On Friday 6th October, twenty five UniRoyal FunCup "Beetles" assembled at the fantastic Oulton Park circuit in the heart of Cheshire, to contest the final round of the 2006 championship.
With Friday dedicated to testing, the #190 Cuisine de France car had an intensive series of suspension changes planned, in an attempt to close the gap to the speed of the JPR car which was clearly at an advantage in the recent 25 hour race at Spa Francorchamps in Belgium. The weather did not play into the team's hands however, with the sessions often red-flagged as other cars visited the numerous gravel traps around this tricky race track.
Pete took the bulk of testing duties, and reported difficulties with unpredictable oversteer in most of the right hand corners, especially in wet conditions, a characteristic also noted when Marc and Ian took the wheel later in the day. Various "cures" were tried but it was not until Qualifying on Saturday morning that a big step forward was made, a legacy of the team de-brief the previous evening.
Although the skies dawned blue on Saturday, the track was still damp, but Ian was able to go out and, despite having minimal running the previous day, he put the car at the top of the time sheets! Ian reported a good balance in the car and this was backed up by Peter when he took the wheel. At this stage it was important to be out on track as the damp surface was drying and the times tumbling. Finally Marc was strapped in with much of the track in sunshine (with the notable exception of a lethal Druids), and the 190 car looked certain of a top six qualifying time. However, a slight touch of the kerbs through the awesome Cascades corner threw the car off the track and across the grass where an evil ditch removed the front splitter (critical for aerodynamic balance).
With no time to replace the damaged bodywork, Peter took the car back out to assess the handling and despite the lack of a splitter, he was able to lap a second quicker than the dry lap times of the previous day, again a testimony to the set up changes made overnight. Nevertheless the other less aerodynamically-challenged cars were lapping more than two seconds faster at that time. Fortunately the FunCup utilizes a random grid draw, and so the lap times were not so critical: the 190 car would start in tenth place.
It was decided that Peter would take the first stint, followed by Marc and then Ian. Each driver would run two 40 minute stints, as mandated by the championship rules (refuelling only being allowed within 10 minutes of these 40 minute windows). With nine cars ahead on the grid, the critical issue would be to get through the melee of the first laps without damage.
"I haven't started one of these cars before so I was picking up tips from Ian and Marc. It worked perfectly: I got off the line with almost no wheelspin and was able to squeeze between the two cars on the row ahead, before moving right and up the inside of a couple more into Old Hall. To be honest, it was hard to recall which cars were where, but I know I got another down into Cascades and was up into 4th place by Hizzy's Chicane. I have never had such a good first lap at Oulton!!"
The good work continued with Pete moving up to 3rd on lap 2, and 2nd on lap 3, whereupon he started to close down the leading car of JPR1. With the rest of the pack squabbling behind, these two were able to pull away, and the gap between them was reduced very slightly every lap. However, the #98 Wings FST car began to draw closer to the leading duo towards the half hour mark, pulling the #103 JPR3 car with it.
"I was absolutely maxing out the car, turning in low 2:07 laps (a second faster than the car's previous fastest time) but they were quicker. Once they got in my draft, they were all over me, but I didn't want to start defending too strongly because we would have lost touch with JPR1. As it happens, O'Brien in JPR3 took the #98 car off at Cascades so that gave me a bit of a breather and I could close on JPR1 again. But then O'Brien caught us again and threw it up the inside into Old Hall a couple of times. He eventually made it past but saw fit to drive me off the track on the exit, which was pretty amateurish, and I lost the car on the wet grass. It was just a quick 360 but it dropped us down to 4th place, which we kept to the end of the stint".
The safety car was deployed just around the 40 minute mark, due to a car in the wall at Island Bend, and the leaders all dived into the pits to take advantage of the first re-fuelling window. Peter was no exception and handed over to Marc, the team's excellent pit-work jumping the car back up to third place. However, the broad smiles would soon turn to grimaces as, on the re-start, Marc was unfortunate to get sandwiched between two cars (one a backmarker!) at Old Hall, the slight impact ripping out the valve of the rear left tyre and bouncing the car up into the air.
Marc brought the car back to the pits safely, and the team sprang into action to change the tyre, but it was apparent as soon as he rejoined that all was not well. The suspension had clearly been bent in the incident, and the car was oversteering wildly in the fast right hand corners, and struggling for traction. Whilst spectacular, this is not a rapid method of driving, and a further pitstop had to be made whilst the mechanics investigated what could be done. It was clear the hub was bent, and some quick adjustment of the rear geometry was carried out to try to dial out the damage. Marc went out again to complete his stint and it was clear from his body language that the car was far from ideal.
Nevertheless, Marc persevered and Ian took over shortly after the 80 minute mark. Watching from the pit wall, the team could observe the car fish-tailing as Ian turned into Old Hall corner, not the best place to experience this effect! Ian stayed out of trouble and handed over to Pete as scheduled.
"I knew the next stint was going to be grim from what I'd seen of Ian's laps, but when I got in it, I was amazed how bad it had become - the car could have won a drift championship! It was oversteering even behind the safety car, and when it was running at speed, you hardly had to turn the wheel and it would be sliding. As Ian had, I had to find a completely different style of driving, just to keep in on the road, let alone at a reasonable lap time. Even during that stint, I could feel the rear left tyre degrading so I decided to take it a bit easier towards the end to make sure there was still something left to drive for Marc and Ian's last stints."
Marc emerged from his second stint looking similarly amazed, having suffered from massive traction of oversteer problems, obviously questioning the sense in continuing with the car now four laps in arrears. Ian finally took that difficult decision after a series of hairy laps when the rear tyre finally gave up the ghost and pitched the car into a spin at the chicane just before Hill Top.
"This wasn't the result we hoped for but on the positive side, we found a lot of time in the car. We were able to stay with JPR1 (the eventual winner) before the car was damaged, and we could not do this back in Spa. I hope Ian and Marc will have me back some time in the future, hopefully also with Richard who couldn't join us at Oulton, as there is clearly more time to come from the Cuisine de France car."
