Donington Park Sunday 16th September 2012

The second day of a 2 day Classic Sports Car Club meeting at Donington was the latest outing for The Spectator. 8 races were scheduled but with the amalgamation of Special Saloons &  HVRA V8 series races the card had 7 races in the end. Swinging 60's Group 1 & Group 2,Future Classics, Jaguars, Sports/Saloon Challenge and a Lotus Elan 50th anniversary race completed the menu. Autumnal is how I'd describe the weather and as we head towards late September and October, what Summer we had is now a distant memory. It was cool and blustery all day and it's time to dig the bobble hat and gloves out of the drawer for the rest of the season! 
This was a curate's egg of a day where some of the action was fantastic and some of it was poor. The first 2 sessions of qualifying in the morning (Swinging 60's Groups 1&2 + Future Classics) were probably the most entertaining sessions I've seen all year with lots of cars on track driven over enthusiastically in the most part! The CSCC run a lot of their races over a 40 minute, 2 driver format which is fine for sharing costs and increasing track time but as a fan they're not the greatest to watch as once pit stops start it gets very difficult to follow. The amalgamation of Special Saloons &  HVRA V8 series grids into 1 race was a wise move as both had poor entries which sadly led to a poor race. I believe the Saturday race for the Special saloons was one of high attrition so I can't criticise too harshly but yet again it's a case of too much historic racing. Some cars belong in the past- just because things were perceived as good 30 years ago doesn't mean that they're worth repeating in 2012.
A very early finish for Donington (5.20pm) was a shock! Admission £10 (£5 DPRAC discount) and A5 programme £2
It was interesting to note that it appears work is being carried out on the Infield for the first time since the disastrous Grand Prix fiasco. On the inside of Coppice corner earthworks were in evidence with access for trucks using the infamous tunnel that had the build quality of a sand castle when it was first opened..... Whether this is just tidying up or the start of something big who knows?! No news is forthcoming from circuit management apart from PR nonsense concerning the old Dunlop Bridge being bought by Chris Evans. Who cares....The bridge is talked about in almost mystical terms by many but it was out of action for years before it was removed. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Donington Park Sunday 29th September 2013

Image
Another Sunday, another visit to Donington....This time for a Motor Sport Vision Racing organised meeting where the headline event was the finale of the BRDC Formula 4 championship. 12 races on the bill included 3 for the Mini Challenge, 2 each for Production BMW's, F3 Cup and Radical SR3 Challenge along with the aforementioned Formula 4 plus a 1 hour Lotus Cup UK race. The BRDC F4 championship has been one of the season's highlights. Pitched against the newly winged Formula Ford at the start of the year for drivers wanting to start their climb on the single-seater ladder, the series can quite easily claim to have "won" the battle with grids hovering around the 20 mark for most of the year. 18 cars entered Donington as those drivers who'd got no say in the title race left for pastures new or ran out of money. To have 6 drivers in with a mathematical shout at winning the championship going into the final 3 races says much for the competitiveness of the series...
Read more

Donington Park Sat/Sun May 19/20 2012

Image
Back to Donington this weekend for the visit of "Superstars". No, not the famous BBC show of the 70's and 80's where top sportsmen of the day competed against each other in squat thrusts and Kevin Keegan falling off his bicycle... These Superstars are an Italian based championship for mighty V8 powered saloons, 18 of which were present. They made an impressive spectacle on a dry track as their first session on a damp Saturday morning made the cars look the unwieldy beasts they are. A star studded entry list with former British Grand Prix driver Johnny Herbert driving a Maserati Quattroporte, plus former GP drivers Gianni Morbidelli (Audi) & Vitantonio Liuzzi (Mercedes). Indeed Morbidelli was the star of the weekend as he won both races very easily in an Audi RS5 that was the class of the field. Fellow Audi driver, Johan Kristoffersson, (who started from the back in the first race due to competing in the Scandinavian Touring Car Champinship on Saturday) finished 2n...
Read more

Silverstone Saturday 5th September 2015

Image
After a 3 week "Summer" break, or should that be a 3 week Autumn/Winter break given the less than Summery August weather, The Spectator ventured to Silverstone for the first day of the World Series by Renault meeting. Starting at Donington in the mid 00's and then moving to Silverstone in 2008 the "Renault Weekend" was always a highlight in the calendar. Free tickets were given away in their thousands and huge crowds turned up every year. Featuring the core Renault championships of Formula Renault 3.5, Formula Renault 2.0 Eurocup and a Megane based saloon series the UK saw a round each year until 2011. After a 3 year hiatus the Renault weekend was back . No free tickets this time around though but a very reasonable £10 on the gate each day and a weekend ticket for £12 if bought in advance. The enormous crowds of yesteryear were not in evidence on Saturday and a crowd figure of 20,000 was quoted for the weekend which would appear to be that 19,500 turned up o...
Read more