The 2017 Alan Healy Memorial Cadwell Park Stages, sponsored by TJS Self Drive

The eighth and final round of the 2016-17 MSVR Circuit Championship was held at a sunny Cadwell Park circuit on Sunday 9^th April. An event organised by the Borders Motor Club, with Mike Taylor and Martin Haggett planning to consolidate their positions in the overall championship and in class D1.

This was a well run event with no delays, even though there was no shortage of work for the recovery crews between stages. The organisers made the most of Cadwell’s dips, crests and fast sweeping bends. At times, the Team Lotusbits Sunbeam was hitting the rev limiter in sixth, which is a speed of 137 mph.

Apart from a minor brush with a first stage chicane, which was an issue for most of the top competitors, there were no real problems over the nine stages for Mike and Martin, with little for the service crew to attend to during the service halts, except wheel changes and spanner checks.

Mike and Martin finished ninth overall and once again collected the trophy for third in class.

The final championship points tally puts Mike in sixth overall and Martin third equal on points, but losing out under the tie break rules to finish fourth. Mike is fourth in the Michelin Cup for those drivers who use that company’s tyres. Final class positions are first for Martin and second for Mike.

Team Lotusbits are looking forward to a third running of this popular and competitive championship starting in the Autumn.

The Alan Healy Memorial Rally

Cadwell Park

April 9th

So the final round had arrived of the Motorsport News Circuit Championship for 2016/17 season and Team Lotusbits had arrived at the stunning picturesque venue of Cadwell Park in Lincolnshire.

With a couple of non-finishes on earlier rounds in the season, Cathy and I came to Cadwell Park not under any real pressure, but just to go and have some fun and see where we could end up.

As all ready mentioned the stunning picturesque venue of Cadwell Park with its hilly undulating track was only enhanced by the hot sunny weather and we set off from Service up to the Stage 1 start, hoping we were on the right tyres for the conditions, it was warm but not as warm but was set to get hotter during the day.

From the moment the lights went green the car felt good and I could tell Cathy was enjoying the car and the car suited the conditions, the grip was there and we could push on round the long sweeping corners and on the brakes a bit later into the chicanes.  Being a nice day the public had turned up in there masses and at one point on the stage we leave the fast flowing track and enter a public viewing section, of twisty low speed corners, only just wide enough for one car to pass through, here the car was doing what was requested by Cathy, all was good, in fact very good we were 13^th after the first stage.

Starting the second stage our first stage nervous had left us and we were ready to push on and see if we could gain on that 13^th position, all was good for the first few corners, leaning on the tyres and pushing the car and using every inch of available track out of corners, then as we entered the spectator twisty section we had marshal’s waving to us to slow down, Unbeknown to us the car in front of us clipped a tyre going through a narrow gateway, causing his front right wheel to point 90 degrees to his left front wheel and after trying to carry on up the stage found he couldn’t steer and ended up blocking the way, we arrived behind the car with nowhere to go.  It’s strange how seconds lost can feel like minutes when the adrenaline is pumping and you are staring at the rear end of an escort, by now we should of been half around the stage.  We finally got free of the escort blockage and powered on around the stage to the finish but looking at the times, we had lost 20seconds and were now down 22^nd Overall, one unhappy crew!

We set about making the time back over the next couple of stages and with a change of tyres to a harder compound and a sneaky small suspension change (unbeknown to Cathy) implemented by myself and our chief Mechanic Keith, the car had less roll in the corners and more grip and by dinner we had moved up to 16^th.

With a change of direction for the afternoon, we were now heading the correct way around the circuit, as if it was being used on a normal racing day’s event, but this didn’t change anything in the style or commitment to Cathy’s driving, if anything she was going quicker still chasing down cars and passing a few in the process, this was no Sunday afternoon driver here! 

We had moved up to 15^th with a couple of stages to go and to be honest we didn’t really know where we could go much quicker, so the last two stages we decided to drive it fast but don’t take any unnecessary risks, which is just what we did and finished the day 15^th Overall and 7^th in our class on the day.

Thanks again to all the Lotusbits Team for all the work they have done over the year to get the cars ready so we can go and play on the weekends and has resulted in the team due to be awarded various Driver and Co-driver prizes at the Motorsport News Circuit Championship Awards night in June.  There may be a write up from this evening, but it may be in the form of photos as I won’t be remembering much the day after.... Hic- Hic!