British GT Championship – Brands Hatch Title Showdown – Test Day
Fun In The Sun

Autumn seems to have arrived all of a sudden, but it was glorious weather again at Brands Hatch: David Lord reckons he hasn’t got wet once this season, photographing the British GT Championship. A sprinkle during an F3 session (or race – he can’t remember) is all we’ve had. He has got drenched at Spa, twice, and Sebring though.

There were three sessions today, the first three of forty minutes, the last one 50: all three were interrupted by red flags, one as early as the out lap! We left 10 minutes before the end of the last session: just not enough time to wait until the end, then wait for the times to come out. Typically, some teams were using new rubber in the last session, but not all of them found the right circumstances to make use of them. Jamie Derbyshire (Balfe Mosler): “I’d been following him (Le Bas in the Corvette) for half a lap, flashed my lights into Druids, was three-quarters alongside and he turned in on me. The nose was ripped off and radiators damaged. The frustrating thing was not getting to use the new rubber.”

Shaun Balfe had been fastest in each of the first two sessions – with almost identical times. 1:28.609 and 1:28.698.

Martin Short had taken “all of yesterday” to find the set-up he wanted for Brands on the Rollcentre Mosler, then found that the circuit had changed a little today, and the set-up needed slight adjustments. In session two, a stone flicked off the water pump belt – so that was the two Moslers getting their bad luck out of the way early – they hope.

At Eclipse, all was going to plan. Shane Lynch was incredibly relaxed, Piers Johnson too, but they would have liked to have been a little quicker. “A high 1:29 on old rubber,” from Piers would have been a low 29 without traffic. There were a good number of TVR Tuscans (not Rs) using the track too, so it was fairly busy out there.

“Whatever happens is going to happen: I’ll just do my best,” said Shane Lynch. My grandmother used to say something very similar. But why do you arrive at the circuit in an H registered Ford Transit, Shane? “I’ve done Porsches and Ferraris, I just like driving a Transit.” Fair enough.

“It’s rev. limiter to the max. for us on Sunday (in the Eclipse Tuscan R, not the Transit) – we’ve got nothing to lose.

"This weekend is a big bonus for us. If someone had offered us third place in the Championship at the start of the season, I would have said ‘f***ing great’. We’re going flat out, whatever happens.”

Lynch and Johnson have a chance of doing better than third by about 16.00 on Sunday.

The order at the end of the first session was Balfe Mosler, Barff / Caine DeWalt TVR, Point Prep. 911 GT2, (no time for Rollcentre’s Mosler, but in here somewhere), Eclipse TVR, Xero Corvette, Damax Ferrari, Glenn Eagling Mantis, Berridge / Stretton DeWalt TVR – and then a surprise.

We didn’t catch up with the driver all day – he always seemed to be in the car – but Warren Carway was fastest in the Cup Class, in the Charlton Lotus Elise, the Honda powered example. A 1:34.263 was mightily impressive from the former Pilbeam SR2 man. It wouldn’t be fastest in class at the end of the day – that honour went to Matt Griffin.

Pat Pearce was first out in the #76 car this morning, once he exchanged one of his two right handed driving gloves for a left (!) and he was hoping for rain on Sunday. “If it rains I think we can get on the overall podium.”

Notice the sticker on the nose of the #76 Porsche.

This car’s clutch problem at Spa was traced to a stone in the bellhousing, which had flicked off the plate which supports the main shaft, causing the operating fork to work at an odd angle, which overheated the slave cylinder and eventually left the gearbox jammed in sixth. “The first mechanical problem we’ve had with this car since we’ve had it,” explained team boss Phil Hindley.

Pearce and Griffin are obviously out to make it nine wins from 11 starts on Sunday, and the Irishman’s 1:32.9 in the afternoon session was 1.7 seconds quicker than anyone else. Without any times, we can’t tell you who was second on the day, alas. Unusually, MST haven’t posted them on the web.

Let’s stay with Porsches for a moment: Mike Youles was present – what a pleasant surprise to see the joint 2001 ELMS GT Champion – to partner Peter Cook in the latter’s 911 GT2, the re-shelled car that had such a dramatic crash at Castle Combe last year. It looked like new, and Youles was carefully not posting any blinding times…”I’m having great fun,” he said, as the pair of us admired the smoke curling off the brakes of the 993. Your favourite corner here? “Everyone tends to say Paddock, but I like Surtees: you have to be patient on the way in, and turn in late, but if you get it right you really gain speed down all the way the straight into Hawthorns.” This car will definitely have to stop for fuel on Sunday.

