Bigpower

I often think back to particular points in my life and most of my cherished memories relate, in one way or another, to cars. It may have been a road trip. It may have been an event. It may just have been an ordinary day out when something automotive shook my cage and brought me back into focus. Forgive my self indulgence; I hope that anyone who reads these memoirs is encouraged to write their own.

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Entry#2

After a sound beating on the quarter mile at the hands of Mr Booker, it was time for a rematch on the race track. Now, if I had thought about this sensibly, I would have chosen the wide, well familiar environs of Snetterton as it suits the 1500kg plus GTR very well. Instead I chose Rizla thin and twisty Cadwell, buried deep in the wolds of Lincolnshire. Did I mention that this was November?

Dan and I gathered our octane booster and collected our passengers for the day, making the break for Cadwell at around 5am. The cross country journey up there was interesting and we arrived in plenty of time for the damp start. I had only been once before so that gave me an advantage over the virginal Mr Booker. Cadwell, for the uninitiated, is a truly intimidating venue. Blind crests, off camber corners lined with Armco and kerbs that will tear wheels off are all part of the hazardous highlights. It is fair to say that this place is one of the very finest tracks in the UK and earns its nickname of the British Nurburgring well enough.

I could see Dan

superb write up - very enjoyable ...

RIPieces GMG GTR's ...

Just a quickie

On our Bigpower trip to the Nurburgring we were travelling down to Dover in Convoy

I think we were on the M25 and the light was fading. In my mirror I spotted a bike approching fast in the outside lane as it came alongside I looked across and thought "How cool does that look:sifone:" as 2 flames were coming out of the exhaust.

As he passed our convoy he made a fast exit to the hard shoulder where he proceeded to try to pat out the fire that was then engulffing the seat!! (Didn't look so cool then!!):nopity:

Nice writeups there Stu and Rob I agree, Stu and I were amazed at how cool the motorcycle looked in the dark with flames coming out the back !!!!

I have had a load of ups and downs with my car (mainly downs due to things breaking, needing to be replaced etc) but my best experience was going out with Ben when he got his Skyline. We went out on the bypasses and roads and found that the cars were evenly matched then. Then another mate told me his friend said he had seen 2 cars out on the bypass over the weekend enjoying themselves....brilliant !!!

Taking the car out on the Novice trackday evening was superb and finding that the car handled better than I could imagine and was pretty quick also. It was a good experience and gave me some confidence in the cars capabilities.

My third and final experience was Stu letting me drive his Skyline at the Nurburgring. I dont know who was more nervous...him or me !! Having been taken out on a few laps by Stu previously and once I had got over the OMG moments I was ready to have a go. I still remember driving out through the barrier and through the first set of corners and was grinning. To be honest the lap and the one after was a complete blur, the next day I swear my face hurt because of the concentration on my face. A phenomenal experience that I am grateful for Stu to have shared. The whole trip was one of the best trips I have been on with such a great bunch of people and I havent laughed so much.

Enjoyable write up Stuart. more installments please

By the way...will there be any 'Confessions of a Window Cleaner' type revelations, just to spice things up a bit
...yeah OK i'm a perve..so beat me

Excellent tales Stu, I'm sure there are more installments to come

Ok I will join in with a favourite blast from the past.

Back in the day when i was young enough to think that Slick 50 was the best performance mod you could make, I Joined forces with a best friend to enter a year of racing in a series sponsored by them.
Slick 50 challenge was based around road going cars built to a maximum spec and must have been available in that spec from the factory. Internally the engines could be modified but externally they had to be original. So Richard (The best mate) had a Mk2 RS2000 droopsnoot Escort that he had been building for some years that seemed perfect for the job. Roland Hayes (now HT racing) built him a 2.2l pinto running an ultra rare twin downdraft 48 set up.
Prepped over the winter months she was ready for the shakedown event at Castle Coombe.
The rules meant the cars had to be driven to the event so I had the Van and Richard drove the car. With a wrong turn somehow (No sat nav back then) we ended driving through the middle of Swindon. Not too bad for me but for Richard, the ultralight flywheel,Lumpy cam and experimental paddle clutch proved to be a nightmare to drive in trafic much to the amusement of everyone on the high street.
We arrived on a frosty Friday evening ready for the qualifying the following day and quickly set up camp along with the obligatory tent and BBQ. With everything in place we set off to the pub on site and proceeded along with all the other competitors to get rat Ar***d.
In those days the camp site was very tight and waliking back earlier than the others we negotiated the pegs and ropes pretty well and slumped in to the sleeping bags.

