NSCC Rounds 3 & 4,
May 3rd-4th, 2015
Mayday! Mayday! Anybody
arriving at York on the Saturday evening for the rounds three and
four double-header probably got a valuable insight into why people
shout that in times of dire distress. High winds and rain, plus the
fact that the jolly farmer has ploughed the field on 'our' side of
the pits meant that there was a definite 'back to nature' feel to the
whole show. More Glastonbury than Bakersfield.
The weekend didn't
begin well for a couple of competitors who got rogered before they
even arrived. Russ Pursley had gone down to Santa Pod to get some
practice runs in on the Dutton, and managed to bust his rear end.
Rick Swaine, meanwhile, got his rear end bust for him by an
inattentive BMW Mini driver, effectively writing off the lovely
orange Viva. Fortunately, nobody was seriously hurt, but it would
just be the beginning of another war of attrition that would leave
many by the wayside.
Sunday morning dawned
with rain, mud, gales, shattered tents and groaning wounded. The NSCC
pits looked like the Somme, though the groaning wounded had less to
do with violent conflict on a global scale and more to do with the
bar now stocking bottled guest ales and Jack Daniels. Most of the
morning was spent watching the rain coming down, but by lunchtime the
'invaders from the planet Cloud' had buggered off elsewhere and the
track was slowly drying.
Eventually, finally,
16 competitors headed out for one-shot qualifying. The track was far
from perfect, but that didn't stop Andy Fadster belting out a
psychotic 9.3 at 147mph, Next up was Ian Walley, freshly repaired
after the fire of four weeks previous, struggling for traction but
managing a 12.0 at 123mph. Four tenths behind was another fresh
rebuild, Derek Beck's TVR, and two hundredths behind him was Keith
Freeman's blown '32. Sitting on a solid 13.3 was Doug Hague in the
Tango orange Skyline, then Paul Hughes in the blown MR2 on 14.1,
again just two hundredths ahead of James Murray in the
now-all-green-again Cortina. Tom Barker's Astra cranked out a 14.8,
while Phil Winstanley in the Moggy Minor was suffering electrical
gremlins and managed an off-form 15.3. Andy Errington's Mustang gave
15.4, Lee Openshaw's huffed Punto a 15.5, and Shaun Wilson's A
roadster a 15.6. Andy Frear's Mad Max-alike Bronco smoked to a 15.9,
championship leader Nigel Henderson's Anglia ran 16.3, and Jamie
Hughes had bust the blown big-block Ford after last meeting and
replaced it with a six-pot Cummins turbo-diesel, running-in with a
19.8. Bum luck award and the first casualty was Paul Everitt, whose
Rover-powered Pop was pushed back off the line for dripping water –
it was only puddle water – and after drying it off, had clutch
issues and stalled on the line. Although he completed the run, he was
outside the 34-second cut-off so the timing computer put him down as
an aborted run and left him off the ladder. D'oh!
With the minimum of
dicking around (which was definitely a culture-shock for some), we
headed into round one. Fadster set the bar high with a 9.1 at 151mph,
just to show that the track was up to it. Tom profited from Phil's
misfortune, the Moggy no-showing to allow the Astra an uncontested
win, while Keith breezed to an 11.9 against Andy's 15.9. Doug showed
Shaun the way, 13.2 to 15.6, before Ian, getting well into his wild
launches, ran a 10.8 against Jamie's improving 17.9. James was lazy
on the line but still managed to drive around Andy, 13.9 to 15.9,
while Derek ran 11.7 to cover Nigel's 16.4. The first round was
concluded by Lee Openshaw pulling a stellar 0.509 light and 15.8 run,
but not enough to beat Paul's 13.6 in the opposing lane.
The biggest drama in
the second round happened in the fire-up lane, when Derek's TVR
suffered a stuck-open nitrous solenoid followed by a mighty bang that
blew the intake pipe and plenum apart and caused rapid weight-loss in
anyone standing nearby. The throttle butterfly was later found, bent
into an ellipse, so Derek was out, allowing Paul to run an
uncontested 13.7. In the battle of the MkII Cortinas, James cut a
good light and upped his game to a 12.8, but was no contest for Ian's
10.9 at 129mph. Keith and Doug had a race that looked closer than it
probably was, the win light coming on in Keith's lane, 11.8 to 12.3.
Tom's luck was about to run out in spectacular style, his 1.49 being
no contest for a breathtaking 8.26 at 175mph from the Twister, on a
track that had puddles on it just a couple of hours previously. Wow.
With the evening
wearing on and the welcome prospect of a big dinner hoving into sight
over the horizon, the semi-finalists were chivvied into the pairing
lanes. Proceedings began with Fadster's luck running out in style –
a hard launch damaged the transmission input shaft, which then
sheared on the gearshift. This meant he was coasting for at least
half the track, but it was a close thing – Keith only just managed
to catch him at the line, winning 11.7 at 117mph to 11.9 at 75mph. On
the other side of the ladder, Ian ran another stout 10.9 to finish
Paul's day and set himself up against Keith in the final.
It was 6.10pm by the
time the final was actually run, and many of us could almost smell
the carvery waiting for us 10 miles away. The two yellow perils
headed for the line, both Fords, both Ford-powered, but otherwise
very different. Their times weren't that different, though –
Keith's '32 got a four-tenths holeshot off the line and went pounding
off up the track, but the turbo 'Tina's mid-track boost let Ian catch
up and juuust squeak past at the line, 10.9 to 11.4. A close and
hard-fought race, but well-done to Ian.
