Round 1 at Snetterton. - 2nd place 
Pole in qualifying for the double header. , In the first race on the Saturday all was going very well until, after leading the throughout the race, the upper wishbone on the offside rear collapsed upon entry to the last corner of the last lap. I dragged the car over the line to get 2nd place. A weak weld on a prototype wishbone had failed and was quickly and easily swapped for a spare that afternoon.
Round 2 at Snetterton. 1st race win of 2009
The following day was to start with the S2 back on pole from the preceding days qualify. A gentle start for the race to check all was correct with the repaired rear suspension and then an increase in pace resulted in my first win of the season. Unfortunately the Palm had crashed during the race, leaving me without lap times so I did not quite push hard enough for a new lap record.
It now transpires that Robin has swapped out our Donington round due to all of the problems with the track alterations and replaced it with another round at Snetterton. Maybe we can go for the lap record with the new car.
Round 3 at Brands Hatch Round 3 was to be the last outing for the S2 before David took ownership and we concentrated on the new 2009 S3. Pole in qualifying, some half a second under the lap record was a perfect start for the double header weekend. However, pole at Brands is never the advantage you might normally think. For one, the 2nd place grid slot is right next to you and secondly, you are at the bottom of the hill which means you not only need to accelerate up a hill but the car tends to slide sideways towards the pit wall. As I pulled up to the start line, the marshals were kindly waving slippery track flags right in front of me to highlight the large quantities of oil left from the previous Formula Vee crash.
As I pulled away from the lights and controlled the inevitable wheel spin on the remainder of the oil, Steve behind and John beside pulled alongside. As Steve tried to go around John, he moved over further than the available space and knocked the front of my car sideways into the Armco barrier. A rather nasty crash against the Armco bent the front suspension and the resulting front wheel alignment steered the car towards the 2nd barrier for a second impact. The rest of the race I watched from the end of the pitlane, with a mangled car against the wall beside me, to see Steve win and a very close and exciting class C / B battle in the mid field. Of course we were all very disappointed with the situation, complicated by the car being sold to its new owner, David, who was going to be collecting the car after Round 3 the following day!
Round 3 at Brands Hatch on the Sunday was eventful with Paul winning his first Class A race in the new Contour. No pictures I am afraid as we had already headed home to start the repairs.
Some considerable effort ensued by John, Tony Dad and myself to the get the car almost back together. Steve Harris from Concept Designs did a fantastic job to supply replacements wishbones and then the following weekend we were all joined by David for the final finishing touches before he took the car away.
Round 4 and 5 at Cadwell Park we attended in support of David in his first outing in the S2. I just wanted to make sure it all stayed together but it was very strange being at a race meeting without racing. The new S3 not quite being finished, we sat out these two races but enjoyed the RGB show. David did very well to get up to speed with the S2 over the weekend at such a challenging track. Some unfortunately teething problems for Paul meant that he was denied 2 further victories and Steve went on to amass some significant points in the class A championship standings.
The S3 first test was a day at Snetterton. 
Well what can I say, the car worked all day without a hitch, was lovely to drive and quick. We had a few items to test and a basic setup to find. I did a couple of gentle runs at the start to check there were not basic leaks or parts rubbing and even that that pace it felt stable. As we turned up the pace the car responded well, if anything being a little light on the front end.
Dad took some great photos which showed that the rear body work was being compressed considerably by the airflow, so the understeer in high speed was due to the efficiency of the rear bodywork. We spent the rear of the day making from modifications to balance the downforce and get a good grip without loosing lap times.
Brian and Ian really have built a very good car. Even more impressive than the speed is the up front reliability. Here you can see Ian doing some pressures and spanner checks.
The major change for me was the introduction of a wind deflector in front of me, during the earlier part of the day my head was being pushed around quite considerably by the wind to the point that if it got pushed sideways half way down the straight, I had to wait until I was braking before the strength in my neck was great enough to counteract the wind and straighten up my head! Fun going down the straight looking sideways at 140mph!
In the afternoon we tried some alternative nose sections to gain some aero balance as well as some improved supports for the rear bodywork to cope with the downward pressure at full speed.
