Email: info@oldandboldracing.co.uk

2011 Results

This page details the results of our races this year see the individual race commentary BELOW the championship table. We didn't race at Anglesey. Paul just undertook the Motogrande solo races.

IF and it is a BIG IF we hadn't had the chain issue at Brands, the gearbox issue at Mallory and the stop/go 60 sec penalty at Snetterton we have calculated that we would have an extra 20 points based on where we were running. That's racing I guess but it's a real shame

Brands Hatch (March)

We turned up on Saturday morning for scrutineering. We hadnt done the test day but had been to Brands 2 weeks earlier for a soaking wet track day.

Great to meet the other teams again and get back into the racing crowd

Got out for timed practice and was circulating in the 56s. Not that good and qualified 22nd for the qualifying Superpole race. I changed my gearing for this race (big mistake as I was flat out midway down the start finish straight and had to throttle off)

Anyway funny thing is I had never done a grid start before. Well I was crap, not enough revs and bogged down and went backwards. Also got to the first corner and self preservation took over and I lost another couple of paces. I have to say I was not that happy. I overtook a few folk and came in after 20 minutes, did a good change over and Paul went out for his stint. In the end we made up one space to 21st on the grid for the race on Sunday.

All finished at 12:30 so I went home (65 miles away to see my grand daughter) and came back in the morning. Paul and his better half Kate stayed in a B&B local to Brands. I must say I dont like this new format, it was great in years gone by with it all happening on one day before and leaving me with a free Sunday. Now that we have to wait 24 hours its a drag. I cant wait to do Anglesey, drive 6 hours home and get back at say 11:00pm and then go to work the following day. OK gripe over, I know some people are fine with the new format, but I also know a lot are unhappy.

Back to the race. Changed my gearing and put some new wets on. Went for the warm up and was back in after 2 laps as my gear lever was hanging off... ooops. Put it back on but too late for me to go out again.

So had to wait for the race itself. Again I had never started an endurance race before so the Le Mans start was a new one on me. Nevertheless I managed to get a good run, jumped on the bike and started it. Its funny but with all the noise you cant tell whether the bike starts or not I had to look at the revcounter. Maybe its just me!.

I like the wet so got down into the 56s quite quickly and made up 11 places in my first stint. Lots of folk were sliding off as well so ended up 10th. My rear tyre was shredded. Paul went out on his brand new set of wets on a quite dry track and put some good times in to keep us going. I didnt know what to do about tyres so had my rear wheel out with a dry and wet wheel ready. I finally made up my mind 5 mins before the end of the session and threw a slick in and risked it. It was an ok bet. There were still wet patches making the bike slip mostly at Druids and it did rain a bit, but again I was putting in steady 56s and then it all went wrong. I changed into 6th on the start finish straight and my engine just revved out. What the hell!!!! I put my arm up and coasted to a halt at Paddock Hill. I propped the bike up, looked down and saw that I had no chain and so ran back with the transponder.

Paul went out and put in 30 minutes and then came in. We knew that we could not fix the bike so decided that Paul would go out for the last 30 minutes so he had a 50 minute rest. Things worked in our favour as the SC went out and slowed down the rate of laps so when paul went out and finished with some increasingly good times we had passed the 75% of the winners laps to be able to claim 8th. I guess we were lucky that other teams had bad luck and it was a bit of a war of attrition. But points is points so we cant complain.

Roll on Mallory and perhaps some better weather and perhaps a reliable bike!

BTW congrats to my mates at Sherwood and Rawlings for the 1st and 2nd places in their classes!

Mallory (April)

Paul had been at the test day on Friday but I couldn't make it due to work. Looking back I wish I had as I hadn't been to Mallory for a year and not on this bike. Paul had set some good times during the Friday and was dialled into the circuit. I went out for the 10 minute practice session and my gearing was all wrong so that didn't help me get sorted.

Gearing changed and we are all ready for the superpole qualifying session. This is a new format and it is basically a short endurance race of 40 minutes, ie 20 minutes each. It didn't get off to a good start as the bike wouldn't start. So lost out quite a few places. The 40 minutes went real quick and we qualifed a not too good 23rd, but at least i had got back into the track.

