24th-Jun-25, 07:45 AM
The Worthing Rally GB team car left the south coast early on Sunday morning to the sound of rolling thunder as it took Phil, Terry and myself up to St Albans for round three of the Slot Rally GB series.
We arrived to the familiar sight of a school hall filled with a variety of strange tracks that would get to know very well by the end of the day. Registration was straight forward and there was plenty of space to set up pitboxes and get in a brew before we headed off into the hall to face our destiny.
Terry's cars
Phil's cars
My weapons of choice for the day...
I have adopted a new strategy with my cars having chatted it through with Andy during the previous round. Gone was my SRC 914 that was a rocketship, but not a team player. In was my SRC 205 which I felt gave a better balance to my runs. So the TR7 is my pathfinder, first on the track to learn the way round and hopefully pick out the danger points. Next up are my SRC Delta and 205. A rock solid core to the squad that would tease out where each of the tracks could be attacked, and a springboard for my nippy Scaleauto 208 that would hopefully benefit from all the lessons learnt and bring home a result.
The three of us were kept together in a group alongside Charlie and David from the Wood Green club. We picked the Ninco 'Thomson's Twists' track to start with, a good layout to get our trigger fingers warmed up on, and hopefully one that would not punish any mistakes too heavily!
As often happens, the first track threw up a few issues. Ninco set ups only seem to work with simple resistor controllers, so the Truespeeds had to be quickly unplugged and the more basic PS controllers were used by us all. Adding a bit of spice to the day, Terry and Phil were sharing the Avant Mitsubishi car. Who would finish ahead of who in the final results? Let's just say it was the subject of much ribbing and teasing between the two of them throughout the day!
Next up was Abbot's Wood, a sweeping Scalextric track (but with some deceptive bends!)
Terry just triple checking Phil's time with the shared car...
This track teased out some issues with the braids on my 205. I hadn't run it at this level before and it seems now that the original braids were a touch short and narrow to handle all the rails and tapes on all the tracks. So a stuttering run slightly unsettled my game plan.
Onto 'Raid' next.
A bumpy Ninco track incorporating three humpback bridges. A sprung guide and a bit of track clearance under your car were essential, along with a bit of care not to get airborne over the hump and deslot. Again the 205 suffered with it's braids, but relief that none of my cars struggled on the bumps as this is the kind of track that can punish a car that doesn't, and set you back on the timesheet.
One further track before lunch, and we plumped for 'Tarmac Terror', and the clue was sort of in the name...
The tarmac was fine, the piece of local knowledge that we did not have was "don't run wide and get your tyres on the grass!'. If you did, they would get a coating of grass cuttings and the rear of the car would lose all grip, directing the rear tyres even wider on each bend to pick up the cuttings you missed the last time round! My cars ran pretty tidily, so were not effected, but Phil and Terry learnt the hard way and had to drive as if they were running on the Worthing Ice Ring stage. My tyre cleaning tape provided the sorry evidence afterwards! Lunch would be a subdued affair for the gardeners in the group.
The afternoon session started in dramatic fashion with the smoke breathing 'Welsh Dragon' stage!
A variety of surfaces, and with tight corners and elevation changes, cars that handled well were rewarded with a good time, whilst those that didn't were heavily punished. Braid issues with the 205 on the copper tape meant a painful run spoilt what was otherwise a good stage for me. My TR7 flew round and was only a hairs breath behind the time of my 208. All in all, a stage full of character!
Onto the penultimate stage, literally, as the SCM Stage was on an elevated stage at the end of the hall.
A painted Scalextric Classic track, and a relatively straightforward stage if your guide was suitably shallow. Unfortunately they weren't for many of the cars in our group, which had to endure a rattly drive with bouncing front ends that would have loosened any fillings in the crew's teeth, and probably loosened their teeth as well for good measure! A timely reminder of one of the many characteristics of the ancient sport of slot rallying! Also, a stage needing to be treated with respect, as the various pinch points around the track claimed half a rear bumper off one car, a wheel insert off another, and rather spectacularly, the rear wheel off one of Terry's cars. This was noted by a couple of the organisers, but as he had started the stage with all four wheels attached, his time stood!
And finally, we rounded off the day on 'Old Quarry', one of those short, twisty circuits that can make you dizzy with all the rapid turning of your head you had to do to follow your cars! Here is it being tamed by some of the slot rallying elite!
Again, the trick here was to keep off the grass...one mistake and it was "ice ice baby"! I kept it neat, and having got a feel of how I needed to configure the braids on the 205 to get continuous power from a twisty taped slot, each of my cars were faster than the previous one, leading to an attempt with the 208 to get under the fifty second barrier. Unfortunately I missed out by nine hundreths of a second, but a fun way to end the day!
Whilst I missed out on the podium in the Modern class with my Peugeot 208, coming 5th for the second event in a row, I think I got the most I could have from it on the day. So no regrets or 'what ifs' to niggle away at me on the way home.