Right, bugger all that
racing lark, it's dinner time! In dribs and drabs, most folk headed
off towards the Barnes Wallis after successfully navigating the lakes
on the entrance road. The Voyager developed another of its mystery
faults on the way, giving every indication of having run out of fuel
despite the fact that there was at least a quarter of a tank left.
Still, many thanks to Paul Everitt and family who were heading out in
the towcar, and who ran down to Howden to pick up a can of diesel for
us. Strangely, it did the trick.
After a damn fine
nosebag, we headed back to the track where we found that Andy and
Craig had shot off to John Sleath's Magical Emporium of the Arcane
and Esoteric and returned with another input shaft. There then
followed some real thrashing in the mud to get the gearbox refitted
which, to the credit of all involved, was achieved before some
well-earned drinking was taken care of. Top marks for effort.
Monday morning was a
world away from the previous day (apparently – I missed most of it)
and with all being dry and having a decent following breeze, it
looked like a stupendous day for racing. In any decent narrative, the
Twister crew should have been rewarded for their overnight work with
a 7.9 straight out of the box before going on to win the meeting.
Well, this isn't Disney and what actually happened was that the new
input shaft snapped like a cheese-string in the burnout, leaving Andy
plenty of time to pack up early.
This left the way
clear for Ian Walley to snatch pole position in qualifying. With
plenty of time to spool up on the line, there were some clues of what
was to come with monster launches and a 10.2 at 131mph. Steve
Neimantas had rolled up, minus the amazing Bentley but with a
drop-dead gorgeous black '68 Charger. Gasket, having reminded Steve
about the good old days in NSCC, sold him a race number and he caned
the big-inch Mopar to an 11.0 to take second spot. Keith rattled off
another 11.4 for third. Shaun Cockcroft was back with the smart
little MkII Escort Harrier, a 15.2 putting him mid-table.
Round one opened with
the closest race of the day, Lee's Punto and Tom's Astra. With
reaction times less than one hundredth of a second apart, Lee managed
a 14.97 to Tom's 15.03 to squeak the win. Keith was ever-improving,
his 11.3 at 115mph being plenty against Nigel's 16.0, while Paul's
little MR2 ended Andy Errington's day early 14.1 to 15.3. Andy then
went on to try his hand at Sportsman ET – we may have a star
bracket racer among us soon. James's fresh engine still wasn't
delivering the promised goods, but a 13.8 was enough to beat Gasket's
15.7, then Ian went out and ran 11.2 on his bye, just for the hell of
it. This was the first appearance of the mighty and
widely-photographed launch technique that saw the Cortina lift its
nearside front wheel three feet off the deck and twisting the shell
so that the front bumper was 45 degrees clockwise to the back bumper.
Andy's Bronco was not so much rollin' coal as bustin' blades, his
Cummins having developed an appetite for bits of its own turbo, so he
sat out leaving Doug to cruise to a 14.9 solo win. Phil's Moggy, now
cured, curtailed Shaun's brief reappearance 14.0 to 15.2, before the
beautiful Charger shut down the diesel Land Rover 11.0 to 16.3. It
turns out that Jamie had only been using third and fifth gear on the
strip thus far, so you can just bet there'll be more to come from
this before the year's out.
With a full complement
of RWYBers, the gaps between rounds was pretty lengthy, so it was a
while before the second round (which was also the quarter-finals
thanks to a 15-car ladder) kicked off. It started with an upset as
Steve's Charger picked up a puncture while waiting in the fire-up
lane that wasn't noticed until he reached the startline, so he backed
up and let Phil's Moggy take the solo win. Paul's MR2 had it all to
do against Keith's '32, but he blew it on the startline, red-lighting
while Keith streaked away to another 11.3. Ian's Cortina had to be
re-scrutineered after the wild round one launch, but he managed to
almost repeat the trick as he ran 11.6 to Lee's 14.9, then Doug and
James ran a close race, Doug getting to the line one tenth ahead on
almost identical times to set up the semis.
The semis were a
straightforward affair, which started with Ian and Doug. Ian was
trying to tone down his wild launches, while Doug was trying to take
it easy on the Skyline, but neither was giving an inch. It was Ian
who came out on top, with a 12.3 against a slowing 13.5 from Doug.
Keith wasn't taking it easy, however, his 11.4 being more than enough
against Phil's Moggy which appeared to be playing host to the
gremlins again at 16.1.
All this set up the
finals and sod me bandy if it wasn't those two yellow Fords again. It
was a good, clean race, Keith being slightly dozy on the line, and
his 11.5 not being enough to catch and pass Ian's 11.3. It's also
worth noting the turbo car's top-end charge – Keith crossed the
line at 113mph, Ian at 129mph. So a full complement of points from
the weekend for Ian, though he now has to go back to Darlington and
address his rear suspension issues. Twice the bridesmaid for Keith,
but still plenty more to come. A damn shame for the Twister team,
that seven at York being so close and yet still so far. And well done
to Doug, his lairy orange Skyline stretching out a hell of a lead at
the top of the table even at this early stage. The perfect
combination of muscle and streetability for NSCC … are we just
going to let the Jap have it? Will Derek's luck ever improve or did
he murder a Pope in a previous life? Is the Twister team sponsored by
Jack Daniels, or is it actually the other way around? What's it all
about? Is there any end in sight? All these questions and more
answered at the next round of NSCC, Spring bank holiday weekend.
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