British GT – Rockingham – GTO Race Report
Race Pattern Follows Form

It was hot, it was virtually packed, it was an entertaining race meeting – so why did we have only 18 cars on the grid? This was surely an ideal opportunity to demonstrate to sponsors that all is not wrong with British Motor Sport. Well done Rockingham and SEAT for bringing in more spectators than ever seen here before. Well done the 18 who were here.

Some of the spectators drifted away to other attractions before the end of this 75 minute event – and as in the Cup Class, but more so, it really was status quo after the pit stops. The order then was the order at the end, with Shaun Balfe and Jamie Derbyshire returning to their winning ways, the Eclipse TVR second and Rollcentre’s Mosler third – which bunches up the points at the top of the table even more.

The car that Balfe and Derbyshire didn’t have to worry about was the Colin Blower GT Class Ultima: Jay Shepherd allowed Derbyshire to lead into and through Turn 1 and most of the way round lap 1, but pressed at the final hairpin and powered past through the flat out Turn 4 at the end of the lap.

Showing utmost care but a very good turn of speed, Shepherd eased away to a nine second lead at ten laps. His best lap was a 1:37.918 on lap 2, which left Jamie Derbyshire to fend off Shane Lynch. If the Rollcentre plan was to beat the orange and blue TVR, it didn’t look like it, as Tom Herridge drifted back from these two in fourth, initially under pressure from a charging Peter Le Bas, in the Corvette. Here’s a man who loves his racing: “I hate it when I have to pit at the end of a stint, I hate it when it’s the end of a race if I’m second in the car – I just want to keep going.” Alas the Corvette didn’t. “Not enough air flow to the power steering,” explained Dave Beecroft, “it simply overheated and blew a seal.”

Le Bas is tough, “but it was like a ratchet – very stiff, then it would suddenly turn. I couldn’t drive it like that. I just couldn’t.”

Unfortunately that was two down, because the blue Ultima lost oil pressure at the end of lap 1. The paddock head rebuild hadn’t worked. With Dan Eagling driving alone, in a Mantis that was a real handful - he pitted early suspecting a puncture, which didn’t exist – we lost the third after 24 laps, poor Dan taken to the medical centre with heat exhaustion. “They’ll get the right stuff into him and he’ll be OK,” said his Dad Glenn. Dan had raced well from the back of the grid, up to the #76 Cup leader by the time of his lap 5 first pit visit.

So we had three TVRs, two Moslers and the GT class Ultima left in the race. Until the stops, there was always something to watch for. Lynch was well in touch with Derbyshire for eight laps or so, then dropped back a little, while Herridge was under pressure all the way to the lap 18 stops of both he and John Hartshorne in the Peninsula TVR: this was Hartshorne’s best GT race performance. The gap was typically half a second all the way, red and black TVR following blue and white Mosler into the pits for a pit stop competition – which Rollcentre won by about three seconds. Short was now ahead of Graeme Mundy, and that was that race within a race sorted out. Short was heading for third at the flag – in the class and overall.

Jay Shepherd (and then Colin Blower) wouldn’t be a threat because a) this is a GT class car and therefore b) it would have to stop for fuel and be stationary for a full two minutes. It turned out to be longer than that. Shepherd pitted after 21 laps, but he was aware that there could be a problem with the car. “I felt a knocking through Turn 4, and then the car understeered wide on one of the infield corners. Maybe that was oil, but I was unsure whether the two were connected. Colin is so short of a budget we couldn’t risk damaging the car, so we lost time checking it over. Colin said it was fine though, but we had to be sure there wasn’t a problem. In fact the car was superb, the best drive I’ve ever had.”

Changing a wheel and general checking, plus the two minutes, meant that Blower was two laps down when he finally went racing.

Derbyshire and Lynch had actually followed Shepherd in after 21 laps, but good stops from Balfe Motorsport and Eclipse saw Piers Johnson seven seconds behind Shaun Balfe as they left, down from nine as the cars entered pit lane.

“But we knew we weren’t a match for Shaun in the red Mosler,” explained Piers Johnson afterwards. “The crew were giving me gaps back to Martin. Second was a very satisfactory result, and splitting the Moslers too – especially with the clutch trouble this morning.” Seven seconds became 23 over the remaining 23 laps, and then a neat 20 at the flag as Balfe eased off.

Similarly, Shorty was easing away from Graeme Mundy in #23, three seconds eventually growing to 24 at the flag. Johnson to Short grew from 11 seconds to 17. It was stalemate.

The other two were the silver Ultima and the CDL TVR. Gareth Evans in the latter had had a spin while in sixth place on lap 11, dropping behind Patrick Pearce in the Cup lead. Evans pitted on the same lap as Herridge and Hartshorne, and CDL got Steve Hyde out very quickly – but Hyde had no one to chase…at least no one within reach. He raced hard to the end, lapped by Balfe on lap 28, but staying in touch with the winner thereafter.

The only other incident of note was that although Colin Blower went two laps down to a flying Balfe soon after the start of Shaun’s stint, he stayed in touch and unlapped himself as Balfe apparently became aware that Johnson wasn’t a threat.

David Addison was feverishly looking for a gap that might close up by the end – but try as he might, there wasn’t one. It was a routine sort of race to end the day, when the GTs had a chance to really thrill the huge crowd. Sometimes races just don’t come together…..

We reckon the points are now Herridge on 153, Lynch / Johnson 151 and Balfe Derbyshire 139.

“We came to Rockingham with the intention of returning to the top of the winner’s podium and we achieved everything we set out to do this weekend,” said Shaun Balfe. Yup, mission accomplished.
MC