BritCar 24hrs: Four go MAD in Silvertsone-A Dubai teams diary of a wet 24hr race in UK

As the intro to one of the great American metal bands once went “This is a journey into sound”, in this case the sound of racing cars. This is the story of how Spencer Vanderpal, Chris Wishart, Paul Denby and Jon Simmonds (4 Dubai based racing drivers) came together to race in the UK’s premier 24 hour race, the BritCar 24hr race held at the home of British motor racing, Silverstone between 1^st-3^rd October. And so came the formation of ‘Team MADS’.

The idea of entering the race first started earlier in the year, and slowly but surely a plan began to form. The first step was to buy a car. So after reviewing various options and investigating possible cars, a BMW 120d (already race prepared) was located and purchased in the UK. The team now had a car, it just left the small matter of obtaining an entry into the race, organising tyres, fuel, spares, service crew, flights and hotels.

The Car

In order to make the car more suitable for endurance racing rather than short distance club racing (this is what the car had been built for) a new differential, bigger brakes and large diameter wheels where ordered. Fitting these parts would mean that fewer tyres would be used and less brake pad changes would be needed. Thus, reducing the time the car would be in the pits and hence the more time the car would be on the track racking up the miles.

Now a team needs more than a just car and drivers. The support team was headed by Ian Rodgers (Team Manager) and Gareth Bettinson (Chief Mechanic), both who are heavily involved in the UAE racing scene. The remaining team members (race mechanics, tyre and fuel technicians, etc) were family and friends (all living in the UK) who “volunteered” to help.

By the end of September all of the logistics had been taken care of, spares ordered, upgrades fitted, all that was left was to turn up at Silverstone and race. Wrong, 2 days (Tuesday) before the practice day, the anti-theft device on the steering column decided that we where trying to steal the car and so it shut down all of the electronics. So Gareth, Spencer and the mechanics had to take a trip to a local BMW dealer in Swansea on to get the problem fixed. Thos solution of course had to prevent the same fault occurring again.

Wednesday 29^th September

One ingenious solution later and the problem was solved. They now just had to drive to Silverstone and set-up the garage before the test day, which was on the following day. In the mean time Ian was charged with arranging to meet with MRTC (car-to-pits communication company) at the circuit to pick-up the car-to-pits communication equipment.

By about 10pm the car was safely in the garage, the drivers (except Jon who was travelling up the following morning) and the support team had arrived at the hotel, the salubrious Towcester Travel Lodge (well at least it had a Little Chief, McDonalds and M&S stocked petrol station on its door step). A good nights sleep was in order as the next four days where going to be long.

Left to Right- Chris Wishart, Spencer Vanderpal, Paul Denby, Jon Simmonds

Thursday 30^th September: Test Day

Now the weather forecast for the four days was basically, rain, with some sunshine starting late Sunday afternoon. Typical British weather, when a major sporting event is taking place then.

Today there were three, 1 hour sessions of track time. The idea was to enable all four drivers to get familiar with the car and the circuit. At the same time we needed to “bed in” brake discs, brake pads and tyres, test the radios and make sure that everything was working on the car as it should be.

The first problem was that Jon was stuck in a traffic jam. So what should have taken about 1½ hours, actually took 4 hours! Other than that, the dry break refuelling system, was anything but dry. The idea behind the system is that no fuel is spilt during the refuelling process, and the two refuelling churns the team had bought, poured more fuel on the floor than went into the car. Not ideal ! The team diagnosed the o-rings that seal the filling neck in the car where to small. Phone calls to the supplier resulted in them “agreeing” to come down to Silverstone the following day.

The track was wet for the 1^st session and as all of the other cars that were going out on track in our session had fitted wet tyres, we decided that wets were probably the order of the day, discretion being the better part of valour and all that.

For the second and third sessions we ran on slick tyres. We didn’t try to set the world on fire in terms of lap times as this was not the objective. So after three hours on track we knew that:

• No set-up changes where needed to the car
• We should be able to run 4 hours on a set of slicks
• The car-to-pits radios worked

Next we took the car up to scrutineering to receive a technical once over and the drivers race gear to be checked. One part of the technical inspection is the noise level of the car to be checked. Now the limit is 102 dba at ¹/₃^rd   of the maximum engine revs. We crept in at 84 dba, which was the quietest car they had tested. Thus, the car was christened “the whispering assassin”. All the scrutineers could fault us for was the towing point on the front of the car which we had to change to a non rigid one.

