I thought I'd start a new thread as the others were getting hard to follow.
First off, thanks to all that came a long to support. It really makes a difference to know your all there cheering!!
The result for me was a little less than I'd hoped for, but as with many of these things, it is a case of development of the car and me along with it.
The start of the day unnerved me a lot. Seeing the snow made me very anxious and i was very undecided what tyres to run.
I had heard several stories of some big smashes the day before when the pro guys ran a few practise sessions.
in addition there were several changes to the car that required a little time for me to get used to.
We have changed the front and rear anti roll bars. i have gone for a 27mm front & smaller 18mm on the rear.
But in addition the power steering had been disconnected. this sadly made the steering very heavy, even if it did provide some feel thought the wheel. This was changed for the practise session where we reconnected the power steering. i have to say in all honestly i want something in between. So we are currently looking at changing the pulley sizes to make the pump work a little less efficiently. I also have a sync issue with the gear box too (currently back at Zak's to be stripped and repaired).
Practise session
I ran the R888 (Semi slicks) for the practise and they felt good. I was starting to get a feel for the car and then the poxy boost pipe came off both the turbo and the throttle body (Visions of Brands Hatch coming back). We missed the remaining session sorting that.
My time for the first sessions was 1.25.06 which was good enough for 24th overall... definitely not what I'd hoped for.
Qualifying session
I felt more confident, had put the weather and other worries behind me and out i went... the car was in my opinion flying!!!! i was braking far too early and needing to get this down to improve my times. Sadly the car drinks way more fuel then i remember and i needed to come in for a splash and dash (As well as a quick check of the turbo pipe). Back out and I'm really feeling good. however i found a big issue with the front tyres screeching and struggling to give me full grip (the slip angle was very shallow). Due to this i felt i was having to run wider than wanted and possibly not get the power down as quick as i would have liked.
All that said, i made a massive improvement on practise and achieved 1.22.87 (just over 2 second improvement), i know there was more to come, but i guess thats motor racing.. So i finished up 21st in club and 18th in FI class.
TBH given the few issues i had, I'm not that disappointed (Sector times looked good and i lost my time and my qualifying space in one sector).
Clearly the series have moved forward and it's now up to me to move with it... I have plans a foot to help improve the situation and I'm quietly confident for Knock Hill that improvements can be made.
Full timing can be found here, along with sector times etc.
http://www.tsl-timing.com/attack/2008/81470.pdf