Iconic cup 2017 R2 Cotswolds Andy Travis Race Report and set-up

Round 2 of the iconic cup brought us to the Cotswold model car club on Kemble airfield, near Cirencester. We were greeted with a wet track to start the days racing. With the constant threat of rain, the decision was made to run qualifying on a round by round format, with the best 2 rounds out of 4 to count.

If a qualifying round was declared wet, that time wouldn’t count as an overall qualifying result (which would happen with a FTD format), and so it gives everyone a fair chance to qualify

Practice

I couldn’t attend the practice day which was held on the previous day, so had to make the morning practice session count. 

The track was drying rapidly, but not fully dry. I ran some used slick tyres & just learned how the car behaved around the circuit. The car had pretty decent grip all around the circuit, even on the damp patches so was happy with the pace

Qualifying

As stated earlier, we were on a round by round qualifying format. The seeding/ heat listing was set by championship position. I won round 1 at Stafford, so was put into heat 10 (top 4wd stock heat) as car 1.

The track was pretty much dry by heat 4. I prepped a fresh set of slick tyres and awaited my heat. However, when heat 5 started, there was a sudden downpour. A frantic effort for the following heats was to dig out the wet tyres & make the most of the difficult conditions. The downpour didn’t last long & the track was greasy which is always a difficult choice.

The Cotswold track always dries quickly due to the fact that it’s on an airfield, so has a decent amount of wind blowing through the circuit. When heat 8 was underway, the track was fairly dry, apart from around race control as it’s sheltered by trees. I decided to use the tyres I ran in practice as a new tyre needs a few laps to scuff in & with damp patches, I would have no traction. I didn’t have much time to allow the additive to take a massive effect, I increased the temperature on the warmers & hoped for the best. I went around a small part of the circuit (no formation laps allowed) and found the car was a bit nervous, but had some traction. As I set off, I found I had absolutely no traction on the damp section by race control. A few sideways moments ensued. Car 3 was on wet tyres & came charging through the field. He had a much better start than myself, so was able to pile on the pressure. On the dry parts (3/4 of the circuit), I was able to pull a gap, but when I hit the damp patch, the gap was lost. Once I found where the car was good & where it was a handful, I was able to keep control. I was able to maintain a small gap & took the round win by 0.1 seconds!

Rounds 2, 3 & 4 were completely dry. I put fresh tyres on for round 2 & aimed to improve the result from round 1. Unfortunately for car 3, his pace dropped off & I was able to go faster, my time improved by over a complete lap! Round 3 was a similar affair, I just used an additive which was suited to a higher traction level. Round 4 started badly as I hit by a car on the formation lap so, had an ill handling car for the entire run. Although I took another round win, the car didn’t feel right. An inspection in the pits found a damaged rear shock rod guide & the shock was pushed past its ball joints. A quick modification to the rod guide, a reset of all wheel alignment was carried out & I was able to make the final

Final

As I took all 4 round wins, I took the TQ position & lined up as car 1 in the A final. A small drizzle shower happened around heat 6, but not enough to make the track greasy although there was less grip than qualifying.

I changed nothing for the final as I knew the car was quick enough on its current pace. The car was stable enough that I could make the car very wide if I had any pressure from the cars behind

The start tone went we all sped into the first corner, grid position 1 almost starts around the corner, so a slow start for me to get around the corner then, I could power away. The car felt fine, but the lap times were almost a second slower for everyone. I just focused on hitting the apex of every corner & driving a smooth line. The commentary from race control was focusing on the gap between car 1 & 2. After 2 laps, it was around 1.5 seconds, on the next lap the gap had doubled. Aside from passing a few back markers, the rest of the final went exactly as planned & I took a comfortable win

Result

Overall I was very pleased with the result.

Andy Vale (2nd) Andy Travis (1st) and Andrew Langford (3rd)

Although the car was a handful in round 1 due to the damp conditions, I was happy that the car was very balanced & had sufficient pace to take pole position & the A final win.

Set-up

The set-up is basically the same as the Round 1 set-up with the camber now 1.5mm and the rear wing angle adjusted.

Video

Here is a video of the event

:

The remaining championship

The championship has stretched from 2 rounds in 2016 to 4 in 2017. Here are remaining tracks & dates:

• Broxtowe: 3^rd &4th June
• West London: 17&18^th June

The next round is at the Broxtowe model car club on the 4th June. With 2 wins, I now have a championship score of 200 points. If I am able to win at Broxtowe, I will be able to take the championship as it’s the best 3 out of 4 results. See you in June!

(Additional Pics by John Weston from Iconic RC)