UK Formula Ford Championship
OULTON DONINGTON SNETTERTON BRANDS ROCKINGHAM
BRANDS_GP KNOCKHILL SILVERSTONE THRUXTON COMBE

Graham's weblog: 25th September: Silverstone

Good news & bad news
Our 55 point lead after Knockhill, meant that things were getting exciting. With only 6 races over 3 meetings left in the scholarship, the dream was very much alive. That was the good news. The bad news was that these 3 events were at Silverstone, Thruxton and Castle Combe, which would mean 2500 miles for the truck, 12 days away in three weeks for the team, and no time to sort anything if things went wrong. Just to add to our problems, testing is limited at Silverstone and David had not been able to go to the test day so was a Silverstone "virgin"

The home of British Motorsport
I like Silverstone. It is a good place to be, especially if the F1 boys are in town. As luck would have it, the week previously had seen an official test session, and we arrived just as the teams were packing up to leave. Renault, Williams and Toyota were putting their toys back in the box when we finally got into the paddock, after having spent 90 minutes sitting outside the main entrance for no apparent reason.

After we got the awning up, and got our things in order, it was off for a look round the pit garages. Nobody got too excited until you got close to the cars, since there were covers over everything, with nothing to see. However, when Kenny stuck his head in a Toyota for a split second, all hell broke loose with a security guard running over to chase him away. After everyone had gone I hung about watching the truckies for the F3 and GTs park up. In one of the garages there were a couple of guys from Williams sitting waiting for their truck to return to pick up a few “interesting” spares. I will say no more about it except to say that I had stumbled into next years project. The boys were a couple of nice guys and we had a good chat about F1 and their experiences, good craic and all very interesting.

Qualifying
Friday morning saw an early start. No breakfast, because the cook was away getting a lesson on how to drive the circuit. It obviously worked, because in the first session he was going well in the wet. Session two was a disaster as the rain came pouring down. We got one flying lap before it was red flagged. We ended up with only 12 laps of Silverstone before it was straight into qualifying. The boy is fighting with one arm behind his back. What can you do? Nothing seems to matter matters to David, as he was straight on a decent pace, and was on pole midway through the session. It did not last as other, more experienced drivers increased their pace. There was not much in it at the end, which saw the Scholarship class guys all together on the grid. Kenny and I were delighted with the result because we know David can race and chances are that if he is in touch at the start he will win by the finish.

Race one
The race was a disaster for a lot of people as a pile up on the first lap took out 6 cars. We should have been the seventh, but luck was on our side and despite tyre marks on the engine cover, wishbones and nose, giving away how close we had come to being a non finisher, David managed to keep going. A safety car period helped, but in truth 7 competitive laps is not much of a race. A strong drive from the back of the grid saw David rewarded with second Scholarship car home and fastest lap.

Race two
This was a stroll. We had warned David to keep out of trouble in the early laps because the track was still damp, and this he did. Others were not so lucky as two of our class rivals crashed out under the pressure. It was a lonely, nerve-wracking run home to our third win of the campaign. Sweeter still was the fact that we left Silverstone with an 87 point lead. Kenny’s smile says it all. Ya dancer!

Next race: THRUXTON

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