Race Report - Rockingham

Second weekend, more damage

Rounds 3 & 4 Seat Cupra Championship (Supporting the British Touring Cars)

For Rounds 3 & 4 we headed to the Rockingham Motor Speedway Oval racing circuit in Northamptonshire on the weekend of the 21st and 22nd April 2007.

Round 3
We now seem to be getting to grips with the car and a good qualifying run left me with a second row position in grid slot four only three tenths of a second behind Freddy Nordstrom of Sweden, whom I had races against last year in the Mini Cooper Challenge. This obviously showed the quality of the drivers competing in the Mini Challenge.

However at the start of the race as has seemed to be the case in all of these races, mayhem ensued at turn 2 when an A Class car spun at the head of the field and whilst running in second place I made slight contact with both the leader and his brother, who was running in third place, resulting in me dropping down to seventh place via a trip to the gravel and also a safety car period for the race.

Once the safety car was brought in an epic four car battle ensued involving my nemesis and team mate Eric Bailey among others. However I was soon able to rise to third position and thereafter consolidated that position to obtain my first podium finish of the championship.


Round 4
After yet another good qualifying run I ended up in fifth place for the start, although regrettably this is on the inside of the circuit and at the first corner found myself trapped on the inside line in what can only be described as a scene from the M25 on a Friday afternoon. I was soon down to eight place but what ensued was by far the best battle, keeping the huge crowd and live TV coverage fully entertained for the majority of the race. The battle was between second place and sixth place with myself running a very close fourth position in the middle of the field. With Eric Bailey at the head of this battle in second place and driving very defensively there was little anyone could do. However impatience on my behalf resulted in me taking a lunge for third place on lap 11, although regrettably this ended in light contact and damage to my front end. As a result I had to retire from another good position.

However having only completed two of the four rounds so far, great potential has been shown and we would hope to continue to fight for podium positions throughout this steep learning curve.

The Seat Cupra Championship has been run since 2004 and has supported the British Touring Car Championship. In that time 20% of all drivers competing in the Championship have gone on to either compete in the World or British Touring Cars.