Round 6 and 7 were over in Anglesey - Two race win in the brands new car!, the exact opposite side of the country to us but it’s a brilliant circuit and we all enjoyed just the most glorious weekend away last year with the weather and racing. It was a real balm for the sad week that proceeded it last year and lots of friends asked whether it would be comfortable returning this year. I can honestly say that I have only good memories of Anglesey, of course helped by winning both rounds last year and dedicating them to Mum.
Now with a new car this year, we were not expecting to be in a winning position straight away so we booked in for the days testing on the Friday and made a long weekend of it. The testing went well with a few aero modifications to test and yet again excellent reliability. The qualifying was wet and our first outing with the new car in the rain! I qualified 5th on the grid for both races but feeling quite confident as the car was good to drive in the wet with good traction, I just needed some more seat time. I think I could have put it on pole with some better laps near the end of the session as it dried out more and if I had the confidence through more time in the car. The first race was very wet again the car had good traction, enabling me to overtake a couple of places on the first lap. I added a turn of front anti-roll so that I could lead on the front end a little more, modified the brake bias and went after Steve for second place, overtaking at the end of the straight into Rocket In. The middle part of the race I was chasing down Tim in the Class C Striker who was really moving. Admittedly the power advantage of a Class A car is reduced quite substantially by the wet conditions but it took some going to catch Tim who has showing the rest of the Class C driver the way all year. I caught Tim and as neither of us are actually racing each other, being in different classes, he did not make if difficult for me to pass. From there I backed off a little to manage the risk and really enjoyed the car moving around in the slippery conditions. When I came around for the final time I could hardly believe we had just won the first race outing for the new car. There were some big smiled in the pit lane as Brian and Ian (responsible for building and designing the car) and John (my race engineer) joined me in accepting the winner laurel. Race 7 on the Sunday morning was dry so a few subtle changes in the cockpit and a good test of the dry weather speed of the new car.
Again the car felt very good, with good straight line speed and even though the data logging would show that I have a couple of corners to improve on to equal the pace of the old car, we were quick enough to come through the field. From 5th on the grid we came through to the lead and broke the lap record I set last year in the progress. Two wins in the first two outings and still no mechanical issues for a brand new car!
Rounds 8 was return to Brands Hatch for a single round. Race win - 3 out of 3 for the new car! 
I just managed pole, with an excellent 2nd place on the grid by John in the class B Spire. The car was not perfect with lower downforce than Paul or John but I was able to pull some lead out during the early part of the race whilst everyone else was in the pack and trying to navigate around the oil left by the preceding race.
As the race progressed others in the pack found that the oil which covered quite a lot of the racing line was not a hindrance to a good lap time. At the front I was not able to see what others were doing and to play it safe, I stayed off the oil and ran a rather unconventional line. As we neared the end of the race, Paul who was in 2nd place, was able to close down the gap as we navigated around the back markers. At the end we crossed the line under a second apart for the new cars 3rd race win out of 3 starts!
Our race came around at the end of the day when the rain had decided to make an appearance. I had thought it would dry out but it didnt which left us with a compromised setup which was not good enough for the wet conditions. We had too much roll stiffness which was a problem through the quick and long Gerrards corner which is where most the lap time comes from. From my bad start, I slotted into 6th place, just behind Paul. Matt had a problem with slowing into the Hairpin a few laps into the race leaving me following Paul and Gary.
I did manage to get past Paul for a short time but the car just did not have the grip level that he had and he was soon back past. Looking at his post race video, he had about half the effort that I required to keep the car on the track around Gerrards! (You can just about see the steering angle in the top photo!)
I thought I was a little hot entering second turn myself, only to see Paul coming flying past the entry to the corner behind me. Further back in the pack there was a coming together of a number of cars which brought out the red flags. On the re-start it was obvious the this had included David in the BDN S2 which was a big disappointment as he had been showing good pace. The restart was better and I had a clean run for the first lap in the lead. As I came around for the end of the second lap, I could see that Paul had pulled off before he had past the start/finish line for the first time. After a handful of laps I could see a decent lap back to Steve in 2nd place, put in a quick spurt to try for a lap record and then settled into looking after the car, keeping it smooth and seeing if the new additions to the car were making much difference.
Again we used the Bikesports race to do some setup with the new front splitter, mainly to test a reduction in rake. We had a good battle until the 3rd place Bikesports driver was taking a few too many risks for me to want to stay close. I then dropped back and pulled in early so we were ready for the RGB Race.
