Rockingham Slot Car Club held a 6hr DiSCA WEC race on Sunday 11th November. Race report by Matthew Tucker.
12 teams entered, 2 LMP1, 5 LMP2 and 5 GT entries. We welcomed digital newcomers Garage27 piloted by captain Nik Kerswill, with Will Strachan and David Farrow.
The entry list was:
LMP1
Rockingham, Toyota TS030, NdW
Eastcote, Lola B12/80, Slot It
LMP2
Mission 8, Oreca 03, SV Works
Sports Carazing, Pescarolo, Avantslot
Sports Carazing2, Pescarolo, Avantslot
Demon, Audi R10, Avantslot
Racing for England, Zytek, Sloter
GT
Garage 27, Ford GT, Carerra
North Staffs, Viper-R GTS, Scaleauto
R&B, Viper GTS-R, Scaleauto
Kessel Run, Corvette C6.R, NSR
Red Dragon Racing, Ferrari 458, Black Arrow
Handout motors and tyres and then 30 mins of qualifying which set grid position and podium position. Mission 8 took pole closely followed by Rockingham and Sports Carazing.
The race started after a minutes silence to commemorate the end of WW1 100 years ago.
Rockingham had to make an early pit stop to change the digital chip because it would not change lanes in the last 5 minutes of qualifying that could not be resolved in time. The chip change resolved the issue but put the team in last 20 laps down.
R&B clocked 5 laps but stopped counting. Team driver Gareth did not want to stop as the car was good, and so they missed about 5 laps more than they should of. Their hall sensor had come loose and needed sticking down.
It settled down then with Demon leading and Mission8 hot on their heels. Sports Carazing were 2 laps back but not letting the leaders get away.
Garage 27 took an early lead in the Gts, and just kept pounding out the laps- they were not the quickest but kept out of trouble. Kessel Run had tyre issues, their motor pod came undone, and a few other issues over the race. North Staffs and R&B were quick but not quite consistent enough and Red Dragon were up and down and then stopped counting laps which took ages to resolve requiring a refresh of the firmware to get them sorted. They lost at least 50 laps.
Rockingham were working their way through the leader board while fellow LMP1 runners Eastcote struggled initially for pace but subsequently they felt they were missing laps but never tried to resolve it.
At the front Sports Carazing 2, whom were running 4th for most of the race, hit some problems as did Demon. Demon broke their chassis beyond repair and retired after 4 hours. That left Mission 8 leading, with Sports Carazing in 2nd and by then Rockingham in 3rd. Mission 8’s pace dropped off, Rockingham sped up as they smelled blood. Sports Carazing broke their chips anntenae which lost them 20 or so laps with missed laps and pit stop repairs. In the last hour or so Rockingham took the lead, clocked fastest lap, Mission8 held on to second from a hard charging Sport Carazing.
Overall and LMP1 winners – Rockingham: Matt Tucker, Keith Fishenden, Adam le Maistre
LMP2 winners- Mission8: Tamar Nelwan, Tom van Leekwyk, Lennard Man
GT winners – Garage 27: Nik Kerswill, Will Strachan, David Farrow
Concours
1st Mission8, Oreca 03
2nd Sports Carazing, Pescarolo
3rd Eastcote, Lola B12/80
