Round four of the championship and our first race at Donington Park. Having never driven there before I headed up on Thursday evening to get some practice laps in on the Friday test day.
Dan's race pace was good and at the sharp end
Donington Park has always been one of my favourite tracks and had been told by another Academy racer Craner Curves are 100mph-plus in the Sevens. Having spectated at Donington for MotoGP and being a fan of fast corners it was brilliant to know it was my turn to race the circuit. I soon realised the circuit was quite easy to learn and that it was a third/fourth gear circuit for the Academy car. I ended the day with a respectable lap time of 1.24.849.
I went back to my hotel that night and reviewed my onboard footage and lap timing data to see where I could improve. I found a couple areas where I could and I planned to put this in place for qualifying.
Qualifying Day
The weather for Qualifying was perfect. I spent some of the morning checking over the car, preparing it for qualifying and generally enjoying the paddock life at Donington. There are some really nice people in the Academy and you can have as much fun in the paddock as actually driving the car on circuit. I was positioned in the paddock next to two academy guys called Steve Grubb (#3) and Tony Stevens (#68). Tony kindly let me park my car under his canopy which was brilliant as it kept us out of the burning hot sun.
Wheel to wheel racing is what it's all about
It was now time for qualifying! The plan was to try and get some clear laps in plus a tow from other cars down the straights. Getting in the slipstream of another car is extremely important as this can improve your lap time massively. I set my fastest time on lap three which was a 1.25.252. My goal was to beat my fastest time on the test day which would potentially turn into a good qualifying position for the race. I spent the rest of the qualifying session going faster in all sectors but kept catching up with slower drivers at the wrong points on track which compromised my ultimate lap time.
I dropped back a bit to try and find some clear space but never really achieved this. I managed to get one flying lap where everything went to plan and looking at my lap timer I was 0.7 up on my fastest time, I got a nice tow of someone on the back straight but then got blocked on the final chicane. I finished the session with my fastest time which was set on lap three and this qualified me P4.
Reason to be chuffed back in the paddock
The morning of my first ever race had arrived! I was really excited for the day ahead but at the same time the nerves started creeping in. We all made our way out of the assembly area and drove in grid formation around the warm-up lap.
The excitement and nerves were in overdrive as the red lights came on. I had a good start and was in P2 by the first corner. I tried to cover the inside line but someone was already there and I had to go wide. This allowed P3 and P4 to come through and demoted me to P4. I had a good run through Craner Curves and noticed P3 had gone wide; I capitalised straight away and past him. I spent the next lap trying to catch up to the front two, as I ended the lap and made my way down the pit straight I noticed Nick Horton had a good run out of the last chicane and was gaining on me. I couldn't do much about it and didn't defend it either. I decided we would be better off catching up with the front guys than to start slowing each down.
By lap four we were a group of four challenging for first place. Second place driver Hutchinson went slightly wide at McLeans and third place Horton and myself made our way past him. I managed to get to P2 at one point when Heaton went too deep into the last chicane, we then had the long run through Craners side by side at over 100mph but he had the inside line so I let him have the position again. Over the next couple laps I had to defend massively to fourth place Hutchinson. I made sure I positioned my car in the right places and stopped him as much as I could. All the practice I had from defending in karting was coming to good use...
A trophy and some fizz - a good first race!
I made a slight mistake and went a bit wide at McLeans and I could see in the mirrors that Hutchinson had a good run on me. I made sure I aced Coppice and got ready to defend down the back straight. All of a sudden to my shock I looked in my mirror and Hutchinson had gone wide and ended up driving through the gravel. Luckily for him he managed to keep it going and carried on. I then got a good tow from P2 Heaton down the bank straight and got through the chicane nicely but couldn't gain on him to the finish line. I crossed the line and finished P3! I was absolutely over the moon as you can see from the onboard in car celebrations I had.
Results:
1. Nick Horton
2. Henry Heaton
3. Dan Livingstone
4. Daniel Wade
5. Chris Hutchinson
Race vid here (no sound due to camera problem).