Still on 911s, Jeff Wyatt was having his first ever experience (“on road or track”) in a Porsche, in Nick Staveley’s #78 Cup car, and thoroughly enjoyed his first try. “1:40” in the morning became “1:38” in the second session, “with plenty more to come.” Did it bite back? “I tried some oversteer round Druids, and it was really enjoyable, and easy to control. I hadn’t even found the brakes this morning.”

Someone else trying oversteer was Peter Le Bas in the yellow Corvette: David Lord caught him at it at Surtees (slow in Peter?), but as Dave Beecroft pointed out, “No you can’t have a new set of tyres: you grained one of the rears because you went too fast too soon.”

The Irishman (right) couldn’t find his lucky red balaclava, so he went out for the second session wearing “my lucky white one. I did two bank robberies wearing it and never got caught!” We think he was joking.

There were very few mechanical ailments during the day, but Rob Barff and Michael Caine had one of them, in the #91 DeWalt TVR: “It’s fuel pressure or a pickup problem, whatever sounds better to you,” said ‘Barffy’. The black and yellow cars certainly sounded great, a harsh bark as they swept around the scenic track.

So why was Bob Berridge partnering his partner Amanda Stretton in the ’92 car? And why had the cars been withdrawn from Petit Le Mans?

“I’ve got a financial involvement in the team,” said Berridge. “The whole game plan is about getting invited back to Le Mans. We’re planning to enter the whole of the LMES, and the 24 Hours. GTS is where the manufacturers are right now, and prototypes are incredibly expensive, but in this (GT) category we’re up against 50 years of evolution. But with TVR’s Britishness and fan involvement, it’s a very strong brand – especially in DeWalt colours. Richard (Stanton) has done a very good job getting this team to where it is now.”

While discussing the Donington FIA SCC race (Berridge’s Lola had a driveshaft fail with minutes left “it was lifed at 30 hours and it had done 32”) and the Spa 1000 Kms it became apparent that we had done a disservice to the efforts of Amanda Stretton and Liz Halliday in the Cup winning GruppeM / Tech 9 Porsche. Amanda apparently left Phil Hindley “gobsmacked” with her pace in the drizzle two thirds of the way into the race. Well done both ladies.

Berridge let on that Amanda will be part of a project next year which now has a name: “Les Femmes Pour Le Mans”. More about this in due course. The BBC spent the day making a documentary about the ladies' project.

Hindley’s Tech 9 won’t now be going to Bathurst, but Morgan pair Neil Cunningham and Adam (Ad) Sharpe will. They’ll be racing a Maserati Trofeo with Rod and Rick (no relation) Wilson – “and we’ll have the rev limit raised, but we still expect the car to be running as well at the end as it’ll run at the start,” said Cunningham. He was urging Sharpe on to better times in the afternoon in the #66 Morgan: “He’s going really well, especially as he’s had so little time in the car today.” (the pair of them below) Henry Taylor had some of the seat time, although he won’t be racing on Sunday.

Not doing Bathurst either are Stuart Scott and Steve Wood. “We’re just not confident that we’ve got the reliability to tackle 24 hours. We haven’t finished the last three races,” explained Scott. The Golf’s problem at Spa was the gearbox “eating first and second, which was odd because we weren’t using either gear – we were taking La Source in third.”

Bert Taylor’s CDL is doing Bathurst though. “It’s the end of season, we’re going to have some fun and see how we get on,” informed Gareth Evans. That’s the spirit!

At the front of the grid on Sunday, we’ll probably find five cars: the three Championship contenders, the #91 Barff / Caine TVR – and the PP 911 GT2. Mike Youles has been on pole in such a car before here (was it six or seven years ago?) – what’s he going to do in Qualifying? Or will Peter Cook set the time? Saturday is likely to be just as interesting as Friday was. It’s a great circuit, and a great grid in prospect.
MC

Last image - of Ian Flux. The FIA SCC SR2 winner at Nogaro was present today, but not driving. We'd love to see him back in a GT car.