4wd Race Day - Swansea Micro National - 06.02.11

As opposed to Caldicot I've decided to take some good advice and not change the car!! Shocks will be topped up before the National for good prep, a new fan will be on the motor and we're good to go.

The only change from the previous nationals is I'm going to start with the new Emax Motor, after recent runnings I've decided to drop it down to a 15 pinion, we'll see how it feels in Practice

Round 1
TQ for me! Not sure how, not sure why and don't really care!! A couple of errors but generally a clean run. Went down one tooth pinion to 15/49.































Round 2
Another TQ, 3 seconds quicker than my previous time. There is an 18 lapper in this!!

Round 3
This round was a fairly scrappy one and I ended up 2nd place. Based on the rules we keep that is good enough to see me pole today in 4wd!!





Round 4
Another fairly scrappy race from my point of view. A crash on the first corner (as I did in round 3) allowed Chris Bottle, Tony Bishop and Phil Sleigh through. After several more errors I manages to work my way back up ahead of all bit Bishop beat me on the stagger, 3rd in the round for me.

I had a scare pre race as a wire had come off my fan so I ended up putting holes in the body shell, the idea being to get the airflow through the car. I was starting to worry that there were to many similarities to the previous years Swansea effort!




Final
So the pressure is on to try and pick up my first National win. It was my first 4th Micro National TQ in my 9 Nationals and I needed to convert one if only for my relief!!

The first view laps went off without a hitch, I was cautious and managed to hold the field off. Myself, Harris, Sleigh and Bishop pulled away from the rest of the field with very little separating us. After this I managed to pull away a small gap on the field before getting tangled with a crashed back marker. That allowed Craig to pull alongside me coming down the wall ramp and we had a coming together which resulted in Craig landing upside down.

As a result I was able to continue to hold a gap ahead of Sleigh and Bishop. Keith Robertson was commentating and as he announced 80 seconds to go I probably eased off too much and Sleigh managed to close the gap right down. Fortunately for me we both crossed the line without getting through for the 18 laps which resulted in my first ever National win. If we'd got through for the lap then Phil may have ended up getting past!

Bish came in 3rd for a fantastic Carisma debut from him and Craig finished 4th. Todays result keeps me the Championship hunt - just - although more importantly strengthens my grip on the more realistic 2nd place overall!