Kumho BMW Round 1 - Silverstone

By Thorney Motorsport

Kumho BMW Championship
Round 1 - Silverstone
4th / 5th April 2008

Hmmm, an interesting start to this seasons racing really. The M3-R is primarily built for the Dunlop SportMaxx series where we run two other cars (and Astra VXR-R and a Corsa SR-R) but we’re mad keen BMW tuners really so it made sense to see if we could run it in the Kumho BMW Championship as well. The BMW series is one of the longest running in the UK, now in its 20^th season it has an established, committed group of competitors who are all very experienced racers and a friendly club atmosphere.

Technical regulations are very different to the Dunlop SportMaxx, firstly the series runs on pure power to weight, there are no other regulations on what you do as regards power save for the weight ratio, this means that our 1400kg M3 is going to suffer as under Sportmaxx regulations the only power tuning we can do is add a decent exhaust and remap it. We can run the road upgrade brakes (same as SportMaxx) and light weight wheels (we have to run OEM rims for SportMaxx)   but it means no race cams so on the grid we are roughly 110kg’s too heavy...eep.

Despite this weight issue we qualified pretty well in 9^th place running  1.05’s but we are well off the pace on the front runners who were dropping down into the 1.04’s, must be nice to be in an E36 chassis with 1150kg’s to chuck around.  We had some timing issues with our transponder not working for some reason so at one point we were 2^nd on the grid with a 1.03.....sadly this didn’t bear much relevance to the truth.

Race 1

Typically practice was in the dry but an hour before race one the heavens opened and the circuit was drenched, the rain was so bad half the spectators disappeared such was the unpleasantness of the weather – typical British motor racing then I guess! We were pretty happy with the weather, I like the wet and it might mask our power/weight disadvantage so we lined up on the grid at least hopefull of a good first run out.

30 seconds later the hope ran out, my sheer lack of time on the Kumho tyres in the wet (well dry as well I guess) meant that as soon as the lights went out I just sat there, 2^nd gear got me moving but the moment I tried to accelerate the tyres just span, an attempt to get 3^rd gear made it worse and a procession of cars came past me on the straight. Tom (first ever race) even commented to me that he thought I was playing some kind of psychological ploy by allowing all these cars past (including him)....no such luck, I was just crap. By the end of turn one we were in 19^th place – class.

At this point though I started to really enjoy myself, everyone seemed very nervous of the levels of grip (which were frankly non existant) but I was enjoying sliding the car around and seemed to go past quite a few, by lap three we were 4^th and chasing down the leading group however, confidence breeds contempt and despite the fact I was locking up going into Becketts each lap on lap 5 I merely touched the left hand apex under heavy braking at that was it, instant sideways. I managed to catch it from a full spin but once I’d got sliding that was it, I accelerated straight into the back of Ian and into the gravel, I have two neat round holes in my passenger front wing from Ians exhaust – weird really as a the damage to his car was more extensive but looked like a motorbike had hit him, sorry Ian.

Race 2

Grid position for Race 2 was set by position Race 1 so this put us dead last in 29^th place; indeed you’re so far back on the grid at Silverstone that only one set of start lights is visible and looking into your mirror to see the fire tender is a humbling experience. Mind you, I couldn’t really get over taken at the start could I (the fire tender isn’t allowed a racing start thank god) so with nothing to lose and the track still soaking wet I set about seeing how far up the grid I could finish.

Both races were only 12 laps so from the start I needed to get moving to have any chance of a top 10 finish and after my customary crap start (even the fire tender had to wait) we managed to get a good rythm and by the end of the first lap we’d come from 29^th to 17^th, even the commentator was enjoying it so I’m told. Lap 2 we’re up to 12^th, lap 3 10^th and by the beginning of the last lap we’d got up to 7^th.   Sadly it couldn’t last, Ian managed to claw back some time and after a good battle got past and put us into 8^th by the finish line, poetic justice I guess seeing as I re-modelled his rear bumper for him in the first race!

Net result? Kicking myself for throwing a possible podium place away in race 1, the wet clearly allowed our power to weight issue to be lessened and I blew it through over driving, for some reason I had in my head that 12 laps was too short to do anything but drive when I should’ve realise that simply pressuring people in poor conditions tends to generate mistakes and you pick up places as a result – silly. Race two was better and I don’t think we could’ve have done more than 8^th taking into account our 29^th grid position but looking at the lap times we’re still a second off the pace even in the wet so in the dry I don’t think we really have too much of a chance. Still, its good fun, the BMW RDC crowd are friendly and the E46 M3 could easily be made to be competitive if more weight could be removed (and that would be easy if it wasn’t for the fact we need to keep it prepped for the SportMaxx series.

Next race is Rockingham on April 10^th and 11^th, we’ll struggle here for sure as its tight and twisty and the weight will be hard to hide but we’ll have fun and see what happens.

John.