The race day dawned, weather was absolutely brilliant.  After a quick practice session we awaited the start. I had fixed a camera to my bike so was hopeful for a good set of videos. Indeed that was to be and you can see some of the videos on the galleries page.

The start went very well and I made up about 12 places on the first lap. However I can see from the video that I was losing out coming out of Devil's Elbow where once I had a bad highside - still too cautious ---- and also slower coming out of Edwinas.  Mostly doing 58 and 59 laps it wasnt too bad but it shows how competitive this years series is that I got overtaken a lot and didnt do that much overtaking. In the first session I lost two places when I guy fell off right in front of me just coming out of the bus stop.

After 30 minutes it was quickly over and Paul took over. He put in some solid 60s second laps, and consolidated our position.  He came in and did a pretty smooth changeover and I was out for my next session which was uneventful. Paul's out again came in without incident and then it all went wrong. I went out for my final session and just as I was about to leave the stop box by engine stalled. ZX10s can't start in gear and it was always a pain to get in neutral. I finally did it, started the engine, revved it and banged it into gear, it wouldnt go in so I banged it in again. In the moment I wasnt waiting for the revs to fall and some awful noises came from my engine. I finally got in and went out behind the safety car. Something was wrong though, the clutch felt wierd and the box seemed to be changing gear of its own accord. The SC went in and we went up to race speed, but the gears weren't working correctly. After a couple of laps I came in through concerns of safety, last thing I wanted was to have a seized gearbox. 

This was shades of Brands with the broken chain. I couldn't believe it. All I could think of was that I had screwed our chances up so was not the happiest. Paul took it well in his stride (thanks Paul) and went out for his final 30 minutes and took the flag. We still took some points away. Now I need to change the engine (I have a spare Superstock one that has been blue printed - must have been fate!).

Anglesey (May)

Paul went on his own and did the Motogrande as I had decided to save a bit of money as our championship hopes had gone down the swanny due to mechanical issues. Here is

Paul's own words.

Just went to Anglesey to get my head in gear after a so-so Mallory. Friday was a bit of just ride round and round and find my confidence. Did enjoy it and started to feel better, Saturday and the qualifying was a hard one as the couple of warm up laps first thing
were on full wets, and tootled round, but did enjoy that and wouldnt have
minded qualifying on wets, but it started to dry and i made a poor call, i
was to early to go for wet front and power one rear, was still full wets.

Race one was dry and saw a poor start and a head not in gear until half
way round. But was confident and happy that I'd finished and new what i was
doing.

Race two sunday was dry but very very windy, away with the fairies
for the start and first couple of laps then head down and was ok, felt
good.

Third race, dry and very well up for it, Good start and on it, good
consitant lap times and 2 seconds off last years time. Finished smiling
and happy with confidence to go to Snetterton knowing I'm ready to compete
and be competitive.Paul went on his own

Snetterton 300 (June)

After chain breaking at Brands, gearbox breaking at Mallory and missing Anglesey (due to cost for me ? although Paul went there for the Motogrande) we were hoping for some better luck at Snetterton.

Paul went down on Friday for the test day. I had been there a week before to get back used to my GSXR750 which I had reverted to.

Paul had a good day and got down to the 2:10s whilst I had got down to about 2:14 on my previous day. A mate of mine said that 2:00 was a pretty good lap so we had a way to go to be competitive.

I arrived on Saturday and got scrutineered and shoe horned my bike into the garage. Don?t you guys think it is mad that they have doubled the length of the circuit and the number of bikes that can fit on it but the garages have not changed? Also our garage kept shutting down its power. An official said it was our fault for having too many bikes in it!!!!  Well they should have uprated the power for all the extra bikes that they can have there is my opinion. Would be interesting to hear your thoughts.

We had qualified 29 for the race based on championship position. Not going to Anglesey hadn?t helped. It had just poured down and it was a very wet start. I was starting and I got a good start. It was mayhem into Richies with every bike in front taking different lines. One bike went across the front of about 6 bikes out towards the kerbs and somehow missed everybody. I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and held off, as the first rule of an endurance race is to finish.

