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TEAM-LCR REPORTS |
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SVRA Summit Point
Photo by Bob
Harrington |
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The rest of the weekend went
well, Pete
driving as hard as ever in his Chevrons, and overcoming most of his opposition
in the combined Group 5 & 7 races. The silver & green
B23
asserted itself right from the start
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that is, until an AWOL dog
found its way onto the track and
forced Pete into some early braking....
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However, race day revealed that
some 2-litre cars still persist with bigger engines, even to the tune of
2.3. In fact, most of the rest of the pack of the Group 7, 2-litre cars are
either 2.3 or 2.1-litre contemporary-engined cars. Even the lead Group 5
car, which in fact is a 90s replica, has a big engine of 2.3 litres.
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The sad thing is that |
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Well done Pete, for flying the 2-litre flag! - not only with a real car, but a period 2-litre engine. Officially, race results for Pete were second overall, second in class. In our book, however, Pete was first overall and first class. Well done Pete - good race, great sportsmanship. |
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The
Chevron
B42
was a walkover for
Pete on
each and every session. The competition was thin on the ground, but this
did not deter him from putting on a great show for the spectators. The
awesome sound of that BMW engine screaming onto and down the front straight,
and the vivid livery caught everyone's imagination. |
The final race on Sunday was a fiasco. Pete finally pulled in on lap 8 in disgust, dismay, and disbelief at the antics of some of the other drivers and the way the race was being run. Alas, not a great way to finish an otherwise great weekend, but onward and upward! Everyone, including Pete, was looking ahead to VIR only a couple of weeks away. |
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Out for only the second time this year, Phil Meany successfully pushed his Aldon faster and faster as test day went on Thursday. The new setup seemed to be working well and Phil loved the increase in power that the recently fitted twin cam gave him. The new color scheme was well received by all who saw it, some not even realizing it was the same car as last year.
Aldon of
Phil Meany |
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As good as
Phil's
race was, we were concerned by the fact that he seemed to reach a
plateau and was not able to go any faster. It seems we have
a way to go to work out the handling of the car to make it worthy of Phil's
inestimable talents. This was reiterated by the comments of
Bill
Pedersen
and Dave
Handy,
both of whom gave the car a couple of diagnostic test sessions. We will get
to the bottom of the problem now we know in which direction to go. |
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This weekend was the penultimate round of the Endurance Championship, with Paul Flowers being only about 9 points away from first place - held by Sutherland in his Porsche. The two-hour Enduro started really well, with Paul racing beautifully, working his Elva up through the field. His pit stops were to the second. He had succeeded in moving up to first overall (as best as we can calculate from our lap charts), when he came in unexpectedly for a black flag that had been shown to him. On arriving at the black flag station, however, no one had a clue why he should have been summoned. Having lost these precious seconds, he returned to the fray barely ahead of his competition, and - on the last lap - finally had to concede first place to the Neviaser Ginetta 16 father & son team. Still, a great performance by Paul, finishing second overall in the two-hour event, a solo effort on his part. Worth noting is that immediately prior to the Enduro, he had already been on the track for a half hour in a qualifying race in his Brabham. What an effort! Had it not been for the black flag debacle, he would have won the Enduro handily. Unfortunately, as it transpired, his rival Sutherland had extended his lead by one point. Such is the scoring system in this series. |
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Paul's weekend in the Elva netted him a Class first place in an amalgamated race of Class 5 & 7 cars. Paul put in a strong run, his car being sideways in many of the tighter sections of the race track. Although coming in 10th overall, this was a really good showing. Not only was Paul first in the 1600cc class, he was third overall in Group 5. All nine cars in front of Paul were 2-litres or more in capacity and most of the cars were at least 12 years younger, some being 23 years younger. Again, another great, focused drive - typical of all of Paul's drives, particularly in the Elva this year. |
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The weekend ended on a less than stellar note for Paul in the Brabham BT29, As reported earlier, the race was something of a fiasco, and Paul only managed two laps before pulling in because he was experiencing a problem with the car staying in gear. It kept jumping out at the most unexpected times. Since he'd had a great weekend up until that point, he felt it best not to stay on the track just for the sake of it, and so called it a day. |
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On to VIR !! |
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! Very well done
Phil!
Next year will be even better
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once we've sorted the handling
issues that have been identified.
