Track ReportsSunday 16th March 2008After a fairly miserable week of weather the sun came out on Sunday morning and remained with us for the rest of the day. Aaron McGowan finally got his ex-Richard Dempster Clio 182 out and was moving more and more quickly as the day went on. It was nice to see two VX220's circulating very rapidly in the hands of Mark Angus and Simon Walsh. I noticed a blue one turning up to watch. Perhaps he'll come out to play in the future! Miles McDonagh seemed to be enjoying getting to grips with his new Exige. The most unlikely car of the day has to have been Stewarty's Volvo T5 Estate Automatic. The pendulum effect it was displaying at the Chicane was giving the flag marshal, Jenifer, a near heart attack every other lap! Stewarty was joined by David Maxwell in a Volvo 850, which lapped faster as the day wore on. One hard luck story concerned Tom Mulready who was trying to run in his racing Uno before the first race in a fortnight's time. Unfortunately, the engine had other ideas and it blew up in the afternoon. However, Tom got further than Kevin McNamee, who had engine woes in his BMW from the very start. Steve Mitchell brought his Seat Leon Challenge car over from Scotland. That beastie is quick in a very controlled way. Most of the time, that is. Once again the luckless Jenifer witnessed David having a couple of "moments" at the Chicane as he searched out his limits. Paul Keys capped an expensive week (he was seen in Ernie Skillen's Jewellers shop buying an engagement ring on Wednesday!) by burning out the clutch on the Megabusa. Make what you like of this one! The following conversation was overheard by me between Ray Dowds ( who was rumoured to allegedly have hurt his back last year whilst leaping from some bedroom furniture in a Superman cape!) and his wife, Audrey, who has nerves of steel (Well she would have, wouldn't she?) Ray: "Look at the state of those tyres. I'm only getting a track day and a half out of a set!" Audrey: " That's because you are driving so hard!" Ray: " I am not going any harder than usual!" Audrey: "You are. You are much more agressive! You are too agressive!" Ray: "You enjoy it!" At that point I left! A big "Thank you" goes from us to everyone who took part, be they drivers or marshals. The standard of driving in most cases was excellent. No time was lost having to pull anyone from the scenery and the new, later start and finish times seemed to work well. The new catering facilities seemed popular and this arrangement will remain for the foreseeable future. Sunday 17th February 2008First track day of the season got underway on Sunday 17th February at Kirkistown. There was a large turn out with a lot of “old hands” and some new faces.
Saturday 4th August 2007NLP practitioners tell us that everyone has a preferential sense by which they experience their world and if you can tap into it you can melt that personís heart. In my case it is auditory and on Saturday I fell totally in love with the sound of an Audi RS4 on full song! Wonderful! However, that RS4 was only one of a great selection of cars that enjoyed almost perfect conditions. A number of experienced Kirkistown drivers remarked that the track was in the ëfastestí state that they had ever experienced. The first session got under way slightly later than planned at 10.40am and was made up of regular participants such as Micky Dardis in his rapid Escort, Paul Keys in his Megabusa, Nicolas Wood in his Audi S3 and Andy Wallace in his Westfield Ford. Ray Dowds brought his RS2000 out to play with us for the first time and we nearly collapsed with shock when Derek Latimer arrived at 9.30am and made the first session! The second session was meant to be for the people new to us. We had a great mix including Mervyn Lemonís Westfield Ford, Richard Boydís Williams Clio and Michael Robinsonís Toyota MR2. However, the non appearance of a large number of promised Lotus prompted us to let Gavin Byrne and Andrew Yeates run their Exige and Elise respectively in the second group. Three more Lotus did eventually arrive and the Spendlove brothers, Nigel and Lloyd put on their usual rapid display throughout the day. As always there were hard luck stories. It is difficult to know which one ranks highest. There was the Lotus that didnít make it. It destroyed an engine on the road up from Dublin! Then there was the curse of the last session! Se·n Kenny, having driven in a sensible, controlled manner all day made a slight mistake that normally would have resulted in nothing more than a scare. However, this time Fate sent his