I videoed the start of both races with my on bike video and will post that on youtube soon.

One real pain was under the safety car. About 6 bikes went past me on the SC. This wasn?t just as the SC came out it was at least half a lap afterwards. Only 2 bikes got penalised. I have the video evidence for the others!

Lap times kept coming down as the track was drying out and were in the low 20s when we changed over. The changeover was not uneventful as the transponder slipped out of my hand, but I managed to just catch it before it hit the floor. Paul went out and circulated nicely and we qualified 22nd but for some reason there was a change in grid position and we lost 3 places. Some rule about not losing more than 10 places??? Anyone know?

Sunday dawned and the solo races went out dry so we were hopeful of a dry start. But the weather was looking dark and Paul had a set of wets on just in case. In the ened we decided the rain was going to miss us and I went out to the start, but then the heavens opened and wet the track.

The warm up laps went round in the wet and when Paul came to hold my bike I told him I was going to come in after one lap and to be ready.

The lights went off and we were off with everyone gingerly going around the first two corners.  Coming round Corams I expected everyone to dive in, but most didn?t. So I thought bugger it if they can do it so can I. I saw Paul waiting on his bike for the expected changeover and it was three laps before he realised that I had jilted him! He told me later that he was sitting there ?sweating like a rapist? although I am not sure how he knows!

I was a bit wussy and didn?t go as fast as the track would have allowed but my times came down as the track dried out. By the time the first changeover happened the track was well dry. Unfortunately we had a bit of a cock up on time keeping and I over rode by 40 seconds so we ultimately picked up a ride though and 60 second penalty. Paul went out and rode well getting down to the 2:10s quite easily. No incidents throughout the whole rest of the race and I got a 2:09 which was 6 seconds better than my previous best and Paul was amazing and got down to 2:07s. Well done mate!!!!

We eventually finished 10th in class and I have calculated that we may have even reached 6th if we hadn?t had the penalty. Oh well that?s racing!

Oulton (September)

The practice day was great as it was dry and warm. All the regular crews were there with Derek and his Redmond teams, Froggy and Ash from Blujets, Keith Flint and Visorvision and all the normal folks. Rawlings were missing, which was a shame.

Paul and I had some good sessions and got down to easy 1 54s without trying that hard and a lot more to come, so we were very confident of doing 1 50s when we push it in the race. Scrutineering opened early and we were first in the queue and got everything sorted well on time. New tyres on and ready.

Race day dawned at it was wet - uggh. It didn't get better through the day at all. In fact for the solo races it was monsoon like. In the Power Cup race it was so wet that a river was running down the left side of the start finish straight and several bikes went down fast and hard as they braked and then aquaplaned. Their bikes got really trashed. This race then got red flagged and Tony Keilty had battled through to win a very difficult race.

We went through qualifying which was a bit fraught as several folk fell off in the wet, two of them right in front of me. We qualified mid pack which wasn't bad at all. The new system is that the grid position is the average of the two riders.

The Endurance race was on and although it wasn't raining the track was soaking wet. I started as usual and everyone tottered off relatively slowly due to the conditions until confidence was gained with the track grip. I had a torrid time in the first session with slides in many corners. I came in after 30 minutes and I had a new wet tyre fitted to the back. The old one was 4 years old and the new one gave me a great deal more grip and my times went down.We had one issue on timing as I missed the IN board and came in later than I had should have, but several other riders came in at the same time and we didnt receive a penalty.

Paul circulated well and kept up the good work and we seemed to be holding 4th/5th in class. This continued through the sessions. The track got dryer in my last session and it looked like Paul would be able to get a decent dry line session in the last one of the race. But typically it rained so the race ended on a wet track. We finished 4th in class which was not bad and teh first race finish without incident. We didnt really have a chance for a podium as we were too far behind the 3rd folks to catch them.

A few of my mates and my brother had turned up to help so thanks to them for doing the lap timing and boards. we couldn't have dome it without them.

This looks as though it will be the last race of the season so at least it finished on a positive.