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27/12/97 23/11/97 Our team finished the Challenge '97 series on a high note, taking an outstanding 2nd place in the "A Final" against some extremely fast competition. To give you some idea of the pace, the previous lap record was beaten by no less than 4 of the teams during the 6 hours of this race! We finished the series overall in 6th place. We hope the team will have a better start to next season, and maybe finish even higher. 13/11/97 The dates for the Club's Winter Series have now been finalised. There will be 1 race each month from November to April. For those club members who like to race more frequently than this we also regularly enter teams into open events at other locations. Contact Ray Trapnell or another committee member for details and dates. On 2nd November we entered 4 teams in a 4-hour team enduro on the Stowe Circuit at Silverstone. For karts this is a very open and high-speed circuit, and the race was tremendous fun. All 4 of the club teams finished in the top 10 places out of 38, with one of our teams finishing in 1st place. We have now entered a team, captained by Stuart Shearman, for Challenge '98. The Club AGM was held on the 6th November. All of the existing committee members were re-elected for another term. As a result of discussions which took place at the AGM we are once again thinking about ways in which we might introduce our own handicapping system. We are also considering the purchase of a kart to enable us to run our own training/practice sessions. 15/10/97 The 3rd ANKC Championship Race Series ended, as did the first 2, with a very close finish. In fact at the end of the final race the leading 2 drivers shared an equal number of points and the decision was made on highest number of wins. Our Challenge '97 team have been having a lot of fun and excitement taking part in this series. As a result of this we had no trouble in deciding to enter a team for Challenge '98 which promises to be bigger and better. The dates for the ANKC Winter Series are being finalised, and I hope to be able to announce them shortly. 7/10/97 The penultimate race of the ANKC 1997 Championship Series took place. Neither of the 2 drivers leading the championship were present, as they were both away at Uxbridge representing the team from ANKC in the penultimate race of the Challenge '97 Series. This latter race produced a result the whole team was delighted with. Racing in the top group of Challenge '97 we managed to come 4th! No-one, including the team members themselves, expected us to be doing anywhere near as well as this when we started the season. We are now looking forward to the final 6 hour Challenge race at White City during November. This 3rd ANKC race series will once again go to the final race (on 15th October) before it is decided, although this time there are only 2 people left in contention. It should be an interesting race. 30/9/97 Last Saturday we entered a team of 6 for a 3 hour race which was organised by the Anglian Water Sports & Social Club. Despite passing everyone else on the track we did not manage to cross the line first, as we had some bad luck and were delayed on both of our refuelling stops. The first team to actually cross the line was composed of some marshals from the track, so they still awarded the prize to us. Next Tuesday, 7th October, our team will be away at Trak 1 taking part in the penultimate round of the Challenge '97 competition. As there is also a club race taking place on that evening and our Challenge Team includes some of the club's best drivers, this will be a good chance for some other club members to make up a few extra points or perhaps win a place on the podium for the first time! 14/9/97 A team consisting of 5 club members entered an 8 hour endurance race at Daytona International to-day under the name of Off Piste. Our team tactics were spot on, although we were astonished by the last minute announcement that we would have to make a minimum of 15 driver changes. Despite this, everything went right for us for a change, and the final result was a win by 11 laps having led from pole to flag. 3/9/97 We will regretfully be forced to reduce the frequency of our club races at Daytona International, from once a fortnight to once a month, as of the end of our currently booked race series in October. For future bookings we are being asked to pay more than we were expecting to, or had budgeted for. We have only a fixed amount to go towards subsidising the cost of full members' race entries, and we do not feel that enough club members would be prepared to pay the full amount of the additional cost every 2 weeks for the club to continue to be viable with races at the former frequency. All categories of member will receive an e-mail with details of how the price increase will affect them. However, we do intend to organise other events once or twice a month, such as entering teams for the open endurance races at Whilton Mill (contact Ray Trapnell for details), and visiting other tracks both for practise sessions and races (contact any committee member with any special requests or ideas). 30/8/97 Round 6 of Challenge '97 at Caxton Gibbet. After this round the 4 groups are re-arranged, and we end up 6th in group 1. The final 2 races in the series are going to be tough as we struggle to finish the series staying in the top group! Read the race report by Stuart Shearman. 2/8/97 Round 5 of Challenge '97 at Buckmore Park. This was the first race since our team was promoted to Group 2. It was a 6-hour race in which we were up against the combined might of both Groups 1 and 2, and we were not expected to do terribly well. I am pleased to be able to report that we surprised ourselves and shocked some of the opposition by coming 2nd in our group and 5th overall. Indeed, if we had not had some problems with the fuel consumption (having to fill up about every 60 minutes instead of every 95 minutes) and also with brakes fading we would probably have won in our group and come 3rd overall. Louis took us from 9th on the grid to lead the race for a while before the first of the premature fuel stops. We actually had to stop half an hour before the fuel bay was supposed to open, and then wait a while for the people manning the fuel bay to get themselves sorted out! Our target now is to do reasonably well in our next race and finish the season in Group 1 for the final 2 rounds. 