Race Report - Oulton Park 25th September 2004 (Derby Phoenix)

I was really looking forward to this meeting for several reasons.  Oulton Park is where I did my first ever track day in 2001 and it has to be my second favourite circuit in the country (Cadwell being top of the list).  Add to this the good experience I got there at the MRO round in May and the fact that this meeting starts a run in to the end of my season that includes Donington and then Silverstone (all in successive weekends) and you can see why I was so happy to be going there.  Also, Derby Phoenix is a very relaxed and friendly club (if a little disorganised!) and I was looking forward to seeing some friends around the place.

We left Lesley's house (Sutton Coldfield) at around 6.30pm Friday to travel up the M6, hoping to get there for around 8.30pm.  Typically, the motorway was traffic jams throughout the entire journey from junction 12 where we joined it until junction 18 when we got off, meaning we didn't actually arrive at Oulton until gone 9pm and it was another 20 minutes or so before we had found somewhere near our allocated garage.  Still, at least having a garage meant we didn't need to set the awning up and it wasn't too long before we had unloaded and we were both sitting down supping bottles of Stella ad tucking into some hot burgers Lesley had cooked up in the caravan.

I'd found out a couple of days before the meeting that all bikes had to be noise tested before they would be allowed on circuit, so I got up early (unusual and not easy for me!) to get sorted out in good time.  Scrutineering was easy enough and very little queuing involved there, but the noise testing was being carried out by just one person with one meter and wouldn't start until 8.15am.  This meant absolute chaos as around 150-200 bikes lined up to be tested, with only 45 minutes to go before the first practice session!  I got tested ok and signed on, then returned to the bike to decide which tyres to go for......it had rained a lot through the night and whilst it was drying now, the clouds were still threatening and the track was still pretty damp.  I decided to leave the dry tyres on as it seemed to be a lot better, but typically it started raining again while I was in the holding area and the track was soaked by the time I got out.  I did the three laps I needed to do and came in rather than risk staying out.

First up was the Allcomers Heat, which was race 3 in the programme and it had mostly dried up again, so I went for intermediates.  Although I'd entered this race in my original application, I'm not a big fan of the format (any bike, any size, all abilities...throw into three heats!) so I did write to the club a while ago to pull out of it......but disorganised as they are they entered me anyway!  I'd been chatting to Dan Hobson in the queue for noise testing and he said that he wasn't keen on this race either, so was going to start at the back of the grid irrespective of allocated grid space and then go round at this own pace to use it as practice for the Formula 400 race.  It sounded like a good idea, so I joined him and we both sat right at the back of the grid and watched them all go off.  Dan pulled away gently, but I decided to get off the line quickly and get through as many of the 'less predictable' riders as possible and then just take it steady to stay out of trouble.  The first lap was pandemonium, with bikes everywhere and some very, err, interesting riding techniques!  I just decided to pick them off one at a time and being on inters I wasn't going as fast as I could have bee anyway.  Dan came past me on the penultimate lap and I finished the race in 27th place with a 2:01.61 lap.

My next race was race 5 in the programme, so it was back into the garage for a quick wheel change to put the dry tyres on and a splash of fuel before I went out again.  I got around to the holding area and then onto the grid into my allocated 7th grid place, looking forward to a good start and hopefully a good result too.  But just as the flag marshal sent us off for the warm up lap, my bike died and wouldn't rev.  I looked down and could see I'd left the fuel off, so pushed it to the side and tried to get it going again.  It wasn't having it and even though it would start it just refused to rev.  It got a bit better and I was allowed off for the warm up, but it was running very badly and as I got further round it seemed to be getting worse.  Eventually, I got back round to the grid, but it was no good and I had to pull into the pits and my race was ended before it had even begun.  Nightmare!!......a great grid position and a great chance to finish in the top 5 and I record a DNS! 

I soon found the problem to be fuel starvation and Lesley and I spent the next two hours stripping the carburetors to clean out huge amounts of gunge from the float bowls, needle jets and filters before putting it back together again with about 10 minutes to spare before the next (F400) race.  The weather was good so I stayed with the dry tyres and went out to the holding area.  It was running ok (albeit I'd not left any slack in the throttle cable so it was idling at about 4,000 rpm!) and the warm up lap didn't show any signs of trouble, but because I hadn't completed the first F400 race my grid place was at the very back in 37th place!  I lined up and gave it plenty off the line to get away quickly and probably up in the top 25 at the first corner.  By the end of the first lap I was 12th and looking good for a top 10, albeit this was only a 4 lap race so I still had work to do.  I carried on riding hard and passed a few more people, before eventually going past the likes of Alan Armour (RGV250), Mark Adams (RGV250 rider who I battled with hard at Mallory in July) and Shane Pearson (ZXR400) and therefore I must be near the front pack!  I didn't have a clue where I had finished, but when I got back to the garage Lesley had a huge smile on her face and lots of people were there to congratulate me for finishing 6th!!......from the back of the grid!  Fantastic result!  Also, my fastest lap was a 1:59.11 which isn't too bad give the traffic I had to go through.

Onto the last race of the day and I contemplated whether or not to do it.  Dan again suggested going out at the back of the grid, but this time starting a full 5-10 seconds after everybody else and then just pottering around to have some fun.  It sounded like a good idea, but it must have looked a bit odd to everybody watching as we sat there when they all went!  Not that it made much difference, because even though we went off the line as late as we did, we had still caught them by the time we went over the Avenue and into Cascades!  Anyway, I settled back to cruise around and did the first couple of laps leisurely, until on lap three I started having fuel starvation problems again.  It got worse very quickly and by the time I'd got around Island Bend and around the hairpin, it was running chronically ill and I had to limp back to the pits to record a DNF.

Not quite the weekend I had hoped for before it started, but at least I had a good race in the second F400 race and I'm happy that I could have got into the 1:58's easy enough.  Also, I really enjoyed the circuit and it was great to be out racing there.  Oh well, at least I didn't bin it!!

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