Le Mans Classic

[john ruston]

The boys in 356 were stars of show!

[John Elwin]

Originally Posted by Mike Bell

Well, after all that, in plateau 2- P9 on scratch, class P1, and Index of Performance WINNERS!

First time in car, first time at Le Mans. Happy? You bet!

Now in old Le Mans town to celebrate. Got the tram in, so beer can flow...

Congratulations, Mike! Well done on upholding Ten Tenths honour & of course taking a trophy home to Norfolk!

Hope you did the Old Town justice, it's a great place.

[morninggents]

Congrats to Mike and Joe - what a result. So jealous I never got to drive such a legendary circuit.

Did JR win the team prize to top off the weekend?

[john ruston]

For the sake of good order

The trophy goes to Pace in Suffolk who prepared the cars

The watch goes to the bloke who paid for outing and rest of stuff to charity.

Mike and Joe did a great job and they will have the memories and as many photos as they want.

[morninggents]

Is there a link to the results?

[Alan Morgan]

They're here...

http://peterautoracing.alkamelsystems.com/

[Colin McKay]

Some interesting figures there eg Roger Cope's Mk1 saloon set a top speed only 3km/h slower than Andy Wallace's D-type, although best lap was a full minute down. Bet it took a lot more stopping at the chicane!

[Cliff Ryan]

Congrats Mike, Joe, JR & rest of 356 team, great result!

[john ruston]

Apart from the G2 success we also did brilliantly with the Talbot 105 in G1
Rather than take our car that is specifically prepared for racing decided to have a go with the rally car which won the Flying Scotsman,
Overall the the bus came in second place overall by about 1 min 20 sec
Hard to argue there is a more versatile pre war car.

[zefarelly]

Just got home, what a week, I was somewhat tired and a little emotional last night. I've been fortunate enough to do a fair few of the bigger events over the last 15 years, at all levels from valeting up, but this really was the cherry on top.

Thanks to JR for the courage to give me the opportunity! and All the Pace crew for all their hard work in preparing such a great car, and their assistance throughout the weekend, they're great people and a better team. All Mike and I had to do was general servicing checks and keep on top of the brakes & adjustment, which was my Achilles heel !!! I've never raced a drum braked car, and struggled at time in the heat of the moment!

Qualifying was like primary school, Mike and I were learning all the while, Mike just had the measure of me I think on lap times 1-2s most sessions ( although I haven't seen any details) I'm somewhat ring rusty having not raced since last September, and 20kg heavier (driver excuses 73 & 41 if you haven't got the excuse) However, we worked together and I think the overall team effort from JR down helped give us the little bit more we needed.

I'm struggling to remember R1 at the minute, MIke started, I finished, it was red flagged and I was pleased to have slowed right down well before the Exon Valdize Zone. It was messy.

R2 was dark and I had no idea what was happening around me, JR made a great call to pull me in a lap early and break the cycle of another 356 catching me @ 2s a lap. Mike took over, the other car had a driver change too and Mike managed to get us home with a class win by about 1s . . . .close!

R3 . . . pressure on. I was getting the 'go for it' and was putting pressure on myself for the class win again, as well as Le Patron reminding us the other 356's were not far behind, and We will beat them!

I felt absolutely awful after the race, All I knew when I got in the car was Mike had given me a 7-8s cushion over the next 356 (according to live screens at the time, and all that really mattered to us) Having discussed braking points and styles as a team I duly made a monumental hash of the first Mulsanne chicane chasing a DB2/4 . . . fortunately no harm done and I carried on as was. Then, having been confident, comfortable and reasonably quick through the Porsche curves all weekend, I lost in on the exit. It just went, I still don't understand why. nearly two full spins, stopped and it stalled . . . .whilst trying to restart all the Healeys and Jags wooshed past, but I didn't see a Porsche. I got going, really p***ed off with myself whilst trying not to overdrive and make another silly mistake ( we saw hundreds of them over the weekend!)

I then realised the engine cover was wide open, yes down force would help, but so would seeing what was behind me. The seat and door mirror were both still on Mike settings so I had to just live with it. Fortunately I kept it all together with the only further disappointment being the TR2 which got me into Arnage, I didn't dare fight as I couldn't see properly. I followed him home, about a second behind, he made no mistake and I wasn't going to take the chance trying to get it back

Gutted we lost the class win, we later found out he got a 45s penalty for a 2s pit infringement, whilst I got out in 91.5s. Which is close enough I think The rest is in print. Although it took an eternity to be released while MIke was telling me I was being black/orange flagged and we could get disqualified!!!

Congratulations to LAK and Mr LAK in the Aurelia, they did really well, and all on their own, really pleased for them. Great to see so many people and I hope Iain, Colin et all had a great time despite the problems along the way. We saw the Caddy on the road on the way home . . . that's not a common sight these days!

Although they don't read this, I must thank Mrs A-B and mini-me for their support too. Team work all round, the wining combination.

[Mike Bell]

Originally Posted by john ruston

The boys in 356 were stars of show!

No. 'Little Nob' was star of the show.

[Mike Bell]

Being in your own grid / plateau, it proved difficult to keep up with other tenthers and friends in different races. Another 356 that did well, this time in Plateau 3, was the family Speedster shared by Will and Dad (Bill) Stephens. With Mum Anita in charge on the pit wall as always, a proper family effort. Over to you, Will.....

Also as mentioned by Joe, a great result for Louise and Jason Kennedy in their lovely Aurelia in plateau deux. 3 solid performances saw them well up the finishing order, and hopefully we will get their story on here when Louise has recovered from the w/end!