All in all it had been a good day so a hearty Little Chief was consumed for dinner. Tomorrow the serious stuff starts.

Left to Right- Gareth Bettinson, Gareth Thomas, Will Farrar, Ian Rodgers, Lloyd Bettinson, Edwin Venville, Adrian Rodgers

Friday 1^st October: Qualifying Day

The day was split into two parts, a 1 hour day qualification session and a 2 hour night practice session. During both the day qualification and night practice each driver had to complete a minimum of three laps (out lap, flying lap and an in lap).

Whilst the car was receiving its final check over and preparation for the qualifying session, the team managers had to attend the team managers meeting. Due to the weather forecast the teams were advised to get all the drivers to do their necessary laps in first just in-case the session had to be stopped. If a driver didn’t do his necessary laps they didn’t race!

Well soon enough it was time for the qualifying session. The drivers agreed on the order (it seemed to be an amicable discussion!) and so they all got dressed for action.  Qualifying went off with no dramas or incidents, with all four drivers easily completing their minimum number of laps. No heroics where requested and none were delivered.

After about six hours (support races and pit lane walkabout) it was time for night qualifying, this started at 8pm, Of course, now it rained….. This was the 1^st time we had run with the extra lights that were needed to try and give the drivers an idea of where the track went at night. Paul was the 1^st driver out and he politely informed the team that the lights needed adjusting. We could cope with these simple issues. A slightly bigger problem was that the car windscreen was steaming up. All we could do was adjust where the screen blower was pointing (now drivers side rather than the passenger side, oops), clean the screen at each stop and plan to buy some more fans tomorrow.

All was going well, until Chris (last of the four drivers to go out) went out on his out lap. One of the very fast class 1 cars (Mosler) overtook Chris but then couldn’t decide on which way to go. Chris had to decide on whether to go straight on and hit the Mosler or to take avoiding action. Self preservation was the order of the day and avoiding action (take to the grass) was taken. Except with it being wet, the car would stop before it entered the gravel trap. Chris was straight on the radio saying that he was stuck in the gravel. Nothing the rest of the team could do as this point, so that is exactly what we did, nothing.

The next message Chris gave us was that the rescue vehicle had managed to snap both the front and the rear tow straps on the car. This meant that they had to lift the car out of the gravel and place it on a flat bed rescue truck. Now of course Chris couldn’t tell us this because he couldn’t be in the car. The rescue truck arrived back at the garage with about 40 minutes of the session to go. So up the car went on axle stands and a few pounds of gravel was removed from the brakes, chassis, engine bay and anywhere else we could find it. So, after sterling work by the mechanics, Chris headed back out with 20 minutes to go to complete is three laps. Luckily this time no incidents happened and as a result all four drivers would be racing in the 2010 Britcar 24hr race.

The team then fixed the refuelling issue with bigger o-rings and the supplier gave a couple of addition handles that would make it easier to push the churns into the receptacle on the car. Tomorrow is the big day, race day.

Saturday 2^nd October: Warm-up and Race Start

Morning, open the curtains and the weather forecast was bang on right, yep it was raining. The drivers went off for their briefing, probably told not to be naughty and that cars work better when they are driven on tarmac and not parked in the gravel…..

The warm-up was used to check one set of brake discs as they were suspected to be warped (they were) and to practice the driver changes. All in all an easy session with no medals given out for heroics.

Between the warm-up and the start of the race we took a decision on what tyres needed to be fitted to the spare wheels. We settled on one full set of slicks and one full set of wets, just to cover the bases.

It was looking like it would be dry for the start of the race (16:30) but with rain forecast for about 18:00. So slicks were fitted to the car, but we put a set of wets, jack and tools in the car for the grid formation in the assembly area, as black clouds were forming and the fuel tank was filled.

15:15 came round and Paul went to the assembly area for forming the grid (still dry, so we took the wets etc out of the car) and then onto the actual grid itself. As we were on the last row we had quite a walk to the car as we entered the circuit before the 1^st row!!!! So after all these months of planning and preparation, here we were, on the grid. Paul looked quite relaxed and has stated that he was going to take the start very easy as there had been a big incident at the start of a previous 24hr race at Silverstone (the old adage “you cannot win the race at the 1^st corner but you can loose it”). Before long we were asked to clear the grid and so Paul was left all alone, well he had 59 other cars to keep him company.

On The Grid

16:25 and the pace cars pulled away for the rolling start. The team are all standing at the 1^st corner, all hearts pounding. 16:30 and the green flag drops and we are off. Everybody made it round the 1^st corner safely, which was a big relief. Right, time we had better get back to our pit garage just in case.

