Bigpower

24 hours after the show wrapped up, I thought I would try and hammer a few keys to capture the memories whilst they are still fresh, foil wrapped as it were.

The Japanese Tuning Show at Silverstone promised to be something a bit special, shying away from the 'Sound off massive' and tribes of burberry clad oiks...........you can tell that I love 'em, can't you. With the shows promised emphasis on track action, it appeared to be the circuit based event that many of us had longed for.

BigPower had a presence in both Time Attack and EDC, even the concourse boys would be up against one of our brethren. I felt proud to see some of our clan there, walking the walk, really proud.

Ian had elected to leave the shire at silly o'clock in a bid to get there early enough to clean the car again if need be. He was serious about trying to win the Autoglym prize and the fact that he did so well is a testament to just how anal he is with cleaning his car Two weeks, admittedly not time well organised, but two weeks of cleaning saw him impress the judges enough for him to scoop second prize. The result was even more impressive when you consider some of the difficulties that Ian faced. Chipped windscreen turned to cracked windscreen. The fitters damaged the trim........replacement trim

Superb Stu.......I can only echo your sentiments and say what a great day it was 8)

One thing I did notice above all was the crowd really getting into the whole event.....we were perched way up high in the stands, which were quite full, and before, after and during each pass the crowd were going loopy 8) 8) .....the hairs were standing up on my neck at some points

Nice write up Chief,

Thanks again for your help and more importantly your support. Its nice to have someone happy to have their ear bent regularly with inane bollox such as I specialise in !!!! Im always happy to give you one of those early morning wake up calls you enjoy so much !!!

Bob was a star, as was Steve Carter and the rest of the guys in both our garage and anyone whose help I called on - Mark from Abbeys is an absolute diamond and I would be stuffed without him as a mate !! Karen just put up with me being Mr Vacant as usual when in the pits and vanishing for hours at a time, and always has a positive word for me, I know thats what we all want from our other halves, but car hobbys often help put pay to that notion !!!

As I said, Im gutted I didnt perform, the car felt good when it was working, enormously powerful when it shot off from Ian on the first Tsuiso, and the time spent larking about with the other drivers due to my 7th place making me run 2nd from last in the 16>8 settled my heightened nerves a great deal. For what its worth the car is back to not revving at all now - It was a git to get on the trailer last night firing the boards out the back when it decided to wheelspin up the ramps, it just about made it off the trailer into the workshop today and pretty much refused to respond to the throttle at all, I guess there is a positive side to its new 2500rpm idle at the moment :roll: !!!!

Sorry to Dunc, Dan and the guys as well - but as Stuart said, Im not at my best on these weekends, especially when theres problems or I have done well and suddenly theres a weight of expectation !!

I was very proud of what the EDC guys did at the weekend though - they can truly put on a good show, and it can be felt in the car at times too, so I guess thats a major positive - as I said to Stu on the phone today, if I have made peoples day, even for piling in the gravel at warp speed then I guess Ive kinda done my job a bit and thats what its all about in a way.

J.

Wow mate, brilliant write up and fantastic, well done, congrats to young Ian !!!!!!!!

Well done for Bladey and others for taking part !!

Loving the cars in the garage, nice blue S15.

Good write up again Stu.

As you said, It was superb to have BigPower members in all aspects of the day: public track time, show and shine, EDC and Time Attack.

I am very gutted for Mike Payne to not be able to run at all after knowing the preparation and cost going into this event only for a few gremlins and parts issues to put spanners into the works. Zak had worked through the night for two consecutive nights to try and get the car ready but in the end Mike called it off at 11am on Sunday as running the car in on track would not have been ideal. Hats off to Mike attitude though, as even when all this disappointment was washing over him, he was able to remain phlegmatic about it all and suggest to Zak that he spent the rest of the day in bed to recover.

Mike - Knockhill will be your event mate :thumb: and I cant wait to piggyback the excitement up there with my TA taster (ps - we definitely compete on the Saturday )

Bladey - you should have heard what the commentator was saying about you when you were in the gravel (or maybe you did) .... it was funny, but couldnt help us feel deeply disappointed. Not in you, but, For you. I know just how much mental hard work goes into psyching up for competitions and for this to be blown out of the water due to electrical gremlins is galling. If only .....

Top job to Ian on the trophy. I know a bit about the winner's car as he is SIDC and it certainly doesnt get used in the same way that Ian's does. In true Brucee style ... your's was my favourite

Well done also to Lee on the many full day's preparation on cleaning the Evo - despite this it looked awesome and if the competition involved any kind of driving I am sure our boys would be right up the top.

From my point of view, it was superb to experience the track first thing and nice to see Matt doing the same. There were only 14 cars in our public track session and was fantastic for almost traffic free lapping with everyone very well behaved and by the looks of it, well aware of track days rules of giving consent for overtaking..... for which I was grateful as I waved

Weird circuit in my opinion but good to have driven it in relative anger, but I still prefer our own Snetterton to it:

As slippery as Luffield is, it is no match for Coram.
As daunting as Copse's blind entry is, Richies is far more of a challenge.
As great as it is entering Brooklands with the grandstands and the feeling of grandeur, the bomb-hole is a sweeter corner to get right.

So.... who's coming up to Scotland to watch?

Superb write up as usual sir ... also I think thanks to the weather god is required.

Top write up stuart :!: Wish i'd have gone rather than standing in a field watching a ball all day :roll:

Bladey - you should have heard what the commentator was saying about you when you were in the gravel (or maybe you did) .... it was funny

Was it Maz :?: The normal commentator :!: :?:

Yeah, Maz did a great job of keeping everything bubbling. I would hate his job as he must have to try and balance informing the uninformed whilst keeping those in know posted too.........whilst killing time and answering Bladeys texts whilst he's supposed to be commentating

Yet again Stu you have not dissapointed with a cracking report, top stuff!!!

I can only echo everything which has been previously said, all in all this is definitely one of the best shows.

One of the highlights of the day has to be the the four stragglers at the end just listening to the pro's in the final feathing the throttle on the monstrous TA cars around Luffield, at one point we all just turned to each other and the looks on our faces said it all!! :-D


Brilliant day, cant wait to do it all again soon.

fab report mate!
shame i mist you.