Lotus into the tyres at the Chicane. However, I think top prize has to go to Martin Bryans. He was well down our reserve list but was regularly phoning me to see if he was ëiní. Eventually he was and he turned up early with his Sierra XR4i on the trailer. Having signed on he went back up to take the car off the trailer and broke the cast iron manifold in doing so! End of day! Interesting tit-bits from the day include the fact that having finally got their Mk2 Escort Cosworth going quickly, father and son team, Tony and Stephen Traub, assure me that they are definitely going racing at the end of the month. Who is going to be driving? They would not say! Another potential racer, the glamourous Kirsty Forsythe, assured me that she was not touching up her make-up as she walked up the paddock with an open make-up compact. She said she was going to use the mirror to check her oil level! I thought, ìWomen can multi-task. She was probably doing both! Speaking of multi-tasking. Regular marshal and Formula Vee racer, Jenifer Mullan, stood down for a session to give some advice to Paul Keys on his racing lines as he took her round in his Megabusa. Colm Gallagher, alias Arthur, went one better by actually swapping places with one of our participants for a few sessions. Special thanks goes to super-sub marshal Patrick Ritchie who stood in, in both cases. As ever, thanks to the marshals, St. Johnís, Viv, Greer, EÛrann, Jessica and all the participants for making it another successful day. Thanks to Graham Curry and Steven Legge for photographing the event. Pictures can be found on Really Mean Sounds [click here to view] Donal Sunday 3rd June 2007"Crikey!" said the ghost of Steve Irwin, "Was that a shark out there?" No, it was Allen Erskine's Locost splashing through Fisherman's at our last track day! On a day more suitable to water skiing we had a respectable turn out. Allen had to be the most determined. He wanted to hone his wet weather skills for future racing and he certainly did that. Yet even he took to the comfort of an Audi Estate eventually! Special mention should also go to Andrew Parkinson (whom I called Dave all day!) and Kirsty Forsythe who also braved the water in their Indy Blades. Rainmeister Alan Edgar seemed to be having a ball in his Renault 5 GT Turbo while Paul Keys and Gareth Dillon amused themselves and everyone else in their one eyed Sierra. The Lotus contingent, smaller than usual, aptly demonstrated how good these cars are in the wet. I think Peter Gerachty from Linders actually sold one on the day on the strength of this alone! As usual there were "hard luck" stories. Tony and Stephen Traub brought their Cosworth Mk2 Escort down, only to discover that the wheel nuts for the drys would not bolt the wets on! Jim Wilson had no wets for his Cossie. Aaron McGowan drove through a lake just south of Greyabbey and stopped. I donít know who rescued him - probably the Coastguard! The worst one of all has to be our long time supporter Micky Dardis, who brought his Dad with him for the first time ever. Micky travels from Enniscorthy (Put it this way - Edinburgh is closer!). They took the car off the trailer, started it up, revved it up, it spluttered, it died. End of day! Driving standards, generally, were excellent. There was only one occasion when I had to have a word with an errant participant. The award for the stupidest action of the day was jointly given to Keith and myself. In our defence I will say that everything was waterlogged, from the radios to our brains! It was the last session of the day and it had just been red flagged because Clarke Frazer's Corsa had expired at Colonial. At this stage the rain just got harder. We debated whether to restart the session as we were standing in a two inch puddle that covered the whole pit lane exit. As there were only three cars waiting to go, we let it run. A few minutes after the restart, Ricky Griffiths in his Lancia Delta came slowly down the pit lane to join in. There was a good gap in the traffic so we both waved furiously at him to "hurry up". He did. He passed us at, perhaps, 40 miles an hour. The resulting tsunami washed us away! Nobodyís fault but ours! Once again we wish to thank all of our marshals. It is no fun standing in the rain all day with a flag for company. We do appreciate you. 