27/7/97 The club held its Birthday Bash to-day, a special event to celebrate the first anniversary of the founding of the club. We were actually a month early, but it proved difficult to get a date nearer to the actual anniversary. The event was a great success with 36 drivers plus a few families and other spectators turning up for a 3-hour endurance race and barbecue at Whilton Mill. We divided the drivers into 9 more or less evenly matched teams and got on with the serious business of having some fun. For many club members this was their first experience of team endurance racing with driver changes and fuel stops, and also of this particular track. I think they all enjoyed it. Many people have said they would like us to arrange another event like this some time. For a more detailed flavour of what went on see the following reports from 2 team members. 14/7/97 The club team had a good weekend at Le Mans. The competition was intense and we did not do as well as we had hoped, but we kept the kart on the track and running for the full 24 hours and finished 40th out of 50. The date of the club's anniversary event has had to be changed from the 26th to the 27th of July due to a booking error. 29/6/97 A team from the club are off to take part in a 24 hour race at Le Mans next week. Let's hope the weather improves a bit before then. You should have received an e-mail about the club's birthday celebration race to be held at Whilton Mill on the 26th July. The club will not be a year old until the month after, but a closer date was not available. 1/6/96 Round 4 of Challenge '97 resulted in a win for the ANKC team in group 3 at our home track. Looks like we will be going up to group 2 for the next 2 rounds. For the full story read Stuart Shearman's report on our team's efforts. 30/5/97 See Ray Trapnell's report on our latest trip to Whilton Mill and then come along and try it yourself. Club members contact Ray for details. The next race is on 9th June. 4/5/97 Our Challenge '97 team had their 3rd round race on 29th April at Formula Fun on the Western Avenue. Starting from the back of the grid we managed to haul ourselves up to finish 4th. The next Challenge race is a 6 hour one at Daytona International on 1st June, and the pressure will be on us to do well there. 19/4/97 After round 2 of Challenge '97 our team has been moved into group 3. After this re-grouping the racing should now get much closer and therefore even more fun. As we are currently placed at the top of our group we will be starting the next race, at Formula Fun, from the back of the grid. Although it was fun, owing to previous commitments and also a lack of funds we have decided not to contest any more races in the Daytona Summer Series. Our Le Mans 24 Hour team have now paid the final instalment of their entry fee for this race, and are now eagerly counting the days until race weekend of 5th/6th July. 21/3/97 With the summer approaching events are beginning to fill up again. This movement will probably increase once the clocks go forward and we are racing in daylight again during April. To avoid the disappointment of your entry for a race being rejected remember to get your cheques in to Andy Gordon at SWSE07 early. 20/03/97 After the excitement of his first 3 hour team race and our first daylight race of the year last Saturday, Ray Trapnell has coerced a team of 6 of us into taking part in a 6 hour endurance race at Daytona International this coming Sunday. This is the first in another series of 8 races. 20/03/97 We have entered a team for Challenge '97 and have just completed our second race in the series. This is an 8 race series of 3 and 6 hour races using a number of tracks mainly around London and the south-east, but also coming as far north as Milton Keynes. It started in the oil industry, but has now grown to include companies from all sorts of businesses. The standard of some of the teams is very high (in the first round a new lap record was set, and the timing software had to be adjusted to cater for quicker lap times than the track operators had previously thought possible!). There should also be some very close racing as the 40 teams race in 4 groups of 10 and after every 2nd round the groups are re-arranged to ensure that everyone is racing against teams of a comparable standard. Starting positions are also based upon reverse order of current rankings which makes it even closer. Initially we were drawn in group 4 and after the first round I was expecting us to move up to group 3, but after the second round I am not so sure. 16/3/97 A 4 man team from the club took part in a 3 hour open race with 33 other teams at Daytona International on 15th March. Being 2 laps up after the first 30 minutes, we were devastated to suffer, first an engine failure which dropped us back to 12th place and 7 laps down, and then shortly afterwards another failure which put us down in 25th place and 12 or 13 laps down. These mechanical problems cost us 15 minutes with the mechanics in the pits, and also caused us to refuel 4 times instead of the twice we had planned. We eventually managed to claw our way back to 4th place, within 1 lap of the podium and 2 laps of the winners, so at least we were able to go home satisfied in the knowledge that we had performed well enough to win if only we had not been let down by the mechanical problems. 3/3/97-15/10/97 The ANKC 1997 Championship Race Series. 18/2/97 We have entered a 7 man team for the 24-hour kart race at Le Mans in July. December 1996 - February 1997 We organised our first winter race series. 28/29 September 1996 We entered a six man team in a 24-hour race at Lydd, in Kent. 28th August 1996 The club was born, and we got down to action straight away with an initial 6 race series to test the water. |
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