Lydden Hill 22nd May
Posted: Mon May 24, 2021 9:17 pm
I went to a meeting at Lydden Hill on saturday with the mini, it was the first one organised by the new club as the promoter we raced with last year has decided not to use Lydden Hill this year but go to Swaffham instead. So as the first one they have organised it was run as a test session just to get stuff organised etc.
The first session we used the oval which is what we will be racing on anyway. I went out on some worn trackday tyres which didn't really work that well as the track was wetter than it looked with a big puddle on pilgrims corner so after a session of slipping and sliding around I hadn't managed to pass many cars but had held on to the back of a few of the faster cars so it wasn't all bad.
Then the heavens opened so I changed all 4 tyres for some toyo tr1's and lined up again to find they were trying to clear the flooding at pilgrims and on the cut through we use to make it a oval. After quite a while they gave up trying to clear the cut through and said we'd have to use the whole track, what a shame
. The car felt much better with some tread on it and was going well apart from some wheelspin out of the corners slowing me down a little.
I tweaked the car a bit for the next session and when we was lined up they decided to put another formula out on track with us as the time was running out which made it interesting as the faster ones were as quick as the minis. The car was going well again but the tyres were starting to hold it back as the track dried out so I think I could have got away with the trackday tyres for this session.
It was a good day and I still have a couple of things I want to try on the car to see if it helps. Also having looked at some of my video from in the car I need to try some slightly different lines to see if I can gain through that too.
Thanks to Kev for being the catering dept and camera man for the day as he couldn't race due to a bad back.
Here's a few of the pics he took
The first session we used the oval which is what we will be racing on anyway. I went out on some worn trackday tyres which didn't really work that well as the track was wetter than it looked with a big puddle on pilgrims corner so after a session of slipping and sliding around I hadn't managed to pass many cars but had held on to the back of a few of the faster cars so it wasn't all bad.
Then the heavens opened so I changed all 4 tyres for some toyo tr1's and lined up again to find they were trying to clear the flooding at pilgrims and on the cut through we use to make it a oval. After quite a while they gave up trying to clear the cut through and said we'd have to use the whole track, what a shame
. The car felt much better with some tread on it and was going well apart from some wheelspin out of the corners slowing me down a little.I tweaked the car a bit for the next session and when we was lined up they decided to put another formula out on track with us as the time was running out which made it interesting as the faster ones were as quick as the minis. The car was going well again but the tyres were starting to hold it back as the track dried out so I think I could have got away with the trackday tyres for this session.
It was a good day and I still have a couple of things I want to try on the car to see if it helps. Also having looked at some of my video from in the car I need to try some slightly different lines to see if I can gain through that too.
Thanks to Kev for being the catering dept and camera man for the day as he couldn't race due to a bad back.
Here's a few of the pics he took
Yeah that’s a habit of his but he battered the whole side this time 