'Til the next time... Donal. Sunday 29th April 2007Once again there was a great selection of cars including a massive collection of Lotus models, an impressive gathering of Locaterfields, a good number of hot hatches, some well driven BMWís and Evos, an RX8, a good representation of Dr Porscheís produce, a typically understated Skyline and a relatively rare (to us) Sierra XR4i. However, for me and others who commented to me, the star performance was given by Richard Demsterís 182 Clio. This very clean little car, with Richard driving it, was a revelation, not least to a few Lotus drivers. The award for innovation on the day should go to Vinny Hayes who, on a Sunday afternoon in Kircubbin, from a position of zero local knowledge including people and places, left the circuit for a while and then returned, somehow having found someone to sell him four second hand tyres and wheels for a Skyline! The most surreal moment of the day was when the Flowerpot Men came in to sign on! Actually, they were Lee Walker and Graham Curry both looking like extras from National Lampoonís Vacation, with their flower pot hats! They did have the last laugh because I got sunburned and, presumably, they didnít! There were a few bad luck stories like the Lotus that suffered some front end damage after an excursion at Debtorís, or Andrew Yeatsí Elise that got launched over the kerbs at Colonial 2, suffering some suspension damage. However, the worst luck of the day didnít even happen at the circuit. Regular participants, Wesley and Sam Lyle, were on their way to the circuit when a stone smashed the window of their trusty Toyota MR2. Not being a laminated screen, it broke into thousands of tiny pieces which dutifully lodged themselves in every nook and cranny of the interior of the car. Neither Lyle uses a visored helmet and so they decided that it would be too dangerous both for them and the other participants on the day, if they were to go out on track. So what did they do? Well, Sam turned the car round at Greyabbey and headed back to Ballyclare while Wesley took the trouble to come down to us to let us know that they werenít going to make it and we could give their place to someone else! With that being typical of the people at our track days, you just know that there will always be consideration shown to everyone on the track. As an aside, I would like to make mention of and apologise to the people who came in later in the afternoon in what, I think, were Toyota GT Turbo Hatchbacks. I am usually chasing my tail all day in the paddock and did not notice their build up. However, as the day progressed and the paddock began to thin out, I looked up at one point to see an impressively long line of these cars parked side by side right across the top paddock. They looked great and added something to the day. Unfortunately, I hadnít time to talk to any of them, nor did I get a picture. If anyone did get a picture of the display and could send it to me with some details, I would like to put it on our web site. Judging by the comments made to me on the day, everyone seemed to have a great time. Five oíclock seemed to come very quickly and suddenly it was all over. Thanks to Fel and her team who did a great job once again. Thanks to Viv and EÛrann who looked after the grub and to Greer who does anything he is asked to do. Lastly, thanks to all who came and made it the success it was. Donal. Sunday 18th March 2007I feel a whole year older today. It wasnít my birthday yesterday. Itís just that, in one day, we had all four seasons at Kirkistown during our first track day of the year. We had blue skies and warm sunshine, horizontal snow, hail stones like marbles and rain. The whole slide show was accelerated by strong winds. The virgin we sacrificed on Saturday definitely lied! However, loads of cars arrived. The selection ranged from a variety of Lotus Exiges through some very quick hot hatches, a beautiful orange RX7 belonging to Shane Rabbitt and even a Westfield Megabusa and a Sylvia Phoenix. Dave Wishart and Marty Mounce, respectively, deserve medals for driving topless(!) in such weather. Most drivers kept it on the island and there were no major offs. Darren Cook customised his Astra turbo a little. It was a nice speckled brown colour when he got back to the paddock. I think it was mud! It did wash off but, unfortunately, the damage to the front bumper didnít. Kaman Lo won the ìWho can get furthest off the track?î award. Three ropes later we got his MX5 back on the circuit. At 12.25pm a blizzard attacked us and with visibility down to a few feet and snow lying on the circuit, we called lunch. Twenty minutes later I received what must be the ëquote of the dayí. Nicholas Wood (Audi S3) came up an to me with the request, ìCan we get going again soon before the snow goes away?