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Trans-Am Pairs Race

All twenty-six racers stayed for the Trans-Am race, giving us thirteen cars and no loaners required. Both Ed and John W had prepared beautiful 1971 Camaros for their WHO debuts, Andy D had taken a Pioneer Dodge Charger out of the box. Mike and Graham had switched to the white #11 Camaro, otherwise the cars – and most of the pairs – were the same as last time. Jean would co-drive for Ed and Oli with John W.

A last-minute switch to three qualifying heats did add an extra ten minutes of racing to the evening. The last-placed qualifiers would not make the consolation race. It was a super-competitive qualifying – eight laps covering the top twelve. Ed and John dominated the second heat to take pole with 40 laps, half a lap ahead of Oliver and Ryan. Andy and Ash’s Javelin was tied with Peter and Jerome’s Pioneer Camaro for third. Mike and Graham and Alex and Dean completed the top six qualifiers who would battle for the winners’ medals in the feature race. Before that, would be the mad five-minute dash that we call the consolation race...

Consolation Race

This was a frantic and close race that would probably hinge on the half-distance pit stop and driver change. John W was the pick of the bunch through the first half of the race, handing over to Oli at the pit stop. Daniel and Duncan pitted from second and third, Terry from fourth, Andy D from fifth and Alex from sixth – all covered by less than two laps. There were no huge disasters at the stops, but it was Rob – driving Terry’s Javelin – who became Oli’s closest rival for the win. They drove hard and kept their cars on track, Oli finishing half a lap ahead of Rob on 19.75 and 19.25 laps – a pace that would have got both cars comfortably in the feature race. Simon beat Mike in another close battle for third. John F brought the Brut Camaro home fifth and Steve struggled with the big, heavy Dodge – finishing a couple of laps adrift.

Feature Race

The final race was sensational. Ed was first off the line in the Chaparral Camaro, pulling out a gap over Ryan in second and Ash in third. An awkward crash out of turn one put Ash a lap down with a minute of the race gone, Peter moving up to third. A minute and a half in, and Ryan took the lead – still closely followed by Ed, Peter, Graham, Dean and then Ash. The first round of pit stops would be crucial, Ryan comfortably holding the lead, but Ed had problems and dropped to sixth place. Graham and Deane shuffled up to second and third, leap-frogging Peter. Ash made up some ground in fifth. Then the RCS64 weather simulation kicked in, the sky clouded over and the track started to get a little damp.

All six cars were on Hard tyres and they became tricky to drive as the track conditions deteriorated. However, no-one wanted to waste time changing tyres so close to the driver change pit stop. Ryan anticipated half distance perfectly and Oliver was away on Intermediate tyres just as the other entered the pits. Ash stayed out another lap or two and had an empty pit lane to refuel, change tyres and hand over to Andy. Everyone was now on Intermediates, apart from Jerome – who was struggling in fifth place, just ahead of Jean.

With three minutes to go, Oliver had nearly a lap lead over Mike. Alex was a lap ahead of Andy – the top four covered by three laps. Jean was up to fifth, a further two laps back, but was the fastest car on the track. What should have been the final pit stops were completed just before the two-minutes-to-go mark - Oliver still held a useful lead over Mike, but Andy was now right behind Alex and Jean was relentlessly closing the gap. Mike was doing all he could to catch Oliver – he was driving so hard, it didn’t look like he’d get to the end on fuel. Meanwhile, Andy had got ahead of Alex into third, but their epic nose-to-tail battle continued.

As the clock counted down, Mike had no option to make an ultra-rapid splash & dash and hope Oliver ran out of gas. All of the top four were looking marginal on fuel, but only Alex ran out – on the last lap. He’d crossed the line ahead of Jean, so held on to fourth place. Andy and Ash were delighted with third. However, they were nowhere near as delighted as Ryan and Oliver – scoring their second Trans-Am win in a row. A very impressive achievement.

That was the end of the action for the evening. Loads of people stayed behind to pack away in super-quick time. A big thank you to all those who helped with setting up and tearing down. Special thanks goes to Daniel and Ash for their highly-skilled work on Race Control – it was impressive to get through all the racing pretty much on time.

We are back with another Digital Wednesday on 18 March and then our first Digital Saturday of the year on 18 April.