***TRACKDAY/SPRINT: Blyton (Lincs), Sat 19 Sept***

[boosted]

had a sneaking look on Rx8club ...im waiting for this video!

Glad it was a great day still gutted now. 

[Casey]

Thanks to the mx5nutz forum - there are a few pictures on the North East Lincs Trackday page, here's the link (Facebook) - https://www.facebook.com/groups/1443791022507262/

Great one of flames from C J R's car....

[Casey]

Time for a  “report” of the day from me....

Firstly, as said before, a massive thanks to NickD for staging this event    . I know he was concerned as to whether he’d get the numbers to turn up, as he has had his fingers burned with low numbers at previous Sprint events. Thankfully, the event sold out and the day, from my experience, was a massive success (apart from me not winning anything that is). I really liked the format of a morning trackday and afternoon sprint, so hope NickD will be running some more of these.

Sincere thanks also to everyone who supported this event and made it such an enjoyable day.  Without you guys, it wouldn’t have been half as much fun. Special thanks to bigpete for driving up with his two children (wearing very eye-catching, matching “Boston Rotary” polo shirts) to watch proceedings and chat to everyone. Thanks also to Ian.Mothersole for lugging up the club Gazebo, which provided a refuge from the sun in between Sprint Stints  . Finally, many thanks to the RX8OC Committee who agreed to sponsor the 4 trophies on offer to participants  =D>

As Chris231 said, the day started with arriving at Blyton in the fog, where it was impossible to see to the other side of the circuit  :shock: , but by the time we were on our sighting laps the sun had started to burn through and the weather for the entire day could not have been better, with bright sunshine (warming the track) and a very light, cool, breeze to help cool off in the shade.

Amongst the usual suspects at these sorts of days (you know who you are  :wink: ) I was pleased to help hitandhope on his very first trackday session and give him some tips. It’s always great to see someone new to trackdays find out just how well the 8 handles on circuit. I hope hitandhope  :wink:  will be back to enjoy some more trackdays in the future. It was good to meet Nicklaus for the first time too 

On my second track session, I felt a strange vibration coming from the front right wheel on entering Lancaster and decided to return to the paddock straight away, despite it clearing slightly on the rest of the lap. I took off the front right wheel , which was covered in some unusual “brick coloured” dust â€" with none on the left front wheel. The inside brakepad had worn into a “cheesewedge” shape, yet outer seemed OK. I checked the 4 pistons and all seemed ok, so went about changing all the pads on the front and doing a quick bleed (brake fluid, not blood  ). This didn’t take long with assistance from others â€" as always at these days, everyone is happy to help. Brake pedal was a bit “longer and softer”, but a few laps before the morning track session closed showed the brakes were effective.

Lunchtime (already  :?: ) - After a chat over a cheeseburger with some of our group, it was time for the Sprint Briefing from NickD. Having done a Sprint event earlier in the year, the format was no surprise, but Mazdaontrack events are great as Nick always tries to create a relaxed and “laid back” atmosphere, but with safety clearly emphasised.

Everyone had been issued with their sprint number and “Institute Organisation of Professional Drivers (IOPD)” Competition Licence (valid for one event). So, my number “10” firmly attached to the driver’s side rear window, it’s off to queue in numerical order for the first of two practice runs. Good for the drivers and for the Mazdaontrack team, who had a few gremlins with the timing gear, so an opportunity to sort those out before the first of 4 “official” timed runs.

In between each run there was much checking of everyone’s  times, and much banter (and excuses  ). It’s fair to say that the competitive bug was clearly present! Diane was particularly enjoying herself, but I’ll leave that for her (or Julian) to explain... :lol:

Congratulations to all the winners of the 4 RX8OC trophies; the overall “Rotary Powered” fastest time (posted by C J R in his RX-7) was only 7 hundredths of a second ahead of Big John Rev. Big John Rev won the Fastest RX-8 (Men) trophy with an astoundingly quick time of 1m15.91s. The Fastest RX-8 (Women) was tightly contested, with Rutz posting a fantastic 1m20.00s on her last run to pip Chris231 to the prize (better luck next time Christine  :thumleft: ). Zarterone picked up the “ex-rotary owner” award against incredible competition (no-one  :wink:  :lol: ) but he demonstrated how good a driver he is by posting times in his MX-5 which were comparable with most of the RX-8 times. Thanks to Diane for taking the pictures  :thumleft:

After the trophy awards, 8 (how appropriate  :lol: ) of us gathered at the nearby “Black Horse Inn” for a drink and a meal (an excellent Cajun Salmon in my case, washed down with a well chilled San Miguel), to an wind down and chat about our exploits.

I’m sure I’ve missed lots of things I could have said about the day, but I’ll conclude by saying;

a great day, in the company of great people and with fantastic weather. More please....

(a video or two to follow)

[Casey]

A couple of videos which show the gorgeous weather we experienced.

I would have really liked to see Boosted there with his Westroy - the winner on the day was an S2000 powered Westfield - at least, I think it was a Westfield  I would really have liked to see what times Jon could have posted 

The first video is a few laps in the morning session of my RX-8 trying to a catch a white CRX. I later found out that the driver was Rob, the guy on mx5nutz who arranges many of their track events and whom I'd been working with to try and encourage people to come along, but had never met. I hope we can tie up again to arrange some joint events, as the track etiquette, people and atmosphere made it a great day.

Select the youtube link to get a bigger display, and check the gearwheel is set to 1080p for best quality.

Lastly, my last sprint run, where I was trying too hard (with DSC totally off) to post a better time. Oooops, a spin just before the timing beam exit 

[boosted]

great vids Casey. looks a lovely fast and flowing circuit from the on board vids. Shame about the spin but on the limit fun

next 1 for me hopefully. did Clive go? i saw his name down hoping he had a good day?

[Casey]

Clive unfortunately couldn't make it. Again, it would have been great to see what times he could have clocked up!

I'm still amazed at Big John Rev's time in his OEM engined RX-8, 140k miles (but with with Tein suspension and R888's), 3 Sprint times in the 1m17s and one 1m15.91. They were seriously impressive and showed what the car, without power mods, can do.

[boosted]

Hi Casey....tyres 888 or the new toyo r888's....be interested what he has to say about old 888 versus the new r888's if he used to run 888 compared back to back to new r888's.

[Casey]

TBH, I'm not sure exactly what tyres they were. In fact, he actually said he was running "Toyo Proxes" and I thought he had mentioned 888's in the past. I'm sure he's had them on the car for a while, so I'm assuming they are likely to be the "older" version. 

Sorry, I'm not up to speed on Toyo tyres, being a Federal man - but experimenting with Nankangs NS-2R's at the mo