î We ran through to just after five oíclock. Particular thanks have to go to Felís great team of marshals who, having braved the elements all day, agreed to stay on post to give Jack Mc Neice an extra three last laps before he left us for at least two years of pilot school in Oxfordshire. Good luck Jack from all of us. The record for the most miles run probably goes again to Sam and Wesley Lyle in their quick MR2 but they were run close by the John Le Grange team in the GTi Polo. We would also like to thank the numerous guys who offered the use of their 4x4ís if we needed them to extricate stuck cars. Thankfully, we didnít but the offers were appreciated. Once again photos can be seen on the RMS site courtesy of Graham Curry. [click here to view] Sunday 15th was our first day of 2005. The usual virgin sacrifice took place on Saturday night (this is getting more difficult every time!) and the gods obliged with beautiful weather the following day. We were worried with only ten cars booked prior to the event. The trepidation increased on Sunday morning as by 10.30 a grand total of six had arrived and one of those hadnít booked! We got under way to the beautiful sound of Ray Dowds TVR. Ray planned to sell this car over the winter but just couldnít bear to part with it. Des Cullen had borrowed Paul McLoughlinís slicks for the day and thought somebody had fitted a new turbo to his Scooby when he wasnít looking, such was the improvement. Gareth Loganís Mk 2 Escort blasted round, eating everything in its path for most of the first session before retiring with a burst radiator. So began an epic repair job with a radiator being dispatched from Carrickfergus. Chris Atwell proved the rule that smooth is fast by flying round in his M3 Evo whilst looking like he was not even trying. He got my vote for ëmost impressive driver of the dayí. Ernie Skillen put on his usual polished, rapid display and deserves some sort of award for self control, as I know that he really loves to be going sideways! By 11.30 Kaman Lo had arrived from Dublin with a replacement Charade for the one that he blew up last year. This one is bog standard but he still seemed to enjoy himself all day, which proves the point that, itís not what you have but how you use it. Isnít that right, girls? The quiet man, Andy Wallace, had arrived with his WRX Scooby to much banter of, ìItís out of warranty then?î from Keith. Amazingly, Derek Lattimer arrived well before lunch with his trusty Legacy. As usual, he had the entire contents of his garage in the back seat and boot and he managed to get on track about 12.30!. Meanwhile, John Leckey and friends were being impressive in their semi-competition Pug 106. Do I detect a karting background there? Shortly before lunch, two beautiful machines arrived at the gate. Pat Boal in his Ferrari Testarossa and David Frazer in his Mercedes SL 500. I thought they were there to spectate but no, they wanted to play. David had to take the roof off so that he could get a helmet on! Both cars were beautiful to watch on the circuit and I thank both gentlemen for bringing such toys to Kirkistown. After lunch, a wagon-train of vehicles on trailers arrived along with Hayley Rowley and Leo Nulty in Hayleyís Elise. Joey Greenan was towing his left hand drive 1967 Cooper S with his Scooby SR1. Gary White had his Mk3 Rally Escort Turbo. By 2 oíclock the fun was in full swing with Joey doing impossible things in the mini, Leo adding to passenger, Des Cahillís stress levels by spinning while exiting the chicane, Gareth Logan flying once again in the Mk2 and Pat Boal running out of brakes! Unluckiest man of the day was Gary White who blew up the Escort turbo on his first run. Silliest man of the day was Joey Greenanís protege who forgot the keys for the trailer. Somehow they got it unhooked and Joey duly thrashed the Scooby round the track as well. Second most unlucky man was John Lecky who had to be towed in, leaving an ominous trail of oil in his wake. Glamour was provided by Leo Nulty. We could see the reflection of the very talented Hayley Rowley on his bald head! Generally, a great day was had by nearly all who were there. Photos, thanks to Graham Curry, can be seen on Really Mean Sounds [click here to view] Donal. Sunday 10th OctoberThree things probably contributed to this being a much better supported day than usual; the fact that this was our last date of the year, the price reduction and some good publicity from our friends at Autocar. A great selection of cars turned up along with some old friends who haven't been seen for a while. Paul McLoughlan has defected from