[Mike Bell]

Joe mentioned pit stops and penalties in his post. As is getting normal nowadays, the organisers gave us a minimum 'delta' time for passing through the pit lane and changing drivers. For all races accept GpC it was 90 secs, with minimum 60secs stopped. So if you speed or move earlier than 60secs, likely you will show up on the timing and get a post race penalty- in this case 45 secs. For pitting outside the 'window', it was 1 lap penalty! Hence in the first race we moved up the finishing order 2 places after penalties were applied, and 1 place in the last race.

Our first pit stop / driver change was 99 sec, a potential waste of 9 secs, so after discussion, for race 2 we got it down to 95 sec. That was still gifting a possible 5 secs to the opposition, so in the last race we got it down to 91.5 sec. Close enough! The TR2 Joe mentioned was a few seconds under the 90, and was punished accordingly....

[john ruston]

Good photo of Little Nob
Now the two of you have proved you can drive only obstical is getting it on and off trailer!
Nice sill

[zefarelly]

A few snaps. No idea how to rotate them as they're the right way up on my PC!

[Moosehead]

Congratulations to all the Tenthers involved. Was following via the web whilst at work. Gutted not to have been there after my invite but that's life.

[zefarelly]

Does anyone know anything about that AC . . .it was very nice, looked like an Ace/Aceca underneath with a one off? special body? we like it anyway.

[356sc]

Congrats to all in the Pace prepped 356, a truly fabulous result!

The Stephens prepared 356 GT speedster was in plateau 3, one up from JR's, so it was always going to be a big challenge to get a decent result against the bigger more powerful cars, but we managed 15th on scratch and 4th on Index....well chuffed!!

For those of you unfamiliar with the car, we had a disastrous 2014 LMC, resulting in a major rebuild over the intervening 2 years, arriving at this years LMC untested!

Quali went well....the engine was not running as crisply as we would like resulting in a time of 5.40 putting us in P27. Although quicker than we had been in 2014, it felt like we could and should have gone a lot quicker further highlighted when we heard Gareth in JRs car in plateau 2 had put in a 5.35!

Night Quali also passed with no major dramas....5.44 P24.

Fist race was at 7pm on the Saturday, and this is when nerves really started to jangle as it was on lap one of race 1 at LMC2014 that we had our "moment" at Arnage. Thankfully we came through unscathed, but we made a right horlicks of the driver change, loosing about 1 minute in the pits, and the engine would not pick up clean going thought left hand bends...lap time of 5.36 showed we were getting quicker...P18

With the next race not starting till 3am, we set too and drained down the fuel system cleaned all fuel filters, changed the filter King, reset the float fuel levels in an effort to sort the pick up issue

The night race was much better engine ran clean. Sadly a safety car period spoilt the race, especially as we got seperated from the leaders by an individual who clearly does not understand the safety car rules, and rather than driving safetly to catch up the safety car crocodile, poodled round at 80kph....very frustrating, especially as they got no penalty for screwing up everyone else's race! Lap time 5.37 P21.

Driving Le Mans at night is spectacular...those that have had the privilege will know what I mean....it feels like you are driving through history....truly magic!

Final race was at 11am, so we had to set to straight after the night race to partially prep the car for the final race, falling into "bed" (aka the race trailer) at 5.30am for 2 hours of kip!

The benefit of having the fuel issues and draining down the system meant we could measure accurately how much fuel we were actually using...a step up from the more usual wooden stick technique! The downside is we were using far more than we had envisaged and by the end of the night race, fuel level was critical and we were running out....JR and the Pace team to the rescue....thank you!

Final race was very special.....given the hard work the whole team had to put in to get us there, we needed a quick time to justify all the effort.....a lap time of 5.30 was the outcome....not bad for a little 356......spookily this was the time JR had said we get down to before the first Quali session...clearly he had more faith in us than we did of was just trying to wind up the grumpy Irish one!

Given the lack of any testing from a complete rebuild, the fact we had minimal dramas is a testament to my old man's prep skills....thanks Dad!

Good company, great racing, great comaraderie...not sure we will be able to top this one!!

[Mike Bell]

Well done Will, Bill and Anita, and sorry didn't have more time to chill with you all. Just trying to find your paddock was a challenge! Great result.

Quick question- I guess your car was on Avon ZZs like nearly all others. You've driven Little Nob, do you think we would have gone quicker on them than we did on the Dunlop Ls? (Old Brit ones, luckily! )

[356sc]

Yes...set up needs to be slightly different, but we get more pace out of the avons. Grip level is not hugely different, but in breaking zones especially the car feels more "stable" on avons.

[terence]

Originally Posted by zefarelly

Does anyone know anything about that AC . . .it was very nice, looked like an Ace/Aceca underneath with a one off? special body? we like it anyway.

Willment circa 1967? Long while since I last saw it.

[MartinSmith]

Originally Posted by john ruston

Apart from the G2 success we also did brilliantly with the Talbot 105 in G1
Rather than take our car that is specifically prepared for racing decided to have a go with the rally car which won the Flying Scotsman,
Overall the the bus came in second place overall by about 1 min 20 sec
Hard to argue there is a more versatile pre war car.

was great...Well done!!!!

[Mike Bell]

Originally Posted by 356sc

Yes...set up needs to be slightly different, but we get more pace out of the avons. Grip level is not hugely different, but in braking zones especially the car feels more "stable" on avons.

Braking zones? For those you need brakes!

[356sc]

Originally Posted by Mike Bell

Braking zones? For those you need brakes!

You have just been spoilt with those new fangled disc things on other cars you have driven!!!

[zefarelly]

'Zones' were the second half of each straight!

It was so very odd to be caught under braking as opposed to under acceleration and or in a straight drag race. The polar opposite of a Cortina GT!

I've never raced on Avons, but I'm reasonably confident in saying I'd have been worse!