The next round is 'at home' in Worthing, so something to look forward to.
We arrived to the familiar sight of a school hall filled with a variety of strange tracks that would get to know very well by the end of the day. Registration was straight forward and there was plenty of space to set up pitboxes and get in a brew before we headed off into the hall to face our destiny.
Terry's cars
Phil's cars
My weapons of choice for the day...
I have adopted a new strategy with my cars having chatted it through with Andy during the previous round. Gone was my SRC 914 that was a rocketship, but not a team player. In was my SRC 205 which I felt gave a better balance to my runs. So the TR7 is my pathfinder, first on the track to learn the way round and hopefully pick out the danger points. Next up are my SRC Delta and 205. A rock solid core to the squad that would tease out where each of the tracks could be attacked, and a springboard for my nippy Scaleauto 208 that would hopefully benefit from all the lessons learnt and bring home a result.
The three of us were kept together in a group alongside Charlie and David from the Wood Green club. We picked the Ninco 'Thomson's Twists' track to start with, a good layout to get our trigger fingers warmed up on, and hopefully one that would not punish any mistakes too heavily!
As often happens, the first track threw up a few issues. Ninco set ups only seem to work with simple resistor controllers, so the Truespeeds had to be quickly unplugged and the more basic PS controllers were used by us all. Adding a bit of spice to the day, Terry and Phil were sharing the Avant Mitsubishi car. Who would finish ahead of who in the final results? Let's just say it was the subject of much ribbing and teasing between the two of them throughout the day!
Next up was Abbot's Wood, a sweeping Scalextric track (but with some deceptive bends!)
Terry just triple checking Phil's time with the shared car...
This track teased out some issues with the braids on my 205. I hadn't run it at this level before and it seems now that the original braids were a touch short and narrow to handle all the rails and tapes on all the tracks. So a stuttering run slightly unsettled my game plan.
Onto 'Raid' next.
A bumpy Ninco track incorporating three humpback bridges. A sprung guide and a bit of track clearance under your car were essential, along with a bit of care not to get airborne over the hump and deslot. Again the 205 suffered with it's braids, but relief that none of my cars struggled on the bumps as this is the kind of track that can punish a car that doesn't, and set you back on the timesheet.
One further track before lunch, and we plumped for 'Tarmac Terror', and the clue was sort of in the name...
The tarmac was fine, the piece of local knowledge that we did not have was "don't run wide and get your tyres on the grass!'. If you did, they would get a coating of grass cuttings and the rear of the car would lose all grip, directing the rear tyres even wider on each bend to pick up the cuttings you missed the last time round! My cars ran pretty tidily, so were not effected, but Phil and Terry learnt the hard way and had to drive as if they were running on the Worthing Ice Ring stage. My tyre cleaning tape provided the sorry evidence afterwards! Lunch would be a subdued affair for the gardeners in the group.
The afternoon session started in dramatic fashion with the smoke breathing 'Welsh Dragon' stage!
A variety of surfaces, and with tight corners and elevation changes, cars that handled well were rewarded with a good time, whilst those that didn't were heavily punished. Braid issues with the 205 on the copper tape meant a painful run spoilt what was otherwise a good stage for me. My TR7 flew round and was only a hairs breath behind the time of my 208. All in all, a stage full of character!
Onto the penultimate stage, literally, as the SCM Stage was on an elevated stage at the end of the hall.
A painted Scalextric Classic track, and a relatively straightforward stage if your guide was suitably shallow. Unfortunately they weren't for many of the cars in our group, which had to endure a rattly drive with bouncing front ends that would have loosened any fillings in the crew's teeth, and probably loosened their teeth as well for good measure! A timely reminder of one of the many characteristics of the ancient sport of slot rallying! Also, a stage needing to be treated with respect, as the various pinch points around the track claimed half a rear bumper off one car, a wheel insert off another, and rather spectacularly, the rear wheel off one of Terry's cars. This was noted by a couple of the organisers, but as he had started the stage with all four wheels attached, his time stood!
And finally, we rounded off the day on 'Old Quarry', one of those short, twisty circuits that can make you dizzy with all the rapid turning of your head you had to do to follow your cars! Here is it being tamed by some of the slot rallying elite!
Again, the trick here was to keep off the grass...one mistake and it was "ice ice baby"! I kept it neat, and having got a feel of how I needed to configure the braids on the 205 to get continuous power from a twisty taped slot, each of my cars were faster than the previous one, leading to an attempt with the 208 to get under the fifty second barrier. Unfortunately I missed out by nine hundreths of a second, but a fun way to end the day!
Whilst I missed out on the podium in the Modern class with my Peugeot 208, coming 5th for the second event in a row, I think I got the most I could have from it on the day. So no regrets or 'what ifs' to niggle away at me on the way home.
The next round is 'at home' in Worthing, so something to look forward to.
I love puttering with gears
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