My first Donington GP experience!

[Rob Hunter - Club Secretary]

After getting the MOT done on the MegaS2000 on Tuesday afternoon, I foolishly decided the best way to get my eye back in was to do a track day 😂. 

 

Nabbing a cancellation with Open Track at Wednesday lunchtime for the same evening at Donington, I rang Howden to get my insurance sorted. My annual cover includes 5 free track days, and takes just a few minutes to get sorted (fab service as always!).

 

After lunch I swapped my out my cat for the decat pipe, checked fluids, torque  settings, and pressures, chucked some tools in the boot plus spare wheels/tyres in the youngests mighty Corsa before we headed to Donington. 

 

In my excitement, I'd not realised until the driver briefing that I'd booked the full GP circuit...  Only then did the realisation set in that I was facing a track layout I'd never used in a car I'd not driven at all for 4 months on tyres I've never used before (Nankang AR1's).... On top of that, local members John, Hedley, Tony, Glynn and Ben had all come along to watch, so no pressure 😂

 

During my last Donington track day in mid 2024, I was black flagged for noise (hitting a beautiful sounding 103.5db under the gantry vs the 98db limit!) and knew it was induction noise from the ITB's.... recently I'd picked up a PX600 airbox to help with this so fitted it in the paddock while we were waiting for the driver briefing.

 

 

When test fitting, the airbox is a very "snug" fit under the bonnet so despite trying various adaptors, I can't run any of my filters.... as I will only run it on track I'm currently investigating fitting a 100mm turbo mesh, watch this space... I'll also be playing around with the fitment as the bottom of the ITG backplate doesn't quite fit the Pipercross airbox meaning a bit of duct tape is needed (it's securely and works, but isn't pretty 😂).

 

After the sighting laps, I took to the track with my youngest riding shotgun managing a leisurely 2m01s fastest lap. Thankfully nothing fell off and all the temps were good. The weather was amazing and we had loads of stunning cars on track, including Radical, GT3RS, Ferrari, M4, M3, M5 etc.

 

I am by no means an experienced track driver (having only done Donington National 4 times) but I have been steadily improving my lap times on each visit. Last year on the National circuit I'd managed to get down to 1m21.0 (1m23.1 with a passenger), so knew I was well off my normal pace (with the 30 seconds "rule of thumb" added for the Melbourne loop).

 

My 2024 National personal best on 185/60 R888R and 235/45 Kumho V70a tyres:

 

 

My next passenger run saw me down to sub 2 minutes but knew I hadn't got rid of the rustiness quite yet.

 

Ben shared with me his GP layout laptimes from 2024 in his R1 engined MNR (1m54) and Michael messaged me to say he'd managed a 1m54.5 with a passenger in his Hyabusa powered MK Indy.

 

While the MegaS2000 is a lot heavier than Ben's or Michael's bike engined cars, I've always managed to be competitive with them over a lap of Donny, so knew I could push on a bit more.

 

Now a bit more focused with confidence in the tyres building, I went for a solo run to try and explore the cars limits a bit more. Finally it was starting to click and I could push on, getting to the limit of grip. I pulled back in with a big grin!!

 

Racechrono showed me that despite a bit of traffic I'd hit a 1m52.5 and that if I'd strung together all the fastest sectors I'd have been at 1m51.7.

 

 

On this solo run, I'd been playing with a Fiesta ST race car. Chatting to the driver (Aaron Lali) in the paddock afterwards, this slick shod 200+bhp car is a class winner in the Modified Ford Championship and he was using the laps as testing. He was really sending it on track, so I'm not sure he was overly impressed that a fat old bloke managed to catch and pass him 😂

 

 

On our final passenger run, we managed to catch, pass, and then pull away from the MacG Racing MK Indy (running a 2.0 Zetec on ITB's). Race drivers Josh Tomlinson and Johnny Macgregor were sharing their race team prepped car, so with a passenger onboard I needed all of the extra 70 ish bhp of the Honda as we had no advantage in the corners.

 

Having a look at Racechrono in the paddock, we had managed to get down to 1m53.1 (optimal of 1m52.4) with a passenger. Not bad at all!

 

 

We had run out of time at this point so wasn't able to get any more laps in. 

 

On reflection, I'm sure I'll be able to dip below a 1m50 with a bit more practice. Goddards was a corner I never felt I'd quite mastered (it's a weird off camber job) and I was a huge 6mph below my best at the apex of Craners (you need big cahoonas turning left at 100mph!!). I was also still short shifting a little on Wheatcroft to keep the noise down, and I'd left all the tools, tyreweld, compressor, and spares in the boot.

 

I'd also forgotten to remove the Westfield umbrella 😂

 

 

The new AR1's were very impressive with a nice progressive break away at the limit. The extra front grip of the 205's over the R888R 185's was noticeable on the exit from Coppice where the LSD tends to give a bit of push when unleashing the power in 3rd or 4th. It was also evident through Craners, where I had a more positive front end making it easier to pull the car left to straighten up for braking into the Old Hairpin but I do need to push harder there.

 

The 235 rears worked well too, excellent grip but progressive break away at the limit. Once I was used to them, they felt almost as good as the Kumho V70 but didnt overheat after a few laps.

 

A few photos of the day:

 

Catching the MacG Racing Indy (Josh Tomlinson at the wheel)...

 

Off to build a gap!

 

Hunting down the Fiesta.

 

Through the Foggy esses.

 

Found an apex 😂

 

An absolutely brilliant few hours and the car was faultless despite the hot weather.

 

A load of us will the doing the Open Track evening at Donington (National circuit this time) on the 1st September if anyone wants to join us!