GT CUP - Round 1 - Silverstone
19th April 2010
Practice and qualifying was pretty uneventful and we were happy with the times being posted consistently by both Colin and Sam in the 2.04 - 2.06 range. Whilst on paper this does not represent a quick time, they were posted in a car carrying 75 kg of ballast imposed upon us by the powers that be so we were in fact carrying the equivalent of a passenger for the races. Added to this we have also been moved into Class 2 - but we are not complaining - much!!! We are beginning to know how Ron Dennis felt.
Race 1
Sam was at the wheel for this race and it being his first experience of a rolling start got caught up in a bit of a traffic jam. Once on the move though his pace quickly improved to lap in the 2.06s. He was making good ground on a couple more Class 2 cars when the race was unfortunately red flagged on lap 9 and declared as finished at that point. So a slightly disappointing P8 in class.
Race 2
Being the last race of the day, and the car not needing any work apart from standard checks and cleaning, Colin was "prowling" and getting pretty hyped up for the race. Based on the pace of the car in race 1 together with the late afternoon track conditions he felt that a class podium was possible so we had our fingers crossed as they set off on the formation lap - it was going to end in tears of joy for either the Mowles' or the KTM spare parts department. Colin made a blinding start and used the superb acceleration of the X-Bow to gain 7 places by the time they got to Copse. This put him in P3 for Class 2. Lapping consistently in 2.04s and with a fastest lap of 2.03.6, he maintained this position till the end.
So a satisfactory weekend with another podium and pot. The only blemish was the fact that we failed to get video footage of the two races. The camera was all set up but a small glitch in the power supply meant nothing to post with this report.
So to Thruxton on May 8th for the next round of GT CUP but the ABG team will be out next weekend at Snetterton for the opening round of the Beetle Fun Cup series where we will be running Peter Belshaw.
