Well an early start on Friday morning saw me picking up theminforums resident photographer, Miss Bean at 6.30 am. We then made our way up north to Oulton Park.
We reached the race circuit in time to help setup the marquee for the cars with the ZCars guys and Stiggy. Once that was done it was time to get the rest of the kit ready and take some photos of the Sprint shell.
The first test run for the sprint was a little shorter than expected as the car was a little too light...of oil. That was soon fixed but and the car was ready for the next test run. This time the Sprint was out on the track for a full test and it was running brilliantly apart from a slight noise from the rear nearside wheel. This turned out to be a play in the bearing and after a bit of investigation it seemed that the bearing needed to be modified, so Chris rushed off to a local machine shop. The problem turned out to be the bearing race was too large so after a bit of fettling it was sorted. The corrected bearing was then replaced and the problem solved.
The other ZCars performed well and it was great to see the mini battling with the Caterhams (and other nice cars!) on the track.
The ZCars Monte Carlo and...
Saturday
Another early start and the Sprint was prepped for scruitinering which proved to be no problem. Qualification saw a good result for the ZCars lot and it was all set to be a great race.
You can almost see Chris's grin!
For the start myself and Bean managed to get into the Media viewing box. As the lights changed, the Sprint got a great start and surged through the grid until it all seemed to be happening a bit slower.
When Chris got the Sprint back to the pits it became apparent that it was not good. Investigation later on proved that it was a sheared cv (cv failure), unfortunately not a quick fix.
Mark the ex Touring driver (In the black ZCar) had a great start for the first race. He was really flying round the track but a bit of a bump saw him without a front wheel (not great for the whole driving fast thing). The mini was brought back to the pits and the gang there managed to de-mangle, scrounge and fix the wheel back on (Thanks to Stiggy, Mark, The Matt and co. – Oh yes and the go kart guys that lent us a lump hammer!?)
The car was in the running for the final race of the day along with the two other ZCars. Mark started on the grid in 12th and after some furious racing (with a tiny bit of rubbing) the was 3rd, just behind last years class champion and runner up! A pretty good result for his first day racing in a ZCar.
The other ZCars performed well and by the looks of the driver’s faces at the end of the race they certainly had enjoyed themselves.
The cars were packed away and a friend of mine that I hadn’t seen for a couple of years managed to come to see the sprint. He works for Bentley and was “testing� a car for the weekend which I in no way drove round the car park and definitely didn’t get told off by a marshal for going too fast.
