Race 1) 4th October 2008 - Lydden Hill Circuit
Race Report
The debut race for the beetlechallenge was hosted at Lydden Hill Circuit. The beetles ran as a ‘Beetle Class’ within the Cannons Tin Top series. (Many thanks to Rod Birley from the BARC South East Centre who engineered the opportunity to race with them, and get the beetles back out circuit racing - no mean feat!)
Our first 3 Beetles race cars made it to the circuit (There were so nearly half a dozen bugs, but there were a few set backs by each of the individuals building their own cars )
Craig Winfield attended with his 1972 swing axle bug which he used to campaign back in the 90’s Beetle Cup. Running a 1914cc motor, with twin Dell’s and type 1 cooling. Apart from the engine hike from the cup 1641cc motor, this ultra clean race car is almost identical to the day it last run in a Beetle Cup race over a decade ago!
David Charlton came in his Forest Rally Spec 1303 - albiet tweaked to a circuit friendly ride-height! - This car was awesome - running a 1600cc Type1 screamer of a motor outputing approx 130bhp! It had a full dry-sump setup and if you bolted the navigator seat back in it would be a rally car (It still had the stage timing counters on the passenger dash side!)
Simon Sergides just made it, after burning the midnight oil the night before the race in a 1972 Ex-Ian White Cup Car, now sporting new ‘Honey Monster’ Orange livery, and a 2165cc motor (with mild 8:1 compression, Porsche 911 Cooling and an Oil Accumulator -Recently dyno’ed on the rolling road at 120bhp with 117 torque)
QUALIFYING:
The track was dry, but cold, for the qualifying a 10min session with the other cars in the Cannons Tin Top Race Series. These ranged from highly tuned turbo cars (A Toyota Celica, Rover Tomcat, Renault GT Turbo quite literally in a class of their own!) some impressive race prepared Proton Coupe’s, through to some fantastic Rover Mini’s, Rover 220 and XR2… so a real eclectic mix of cars.
To guarantee a grid spot in the races we needed to get 3 successful banker laps in, then it was time to learn the track, feel the cars and see what the bugs we brought were capable of! Simon ‘Monster’ pulled a 0:53 out of the bag - good enough to just squeeze the best qualifying time in class - both David and Craig were within a whisker of this time. Craig pulled of the track early due to a miss-fire issue, and David screamed his 1600cc motor to grab the second grid position (Predictably we were near the back of the grid, with the Mini’s, Rover and XR2 - and the Turbo cars were upfront - but to be honest we all surprised ourselves with our performance, considering we had rusty/no race experience - and had absolutely no setup information - compared to the rest of the cars which had been campaigning for the entire season (and before!).
Simon ‘Monster’s car had a moment in the final period of the qualifying with a dramatic spin - heading for the armco - but just missing it (Thankfully) - The car seamed unsettled after the spin, with some lairy tail-happy action. It turned out to be the Rocker Breather Pipe had blown off and had blown oil over the rear driver side wheel (This was the first time the engine had run consistent high-revs!). The Monster took comfort in the fact that the spin was due to mechanical issue, rather than inexperienced driver error.. then one of pit crew Kev pointed out that the corner where the Monster spun had the other clean tyre fully loaded, so it was probably 99% driver error on that occasion - LoL!
Overall qualifying was great fun and a learning experience for all the drivers, back in the pits we shared what we learned, consulted on tyre pressures etc.. and started prepping for the race.
RACE ONE:
The formed a pre-race formation grid in the pitlane… but where was Craig? His engine just wasn’t playing ball, with some weird miss-fire.. they worked so hard to rectify it, but couldn’t make it to the first race (gutted is an understatement). A short light rain shower commenced as the cars formed the grid - but stopped for the race (Phew)
The Monster and David’s Rally car lined up for a rolling start… the pace car pulled in and the green flag dropped. David literally screamed past two Minis and the Monster Bug into the first corner! (That 1600 is quick!) and went round Chessons drift on 3 wheels - a man on a mission! - Simon in the Monster Bug was ‘learning & observing’ and fell back on the grid to last place.
David’s rally car continued to make progress and increased his lead over Simon by quite some margin, and was mixing it up with the other race car classes! The croweds loved the dramatic cloud of white smoke David left at every hard braking corner.. but it wasn’t tyre smoke - but oil burning - as the dry-sump oil system wasn’t scavenging the oil from the heads efficiently enough by all accounts - nothing to worry about - but the smoke screen was spectacular for the spectators and un-nerving for the cars following!
As the race progressed Simon settled down into ‘the zone’ and picked up his pace.. eventually drawing in the cars infront… he passed the mini’s then had his eye’s set on the novice cross on Davids bug! Now we had a race on between the Bugs! David’s 1600cc 1303 and Simons 2165cc Swing axle bugs were fairly equally competitive (even though the cars specs were worlds apart!) David out handled the Monster Bug in the first few corners (He was able to drive full-throttle through them!) and Simon could just about hang on to his tail, not loosing too much time, but definitely out classed in this section of the circuit.
