Saturday at Brands Hatch brought a close to our 2014 racing season with the final round of Time Attack. We already had the NA Championship in the bag from the previous round where Mark in his EG couldnt be beaten and Adam in the Turbo EP3 was sitting in 2nd place in the championship in the heavily contested boosted FWD class. Umar with the turbo RX7 was still in contention for a 2nd place finish in the RWD class and we were joined by Rob Burkisnshaw in the Vtec Challenge championship winning DC5 who had opted to run against the boosted FWD cars to give himself some good comparisons knowing he had already lapped at 52 and 53seconds in good conditions. The day ran as smoothly as it could with testing track conditions and not a lot of grip but things dried out sufficiently when it counted for the qualifying and finals. Mark as expected qualified in P1 and went on to win the final comfortably ahead of the newer and more powerful FD2. Another faultless drive from one of the nicest people you could ever wish to meet whos attention to detail and thoroughness and preparation had put his 20 year old relatively low powered Civic on the top spot of the podium in every round proving its not all about big bhp. Adam in his Turbo EP3 was trailing the eventual winner and reigning champion Marc Donnelly in his Escort by 10 points going into the qualifying session so needed to put in a strong performance. We released the cars having Rob in the DC5 with the faster cornering speeds ahead of Adam glued to his bumper and pulling him around. The result was a spectacle to see with 2 Hondas lapping consistently in the 55s lap after lap and resulted in Adam finishing in front of Marc effectively putting him ahead on points going into the final. The final came and Adam quickly was back on the pace but after 3 laps the car cut out. Luckily it was recovered quickly and we set about trying to find the failure of a car that had been so reliable all year. The fault was quickly tracked down to the inertia switch having cut off the fuel pumps through the vibration of Paddock Hill and the compression at the bottom. Something we have never seen before but something thats going to be pulled out of any future cars. Reset we sent Adam back out but we were pretty close to the end of the session and were only able to get 1 real flying lap in before the chequered flag. We missed the top spot by 3/10th second! Disheartened as we were at the time you have to step back and recognise the massive achievement made by Adam this year. It was his first year of competition. It was the first time he had ever visited half of the tracks. It was the first time he had ever driven a boosted car! To finish 2nd overall in a championship with so many great cars and competitors in what was only meant as an opportunity to showcase just what can be achieved with a totally stock Honda K20 motor with a turbo kit strapped to it has pretty much stunned us all. So. For the weekend Mark won the final round and the championship something TDi North also won last year in the FN2. Adam off the podium this round still picked up 2nd place overall in the championship. Umar finished 3rd on the day and 3rd in the Championship, and Rob in the DC5 walked away with 1st place OHW in the FWD boosted class.... in an NA DC5! Lots more trophies and hats for Team TDi North As this year comes to a close it leaves me to just thank the lads involves, their wives, partners and families for all the support at the events. This year has worked out better than we ever thought possible at the beginning when we set out just to have a bit of fun and try and develop the cars. I would like to thank Neil, Adam, Ben, Keiron and Alex for their help with prepping and running the cars through the year and also the organisers and other teams that make Time Attack THE series to be involved with. Its 10 years next year and we have been involved from day 1 at GT battle. We intend to be there next year to celebrate a decade of ....Not racing... once again.
Posted on: Mon, 10 Nov 2014 19:52:46 +0000
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