the Subaru camp to a Supra. His was one of three on the day although Ernie Skillen's is a monster! We welcomed Sarah Mahon for the first time. If she was male we would be talking about her metallic reproductive appendages since she was playing with the big boys in her little Fiat Uno! It was nice to see Winston Kerr and Paul Ayton in their respective Westfield and Quantam in attendance. To add to the variety Kevin McNamee turned up in his potent S2000 engined BMW and was just incredible! There were a few hard luck stories. Jonathan Smyth had a strange fuel problem that stopped his 205GTi. Andy Phillips' Civic ate itself. However, the biggest hard luck story goes to Kaman Lo who brought his little but quick Charade from Dublin. He was going well when his con-rod decided that it preferred the environment outside the confines of the engine block. Since he had driven the car from Dublin, Kaman had an added problem in how to get it home. He decided to leave it at Kirkistown until he could get back with a trailer For some reason he locked it (Who was going to steal it? And how?). Then he realised that the keys were still in it! All in all the day went well with only one major off when Mick Byrne went water skiing in the Sylvia. The weather stayed fine. Thanks to all who attended and we hope to see you next year. One of the marshals, Graham Curry, has posted some pictures and a report on Really Mean Sounds [click here to view] On Sunday 25th April we had a very poor turn out but that meant that the cars that were there had lots of track time. David Clarke was first to arrive with his Golf . He was soon joined by David Beattie in his stripped out Alfa 155. For quite a while these two had the place to themselves. Eventually the Barry Rabbitt posse rolled in, with Barry in a very recently acquired BMW M3, Eoin Loughnane driving his very quick Audi S3, Gary Clarke in a very tasty VW Corrado and James Collen in a rapid Pug 309 GTi. Justin Egan was riding shotgun, not intending to partake, in his ridiculously fast Cossie Sierra. The first run saw David Beattie with brake problems. Basically, there weren't any! For the next hour he feverishly worked at the front end and low, the brakes returneth! (and stayeth!) Meanwhile Barry Rabbitt was trying to morph into something resembling a human, using copious quantities of Coke (the drink!) and Keith's gourmet sandwiches. It worked and soon he was complaining that his M3 stuck to the track too well! Eoin Loughnane was being most impressive in the S3 and was entertaining the marshals excellently along with James Collen and Gary Clarke. Around midday Derek Latimer weighed in with his trusty Legacy and as usual, began turning it into a race car in the paddock. I have never seen anybody get so many tools and spare wheels into a Legacy. I think it is a Tardis in disguise! This time he was fitting some newly acquired slick rubber and, just before lunch, he got his first run. It looked that we might get a bit of rain so a couple of extra sessions were squeezed in before a later than usual lunch break. The rain didn't amount to anything and activity resumed at 1.50pm with a threatening sea mist approaching from Fisherman's Corner. It never really got too bad but lights became a necessity for a while. What it did do, however, was cause the Strangford Ferry to be cancelled, thus necessitating a circumspect route home for our Southern participants. As usually happens in the afternoons, much swapping of cars, drivers and passengers took place, with everyone, generally, having a great time. However, a pressure was building like that of a potentially active volcano and suddenly, it erupted. Justin Egan came into the office to sign on. That big Cossie was itching to get out! Word went round the marshals' posts that the Cossie was coming out. They weren't disappointed. This was no ordinary machine. It was a rocket ship and Justin can handle it, which is just as well considering the way it stepped out in Debtor's on his second lap. The remainder of the day saw good weather, better driving and much entertainment from all concerned. The only casualties were David Clarke's GTi which went on to the trailer early with no brake pads left and one of Derek Latimer's new slicks which blew out, thankfully not at Debtor's. Since it actually blew out from the centre of the 'tread' and not a side wall, Derek will be paying a visit to his supplier for a refund in the near future. All in all, a good day. It's just a pity that there weren't more people there to enjoy it! The next date is Sunday 13th June. Donal. |
