| Race report by Ryan Donovan |
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| The easter weekend,15th-17th of april brought us one of the largest and impressive meetings of the year here in the uk and with that in mind,a big thankyou and well done goes out to all the people involved in the preparation and running of the meeting,superb job. |
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| We arrived mid afternoon on the friday before the saturdays practice to ensure we got a good pitting area and camping plot,my first impression was much better than what i was expecting and that was before we even entered the arena,once inside that was it i wanted to hit the track and get some air time,now i couldnâ™t wait till the morning,with that in mind i decided to get an early night so i was nice and fresh for the 4 rounds of practice the following morning. |
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| Saturday morning arrived and the practice heats begun,with 4 rounds of 5 minutes to play with,this meant loads of tracktime and the opportunity to change the car without worrying about the outcome,this would also be my debut meeting with a new engine/fuel and servos package which consisted of the nosram rs engine,tornado fuel and the thunder tiger servos which fellow team mate jon hazlewood (xray) has been using and has given great reports about,after speaking to jon in the morning about his setup,i had a few options open to try during the day,we also decided to make full use of the practice sessions and pit during the 5 minutes given,to fine tune the engine so it was at optimum performance for Sundays qualifying. |
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| All we needed to be looking at was lap times and not overall position,as that is what i see practice for,so to round 1 and the car felt good already,the servos felt awesome and the engine and fuel seemed to be working well too,round 2 and we decided to run a 13t clutchbell to help with the approach to the many jumps on the track,this helped considerably and could now clear the many doubles with ease,aswell as that we changed to short wheelbase and dialed the shocks in as it wasnâ™t bumpy and just needed the car to change direction quicker,this also seemed to work and the lap times showed it too,the engine was also getting quicker by the minute as we gradually leaned it off during the sessions,round 3 and now that i was 100% happy with the car it was time to try some drastic changes that had been recommended by fellow team mate jon hazlewood (xray). |
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| We decided to give it a try and change the oils in the diffs to something we wouldnâ™t normally run which resulted in 7000 front,5000 centre,10000 rear and also remove the front roll bar completely to balance it out and âśo my godâť it was awesome,now that i felt 110% happy with the car and the engine was good but still a little rich we decided not to change a thing for the last round of practice and get a full 5 minutes on the track,feelings at the end of the day was,extremely happy with car,engine,fuel and servos and couldnâ™t wait to hit the track again. |
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| Sunday morning and 5 rounds of qualifying lied ahead with the best 3 to count,round 1 and i just missed tq by 0.58 of a second to graham alsop,third was jon hazlewood (xray) it was only the top three to put 9 laps in this round,also in the top ten was matthew perry (xray) in eighth and justin mackey (hot bodies/nosram/tornado) in tenth,round 2 and the only thing i changed was to have some new tyres on which paid off as i was to set tq in that round with another 9 lapper,second was jon hazlewood (xray) also with a 9 lapper,it was only the top 2 in this round to put 9 lappers in,justin mackey (hot bodies/nosram/tornado) managed to get in the top ten again finishing tenth in the round,round 3 and this time it was swedens driver linus thern to take tq is this round. |
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| Jon hazlewood (xray) took second and myself in third,it was the top 5 drivers is this round to all put 9 lappers in,at the end of the 3 rounds of qualifying it was an xray 1,2 overall with myself taking the top spot and jon hazlewood (xray) taking the second spot,also in the top ten overall was justin mackey (hot bodies/nosram/tornado) in ninth place,round 4 and time for another set of new tyres but this time only managed a fifth in the round,it was again linus thern taking the tq in this round with jon hazlewood (xray) taking third,it was the top 7 is this round to all put 9 lappers in,this now meant it was extremely close at the top between myself,linus thern and jon hazlewood (xray),tq overall could go anyway which meant it would go down to the last round of qualifying,round 5 and the last of the day,it was linus thern to go out first and fortunately he had a bad run and only managed an 18th in the round,it was jon hazlewood (xray) to go out next and he put in a good time with another 9 lapper,next it was myself to go out and try and beat that time set of jon hazlewood (xray),unfortunately i missed it by 5 seconds which meant it would be jon hazlewood (xray) that took tq overall unless someone went quicker than him in the last heat of the day and unbelievably they did,it was steve haynes who took tq in the last round with his fastest time of the day,talk about leaving it to the last minute,so the last round finished like this,steve haynes took tq with jon hazlewood (xray) taking second and myself in third,it was only the top 3 in this round to put 9 lappers in,so with steve haynes taking that 1 extra valuable tq point away from jon hazlewood (xray) in the last round that would leave him 1 point shy of tying with myself and linus thern on 595 points,because myselfs next 2 best results was a fifth and a third and linus therns was a fifth and an 18th,that crucial last round paid costly for linus thern,which meant it was myself to take tq overall and secure pole position in the main final the following day,jon hazlewood (xray) took third overall. |
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| Monday and it was to be a relaxing day for myself having already secured my place in the final,it would be the top 6 out of each semi final to progress to the main final including the fastest 7th out of the two finals to make it a 14 car main final,first up was semi b and the top 6 places went to jon hazlewood (xray),elliot boots,steve haynes,mike craddock,frederik mathiesen and the last spot went to justin mackey (hot bodies/nosram/tornado) to semi a and the top 6 places went to graham alsop,linus thern,david crompton,dave bailey,john holmes and the last spot went to brennan ralls,the fastest 7th out of the two semis went to matt perry (xray) just 4 seconds quicker than the 7th place driver out of the other semi,so we had 3 xrays in the main final,myself on pole,jon hazlewood in second and matt perry in 14th,justin mackey (hot bodies/nosram/tornado) was also in the main final in 13th,to the main final of the day which would be 45 minutes duration and i couldnâ™t of wished for a better first lap. |
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| I had pulled half the straight lead on the cars behind and then on the second lap made a mistake on the far left doubles needing to be marshalled,the marshall tried his best but unfortunately due to the flying cars he had to wait for a few to go by,i rejoined half way down the order but soon made places back up but to make yet another mistake,just too many mistakes in the final for me,jon hazlewood (xray) took the lead on the second lap and never looked back winning comfortably lapping the whole field 3 times,myself finished in fifth,matt perry (xray) finished in tenth and justin mackey (hot bodies/nosram/tornado) finished in twelfth. |
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Everyone was pleased with their results and all the cars performed well,good result for the xray/mirage team,looking forward to the next meeting which will be the second round of the brca nationals at mold (north wales) on the 23/4/06.
Ryan Donovan |
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