Racer series 1/5th scale bike national round 6 Derby

Meeting results

Ian's meeting

It seems like ages since the last round of the Racer series so it was good to meet up with mates again, and have a good days racing. In the long layoff between rounds I hadn't been resting on my laurels from my win at the previous Derby round and had made quite a few detail changes. Most of it has to be said based around just making the bike strong enough to withstand another punishing day at the roughest track in the county, but some a little more tactical.

We both ran a new ali rear chain sprocket here for the first time, that we are hoping, among other things, can be produced and distributed by us at some point. Apart from being considerably lighter, looking dead sexy and being one tooth smaller it also happens to be round! You don't realise how bad the standard gears are until you fit something that is that much better. I don't know that it made that much
difference to the performance but it certainly didn't hurt and after some testing and very punishing racing it has shown no signs of wear or damage.

The biggest difference this weekend was in the setup and approach. Last time I went with a quick bike and tried to make it get round with out destroying itself, (which only just worked). This meeting I went with a good safe bike and then slowly made it quicker. Oh, and a hammer in case the ideas didn't work!!! Fortunately for me, Steve Newey was having exactly the same weekend that I had had at the previous round and three other riders where now right on the pace to increase the pressure on him. This made it tight at the top, but my bike was good, I was the only one putting in consistent 13 lappers and I knew that in a race, with my bike's good braking, I would be able to win, with a push and a shove into the last corner if necessary. :-)

There was a long break before our final so I decided to do a run before they started, to give the bike a final shake down and it was even better. I've No idea what the lap times where, but I reckon I was getting down into the 22 second laps again, which is what I had been doing during the last meeting, but had been unable to mach this weekend. Unfortunately, in the final, it was never quite as good and proved to be not quite as quick, and much more of a handful. Steve, like me at the last round found a fast, if not easy to handle, setup for the final and gave me a hard time. I was never that worried though. I knew that if I could just stay in touch that I could have him at the end if required so when he took the lead at about 1/3 race distance I was content to sit behind. In the end though he made one to many
mistakes and I was able to cruise round to a safe, if not comfortable victory.

So the series goes on. If I can just do this again at the next meeting at Mendip then the championship all comes down to the final round. Steve still has the upper hand but I feel like the momentum is shifting towards Team Benwell so we shall see.

Mark's meeting

This meeting couldn't have come sooner for me. After the disappointment at Halifax and the last Derby round, I knew that my bike was lacking in certain areas and steps needed to be taken. With Ian's help we set about improving the steering response and mid corner speed. I won't go into too many details but suffice to say that I managed to knock over 5 seconds a lap off my previous best at Brookland. (Thanks for the loan of the track Gary). I needed to back into the top three and now feel I have the bike to do it.

And so to Derby. The secret here is to have a good handling bike and then the speed and ultimately fast lap times will follow. Both Ian and me had the the rear sprockets to test, which turned out to be flawless, are marked improvement on the standard item which we found out aren't round!! My set-up was a compromise, I opted for a very "safe" set up which gave me consistent 24 second laps, not the quickest but good enough for third on the grid which is where I needed to be if I was to have any chance of affecting the result of the race. It is now a two horse race for the championship between Steve and Ian, but third place is still wide open between three or four riders. So I really needed a good result here. I watched Ian and Steve practicing before the final and figured that if I could just keep up my consistency my only worry would be Colin McCabe, who was turning in some quick laps and being consistent too.

The final was very disappointing. I don't know whether it was because my tyres had been sitting in the sun for an hour and a half. Or whether the track had gone past it's optimum temperature. Or it might have had something to do with the cars and trucks that had just had their finals. However, for me the grip had gone completely and my bike just wouldn't turn. Ian and Steve quickly disappeared into the sunset which left me defending my third place from Colin, who found it very easy to nip past on a tighter line. I spent the rest of the race just handing on to a disappointing 4th place. However, lessons have been learnt and with a few more mods lined up for the Benwell NF 002, Mendip may well be my meeting.