Then between Devils Elbow and North Bend, Simon took a different line to David and could out-torque him up the steep hill and create the opportunity to overtake and defend the line. Simon took the lead in our class, and steadily increased his pace and confidence, so did David so they were nose to tail most of the time, with David piling on the pressure in the corners! Simon’s in-experience then reigned through, as we made a mistake on the paddock bend, and piled into the kitty-litter and fell to the back of the grid again! (We now officially had an underdog!) He had it all to do again! The spectators and commentators got behind the Bug’s! we had two races on now - the one at the front for the turbo cars, and the one at the back with the Bugs! The Monster Bug pushed hard and re-took the mini’s and then had David firmly fixed in his sights again.. several laps continued with Simon unable to squeeze past David’s number 88 bug… we really did have a 1600 IRS Bug and a 2165 Swing Axle Bug head-to-head in battle - brilliant!… then the second to last corner, Simon ‘had a go’ round the outside of the hairpin… the two bugs were racing to the final right hander neck and neck - side by side and the Monster bug 68 finished in style with an almighty tank-slapper -fish tailing across the line - wait for it - just three hundredths of a second faster than David in the rally spec car 88…!
A superb race, which lived up to everything we hoped would happen with the fairly loose regs of BeetleChallenge!
RACE TWO:
Unfortunately Craig retired from the startup grid - much to everyones disappointment - not least his (One thing we could do with is some more mechanical help in the pits - if any one is interested - as the time between qualifying and the races is pretty tight, and any additional help can make a big difference - so if you are interested in crewing do let us know!)
The heavens opened and we had our first wet race! The rolling start commenced, the pace car pulled off and the flag dropped… David and Simon were mixing ti up from the start this time, and we were immediately locking horns with the Mini’s again. David in Bug 88 had to pull off due to a suspected ignition issue, which was a shame, which left Simon in the bright orange Monster Bug out there racing against the other classes!… Simon increased his pace lap by lap as his confidence grew (this was is rookie debut and first full wet race!) Looking pretty comfortable out there in the wet, and clearly enjoying the challenges of a wet race, he started to reel in some of the faster classed cars and was looking good to potentially make his way in to the mid-field challengers, as the rain was a bit of a leveler. All was looking good, but unexpectedly he pulled into the pitlane - having thrown the Fan Belt… gutted let down by a few quids worth of belt! (But at least that was it)
So Simon Sergides took 1st in class, and David Charlton 2nd in class! (but hey we had made it to the track and were racing for the first time in years - so in reality that was the biggest result.
It was a brilliant day out, we were visited in the pits by some of the other guys building race cars at the moment which was great!
We were all so gutted for Craig Winfield car 78 (who has been instrumental in getting the racing off the ground) He suffered set-backs from the get go, when we received a call that his transporter van had broken down on route to the circuit, he fixed this road side luckily, but was soon followed by unwelcome disappointment at the track with his engine issues (in typical style everything was OK the night before when the race car was loaded) We’ll see him at Brands Hatch though!
Twat of the day must go to Simon - Who initiated some panic repairs to the ‘faulty oil light’ as he was nervous to go out on track when the oil light wasn’t working!… it turns out after an hour of fettling and head scratching, that we eventually figured out why the Oil light would only flash on for a brief second when the ignition was switched on… the oil accumulator is pre-pressured and ‘obviously’ pressurizes the system when you turn on the ignition - hence the light goes out instantly!
Plonkers of the Day is a closely tied draw between Kev and Phil - for bothering to listen to Simon, and spending the time fault finding and fixing an issue that wasn’t there in the first place!
WITH THANKS:
I have to say thank you to the BARC for letting us run as a Beetle Class in the Cannons Tin Tops Series, and that all of the competitors were friendly and well behaved on the circuit, which made for a fantastic day out - so thank you guys - we look forward to racing with you again at Brands Hatch in a months time!
Phil from Perftec (You’ll have seen him and his superb range of VW clothing at the major shows!) Came down to lend a hand in the pits, and catered for us all with a BBQ, Teas & Coffees! (Thanks a million Phil!)
All of the drivers have a list as long as their arms of personal thank’s to the people and companies who helped get us to the races (You all know who you are!)
And finally a thank you to the spectators and commentators, they embraced our iconic bugs, and really got behind us (The families of spectators loved the beetles, and were welcomed into the pits having their photos with/in the cars!)
Here’s to the next round.. we are hoping to increase our presence on the grid with 5-7 bugs, as several are in the closing stages of their builds now! This will be brilliant as we will definitely have some bumper-to-bumper bug race action if this weekend is anything to go by!
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