Around 3am we were awoken by some shouting outside. To this day i can remember it clear as a bell.
Oi bas*id watch my tent. F**k off...... Who you tellin to F**k off?. You ya gaylord git....

At this point another joined in from about 20 tents down
Will you two pussys shut the F up we are all trying to sleep..... You can F off too Ya meddlin bas**d...
Who you tellin to F off?..... F off yourself

Then a few more
If you lot dont shut the F up and get some kip Im gonna come kick all your asses.
Boll***s to you all I was only tryin to find ma blo**y tent

Within about 15 mins the whole site were shouting abuse at each other.
Then without an official in sight it went deathly quiet.

A couple of minutes passed and the whole site erupted in laughter. Everyone poked heads out of the tents to see who was involved and the whole site was awake.
A few minutes passed and the silence fell again Broken by the odd snigger here and there but generally everyone back in sleep mode. The original trouble maker then spouted out again. Waltons styleeee


GOODNIGHT STEVIE BOY.

GOODNIGHT ALISTAIR

This then swept through the site like wild fire.Each tent saying goodnight to all their own occupants.

I eventually got to sleep around 5 am just ready for the 7am call of the monster V8 rover SDI sposored by Trianco boilers next door being fired into life.

Whilst i then followed a path of business' some fruitfull and others not so, Richard carried on in the race game and most recently has been recruited to head up the new F2 series for next year with Jonathon Palmer. We still keep in touch but the days of tom foolery have been gone for quite a while.

http://www.businessconsultingdomains.co ... gates.html
I cant thank him enough for taking me on part of the journey with him and providing me with some memories i will never forget.


Probably one of those "you had to be there" moments but i am LOL as i write this.
Oh well back to the house packing 2 weeks to go


Jay

I can't mention most of mine, and already bored half the northern equator with my single trip to the 'Ring.
One I can mention made me pucker up more than nearly anything else I can remember.
In a previous life, about ten - twelve years ago during training exercise at work, I was the designated driver for a mutual aid team, what the press love to call Riot teams. It was a soaking wet night, and the grilles on the van were down, as we had bricks and debris being thrown at us.
The exercise was situated in a simulated hostile environment, whereby we had to go in as part of a serial to secure a building to get injured officers out. The only lights were the cars on fire, and the yobs (training officers) throwing petrol bombs at us. The lack of visibility, and noise of fire and people screaming makes it difficult not to take it seriously. Between the rain, the grilles and my visor, I struggled to shift the V8 Sherpa through the burning streets, and just as we got to the FHP (forward holding point) petrol bombers came out from a side road and started raining down us. I've never been so grateful for driver training, but somehow I managed to reverse the van full of shields, colleagues and McDonalds back at warp factor ten and out of trouble. We got out of there to regroup, gathered ourselves and reclaimed the street and the building.When it was all over, we were all grinning like idiots.



(I must stress, practise is fun, real is horrible)

There are so many to choose from and like Stuart they nearly all revolve around cars. The one that haunts me the most was when we first built this car, we had decided to take it to the RS National day at Donnington for a play but when we arrived we realised that we had petrol leak from the tank....Gutted doesn't come close.
Alan as usual came up with a solution, crazy and impractical yet possible.
We would attend the breifing then take the car (which was being trailered) back to mine, empty out his sierra gt, which was on my drive, return to donny and take it out on track, 80 mile round trip. By the time we got to mine and switched cars there was only 45 minutes until the second session of the day and Alan was deterimed to make it even if it meant him driving through the main gate and straight out on track. I spent the entire journey persuading him that it was a bad idea and finally he agreed.
We arrived back at donny and met up with some of the guys from the club we were with and chilled until time for our session. I had decided not to drive as this was Alan's daily drive so I went out as a passenger.......BIG MISTAKE.... I have never been so scared in my life. Bearing in mind that was his everyday car standard suspension, standard brakes and budget tyres. 1 steady out lap then he was on it..Hitting every apex, riding the kerbs, cutting the corners, 2 wheels on the dirt. The car was rolling like a jelly mould I actually brake his door handle I was gripping it that hard....(shite never told him that.....Sorry Al). He was brutal to that car and I found myself wondering what would die first the car or me....Seriously, after 10 mins of a 20 min session I wanted out and found myself looking over at the marshal at the end of the pitlane with tears in my eyes as if begging him to wave the chequered flag. Ba****d, didn't for another 10 mins, only then did Alan decided to cool his car down.

Session 2 was the worst.....Craner Curves