The Start 1^st Corner

 18:30 two hours in and it was time for the 1^st pit-stop, Paul out, Spencer in. The pit-stop was completed nice and easy, no rush, no mistakes (looks we could teach some of the formula 1 teams a lesson or two). Well soon enough the rain made its presence felt, just as it was getting dark. So poor old Spencer had to content with a track that was getting ever more slippery and with night setting in. Trying to decide whether to stay out on slicks or to come in and change to wets was not easy. As some of the faster cars had to stop more often then we did so we took to looking at what tyres they were fitting to try and gauge what the general consensus was on what tyres to be using. After about 1 hour into Spencers stint we deemed it better to switch to wet tyres, so in came Spencer and out went John.

During the next 12 hours we had numerous safety car deployments, predominantly to rescue cars that had spun off the circuit and parked themselves in the various gravel traps and due to the heavy fog / mist that descended at around 4am (just after it stopped raining ironically). Luckily (or due to the drivers skill they claim) we kept on trundling round keeping the car on the black stuff…… most of the time. Spencer had one spin which left him facing the oncoming cars and Jon deciding to have a quick break in the Stowe gravel trap.

 As sure as day follows night, it kept raining, why the team manager spent so much time on the pit wall is a mystery. He claims that he got better radio signals there than in the garage and that he could keep an eye on the track conditions. He still claims being a Team Manager is a glamorous job. Oh yes, he also had to control the pit-stops, so he was going to get wet anyway. 

Jon Simmonds in black hat, Gareth Bettinson in black race suit, Rick Kerry in blue & white jacket (previous owner of the car), Spencer Vanderpal cleaning the tyre, Will Farrar holding the tyre. Adrian Rodgers holding the floor squeegee, Debbie Denby, Angie Vanderpal & Chris Wishart looking at tv screen

Yes It Rained

With just under 2 hours to go, Chris gets in the car for the final stint. Just under 1 hour to go Chris is on the radio, “I have smoke in the car, I’m coming in”. As soon as the car stops in front of the garage the mechanics swarm over the car. A split water pipe in the engine bay was the culprit. Within 10 minutes a repair had been carried out and out went Chris again. Now by this point all of the team were in the garage looking at the timing monitors or watching teams carry out last tyre / driver changes, even with 15 minutes to go. We should point out that there was less than 1 minutes gap between the 1^st and 2^nd place cars (yes after 23+ hours racing it was that close). Some of us were thinking that surely it would be better just to keep driving round as the car might not start if you stop, spin the car on cold tyres etc. When wouldn’t you believe it, Chris is on the radio “I need new rear tyres, these are shot”. We hadn’t realised that it had actually stopped raining and a dry line was appearing on the track. Well with wet tyres on the front and with only 10 minutes to go, Chris was sent out with two replacement wet tyres fitted.

During the event only 3 people (each wearing fluorescent bibs) could stand on the pit wall. Well that went right out of the window with 2 minutes to. Low and behold, 24 hours after the green flag was waved, the chequered flag was brought out. To much joy and celebration Chris came round the last corner and drove down the start finish line next to the pit wall flashing his lights. WE HAD FINISHED.

We had started 58^th out of 60 and finished 38^th overall (14^th in class). For team that were competing together for the first time, with four drivers who had not raced together in car that nobody had driven before the event, at an unfamiliar circuit (except to Jon) we felt we had accomplished we had set out to do.

After all the jubilation, it was back down to earth as we had to pack everything up and be out of the garage by 22:30. It is amazing how stuff gets spread around during an event and how much rubbish you generate. So, we all pitched in and in short space of time the garage was back to as it was before we arrived. It was then back to the hotel to shower, dinner and sleep. Except for some of the team who had to leave back home (UK and Dubai) the same night.

After a little over two weeks after finishing the event, we can all sit down and reflect on what we achieved. Some might argue that not driving the car before the event wasn’t wise, all the preparation work should have been completed before the 1^st test session, well anybody who races knows that no matter how much you prepare there will always be things that need to be done at the last moment and lets not forget that the majority of the team are based in Dubai and we were racing in the UK.

After recovering from the lack of sleep, stress and tension of racing for 24 hours the main question is would we do it again. Heck yes, so much so that an entry for the Dubai 24hr race in January has been confirmed. Team MADS mad, well it helps.

TTFN Ian @ Team MADS