As I said at the
start, this is a very fast, long corner and even
being off line and going slower than usual I was
still on the high side of 110 mph and heading
straight for the tyre wall. Damp grass and slicks are
not good bed fellows, but somehow I managed to hold
it all together although having avoided the tyre wall
I then thought for a moment I was going to career off
to the other side as the back came round wildly. When
it was all over and I rejoined the track forth in
class Paul Lawrence had drawn up along side and had
the inside line for the esses. As he had been taking
two to three car lengths out of me in every braking
area all through the race I was powerless to do
anything, and as it was the last lap, fourth in class
was where I finished.
Given that some people
are spending more on their tyres than I am for my
whole season doing two series - including the
purchase cost of the car - and the brake problems I
have been having, I am not too unhappy with my
result. Even the 3.3 seconds adrift in lap times to
the fastest time in class is not too bad - at least 1
second of that will come just from fixing the brakes,
another 0.5 seconds I believe at least is easily
there in my driving and the slicks I was using have
now had a full four seasons use and they were
Michelin's hardest compound to start with - they were
barely tepid after the race. The consensus of opinion
is that new tyres would find me at least 2 seconds
and maybe as much as 3 seconds a lap, so I think the
car - despite its venerable age - can be modestly
competitive with a bit of TLC and money which is more
than I dared hope for when I set out to do the
series.
Even more encouraging,
despite all the brake and drive line problems, I
still recorded a time just 0.03 seconds slower than
the car's previous owner who won class championships
with it, so I must be doing something right.
The next Formula
Saloon round is at Oulton Park in Cheshire on May 17
which will also see me doing round two of the
Historic Group 2/5 Classic Thunder series where I
know the car is competitive having won Round 1.
Chris Hermann
Photography by Tim
Biller
