Tel's Tales 026 – 3 Sisters 6^th April 2014

Some of the competitors had a few preparation problems before the event including Steve Everall not being able to find any polish for his car and having the rear of the tub resprayed after a shunt last year. Matt Turner was still waiting for a new clutch which seemed to have got lost en route. I had a panic when the car would not start and I quickly traced this to a battery at 12.2 volts which will not power the MBE ECU. Nick Algar was also working until 2330hrs on Sat night to get his Force ready for an early morning start.

I woke up at 0330hrs to hear rain hammering down on the house roof so things did not look promising for the morning. Up at 0530hrs and away at 0545hrs without breakfast (no time and as a racing snake I needed to keep my weight to a minimum). As we got closer to 3 sisters and crossed the pennines the rain eased up and it looked a bit brighter. It was great to see a lot of the usual guys and new faces in the paddock and during the day many Westfield guys came to support us or just for the craic. After signing on we all got through scrutineering without problems and a brisk walk of the track showed that although the rain had stopped the surface was still very wet and practice was a bit hairy ( especially on slicks) with most of us posting times that were about 7secs or more slower than target times.

Immediately it became clear that a few cars had problems but that always happens on the first event for most people. Steve Everall had a misfire which John Hoyle helped cure with a new set of plugs, John Hoyle was playing around with his new launch control and traction control gizmos, I could not use the flatshifter to change gear for some reason and this persisted all day, Nick Algar was having gear selection problems and eventually a clutch fluid pipe burst after an electrical fault blew a hole in it so he only did a practice. The worst issue was Matt Turner who initially bent the gear shifter rod and later the newly fitted clutch gave up the ghost in a cloud of smoke from the bonnet and that ended a frustrating day for him. We had 2 practice runs and then we managed 2 timed runs before lunch and on each run the track was getting drier but was never really ideal/dry with some patches of damp remaining. Indeed most cars looked like they had been involved in motocross or grasstracking as the were covered in water and mud spray so Del decided he had to wash is immaculate car between runs! Lee Smith, who visited the green stuff earlier on, nearly missed his curry and chips lunch and had to leave it in the trailer as he forgot we were having T2 before the break. Still, he is a young lad and maybe thinks food is better than sprinting but he will soon get his priorities right! Steve Wilson and Andrew Lowe ( who also took some good photos) were having a great time despite being new to the scene.

In the end the times gradually came down and everyone had their best run as T2 just before lunch when the official description of the track was warm and damp. John Hoyle won his class closely chased by Stephen Everall and both got trophies. I just held off Tim Nunn to win the class and come 4^th overall, Tim was 6^th overall, Derek Hodder was 7^th overall and John Hoyle 8^th overall so quite a good result. Andy Hargreaves, Del and Marshall Rowland (in his Elise) had no competition in their classes which was a bit disappointing.

The anticipation of an afternoon with lots of runs soon turned into the reality of steady rain and that ruin my battle with Tim Nunn and put a dampener on it for everyone. Some of kept going out to get some seat time but the conditions gpt worse so we had slower times and also some sideways action to amuse the spectators.

Finally a few of us were left with repairs and mods to carry out before the next northern round at Croft on Easter Monday and we all hope it will be dry!

Terry.everall@virgin.net

Speed Series Correspondent

Class G competitor