Friday testing
We turned up to a dry but overcast Donington optimistic for some good results. The aim of testing was to get familiar with Donington again and also to try out some new things regarding setup on the car. With every session I went quicker and the setup changes also benefited the handling of the car. However the weather forecast for Saturday was heavy rain so the Friday testing looked to be a little pointless!

Saturday race
After a night of torrential rain the weather looked to be brightening up a little however it didn't last long and the rain came once again just before qualifying. Having not really driven the car on a wet track i was a little apprehensive but excited to getting out and seeing what the car was like. As soon as I went out I was loving it! The car was pretty settled and I felt as though i had qualified low/mid top 10.

When I came in I found out I had qualified 7th which I was a little disappointed with as I felt my performance was better than that, but I was told I had been 4th quickest at one point which boosted my confidence.

I lined up on the 4th row for the first race which was still wet. I was unsure as to what revs to use to get a decent start but I nailed the initial part however got quite a bit of wheel spin in the latter part which dropped me two places to 9th. I managed to battle past 9th place and pulled away towards the leading pack but some setup issues meant I was unable to pull them in. So 8th place it was.

The second race was at 7pm (bed time!) and by that time the track had dried and my second fastest lap time in qualifying put me 7th on the grid again. I got a great start and held 7th into the first corner. After the first three corners the top 7 cars had pulled 10 car lengths on the remaining cars which allowed me to concentrate on the cars in front of me. From the Friday testing I knew I had to brake later into the corners which I did and really kept on the top group, I was about to make a move on the guy in front when my brakes locked up and spat me off the track into the gravel trap.

I was gutted, it was my first DNF in the Mazda championship. But looking back on how I was going before I went off I had improved my lap time by 1.5 seconds and I was up competing with the top bunch rather than chasing them.

We had planned on putting some new carbon pads in the car but the budget we ran under didn't allow us to do so but I'm pleased to announce that we have some new sponsors:

used-garage-equipment.com and Oughtred & Harrison LTD.

So new pads will be in by Castle Combe! Looking forward to it!