PH goes hillclimbing
Another reason to get after a cheap MX-5
Step one? Hit the classifieds and bag a Mazda
This is why I found myself at Wiscombe Park in Devon. As a long-time fan of both hillclimbing and the NA/Mk1 Mazda MX-5, it was time to put the two together and discover just how much fun other competitors were having.
Pacing notes
Wiscombe is one of the few mainland UK hillclimbs I had not previously visited, so stories of it being one of the most demanding were still clanging in my ears as I walked up the hill before first practice. Watching videos of others in the week leading up to this meeting, organised by the very friendly and helpful Torbay Motor Club, just don't impress how steep and continuous the course is.
Little Mazda huffs and puffs up Wiscombe Park
Even if the car was far more valuable than most Mk1 MX-5s, you could easily have a rattier contemporary of this car for Shed money or thereabouts, leaving enough for a season's hillclimbing. There are plenty of competitors using bargain MX-5s on the basis that if you bend it, you simply buy another one rather than fix it.
Suited and booted
Having found your car just add race numbers, timing beam strut and a couple of safety stickers, and you're ready. That kind of budget would also allow you to invest in some decent sticky but road legal tyres, generally reckoned to be worth around two seconds on typical courses. New Toyo Proxes were the tyres of choice for 'my' MX-5 and they offered decent traction off the line and through Wiscombe's bends and hairpins. More of a problem was the lack of a limited-slip differential, which really showed itself exiting the Sawbench and Martini hairpins.
Standard suspension possibly a bit soft...
By going relatively slowly, Bunny's Leap was more of a gentle skip, but it also showed it should be easily possible to take flat out in the MX-5. This is because the Mk1 simply wasn't going to build enough speed for Bunny's to be the edgy crest it can be in quicker cars.
Man up
After Bunny's comes The Gate, which looks dauntingly narrow and tight on first approach. Further runs proved this could be taken more quickly than seems prudent, so long as you trust your car's suspension and brakes. The advantage of having a near showroom-fresh car was both of these elements were spot on.
Mint, original cars now rare ... so we raced it
After two practice and two timed runs, some familiarity with the course and the car resulted in a respectable 56.62 second best. For comparison, quickest time of the day went to Mike Lee in his OMS 2000M single-seater at 38.49 seconds. While the MX-5 was never going to challenge for FTD, the sense of enjoyment and competitive spirit is exactly the same.
The other advantage of hillclimbing a Mazda MX-5 is, at the end of the day, you just peel off the race numbers and head home while others are still loading cars on to trailers that cost more than your entire weekend's racing.
Edit: I think PH could also do a nice article on AutoSolos as that is the cheapest of these kinds of events and they are brilliant fun. A day's competition can cost you as little as £60 including entry, fuel and a bacon roll!
Nothing beats the post top ten run off, mass start race (sorry gentle ride) back down the hill - the bends take on a totally different character going the opposite way & with the aid of gravity.
Edit: I think PH could also do a nice article on AutoSolos as that is the cheapest of these kinds of events and they are brilliant fun. A day's competition can cost you as little as £60 including entry, fuel and a bacon roll!
I think my last one cost me £40 all in!
Edit: I think PH could also do a nice article on AutoSolos as that is the cheapest of these kinds of events and they are brilliant fun. A day's competition can cost you as little as £60 including entry, fuel and a bacon roll!
I think my last one cost me £40 all in!
Look at this picture from Shelsey Walsh a few days ago:
That started as a touch of grass at the wrong place and it developed into a massive f
k up!I come from a racing family and I have seen a lot of crashes and crashed cars. I realise that it doesn't happen every week, but it certainly does happen and virtually any inversion on an MX-5 will see you dead.
I quite fancy a bit of hillclimbing for the reasons in the article. Not too bothered about winning, and I don't think I'd win in my class in a standard mini gp even if I was a driving god, but as something more competitive than a track day without going into silly amounts of money I think it'll be a nice little event
Its a single seater hillclimb special. Daily Mail link, but it appears to be reasonably accurate, sensation-free and not particularly like a DM article, in fact.
Have the car (Mk1 MX-5, roll bar, harness bar, sparco seat, 5 point harness, AD-08's)
do you just book and turn up like at a track day or is there more to it than that/
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
You need to check with the MSA Blue Book what class you will be entering - this will also determine whether your tyres are OK for that class - that can also depend on the Additional Supplimentary Regulations that the club issues for its event. There are two lists of tyres, 1A & 1B - most road going classes will require list 1A tyres, unless the organising club states differently. You don't need a 5 point harness unless you're entering a libre class.
You need in spec Helmet, fireproof suit & gloves. Most people also go for boots, but fireproof underwear/socks etc aren't mandatory.
At its most basic, car preparation can consist of wrapping yellow tape around the negative battery lead & marking the ignition switch on/off. Once you start modifying the car you need to make sure you do it properly to the relevant section of the blue book, or you could fail scrutineering on the event. For instance you may need to have certain sized 3mm strengthening plates welded under your roll bar if you want to run in modified production, the bar nees certain sized bolts, your seat may need strengthening plates depending on how its mounted etc..
And as mentioned above you need an MSA National B Non Race licence.
Its all in the Blue Book, which is also known as the Blur Book which you'll come to understand why when you start reading it! The BB also has a list of scrutineers local to you. Most of these guys are very helpful & its always worth contacting one & asking for advice if your unsure of anything in the BB. There's also a lot of helpful people & interesting threads on the Uphill Racers forum;
http://www.uphillracers.com/forum.php
One word of warning - hillclimbing is brilliant fun & pretty addictive...
HTH
Keith
Edit: I forgot, as mentioned in the article basic car prep also requires a timing strut for the vast majority of speed events. Dimensions are agin in the Blue Book.
It's really addictive as per the previous poster.
Think I was at Wiscombe the same weekend.
Here's my attempt-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2NdfWmzas8&sns...
46.12 sec
It's really addictive as per the previous poster.
Think I was at Wiscombe the same weekend.
Here's my attempt-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2NdfWmzas8&sns...
46.12 sec
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