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2016 Track days

April 2016 Curborough

April 2016 Curborough

Curborough this time was an interesting day. As you will recall the last week of April had some rather unseasonal weather. Reports of airports being closed due to snow, gale force winds, hailstorms etc. Well on the 29th April Curborough Sprint course got the lot.

The day started off very cold, you certainly noticed it when getting the Tiger out of the garage at 6:10 in the morning. But the drive down was uneventful and mostly dry - there were a few bits of rain in the wind but nothing to speak of. I picked up the keys and got to the gate to find a couple of people already waiting, Gary Leacock with his Midget and Gordon Riseley with his MR2.

So I let them in and waited for the rest to arrive. By about 9:45 most of them had arrived we were just missing Bill Archer who had got slightly lost - but he made it by 10:30 so not too bad. Incidentally due to the weather forecast Steve Spencer came in his MX-5

The day started with a sighting lap and then everyone was off, almost. An hour into the track being open and the heavens opened and it hailed. The hail was so bad it filled the cars with ice, and the MEV’s passenger seat looked like an ice tray. Ten minutes later it stopped and the sun came out. A few minutes after that all the hail had melted away.

Due to the wind this pattern of weather (not always hail but rain as well) kept repeating during the day.

Midway through the morning there was another late arrival - I had been contacted by the course organiser that a world rallycross team wanted to do some test runs and could we accommodate them. I had agreed to this as we only had 10 cars running. They turned up with an (in their words) underpowered 450bhp Mini. When that did a standing start it just disappeared. I think through the day they only did about 6 runs and then went home (but as they paid I didn’t mind).

There were a couple of mechanical issues (could you imagine a day without them). Gary Leacock’s Midget broke its clutch with a blown seal and ended the day early.

Matt Wittock’s Super 6 sprang a hose leak and then became slightly incontinent so left early to avoid any further damage.

That was all though. During the afternoon people started leaving and for the last hour there were only 3 of us and the circuit was dry and warm.

For the new people who hadn’t been before it was probably an interesting introduction but gave them a chance to stretch the cars in a low risk environment.

Finally I am not sure how this happened but I drove home on a Friday night before a bank holiday and didn’t get caught in any traffic jams!