Mallory Masters

[Moosehead]

Surprised no-one else started this thread.

Not surprisingly a slightly low entry for most races what with some of the usual suspects in sunny Spain. Nevertheless the racing was quality if not quantity. Good dices in the Jag XK/Cloth Cap, Top Hat pre '66 and OBG races with some fine on the limit driving. Can't really comment on the Stars/Touring70's race as we left at mid distance but was a pity Mark Wright pulled off on lap 1 as he was perhaps the only possible challenge to the rapid Capri of Mike Wrigley. A report from a mate who stayed till the end mentioned a good battle between the Porsche of Mark Bates and the Rob Hartley Mustang, a peek at the results shows a difference of 0.011 at the line!

Nice to see a good turnout of spectators too

Good meeting.

[Dave Brand]

Originally Posted by Moosehead

A report from a mate who stayed till the end mentioned a good battle between the Porsche of Mark Bates and the Rob Hartley Mustang, a peek at the results shows a difference of 0.011 at the line!

That was in the All-Comers race; good entertainment! A good race-long scrap in the Stars/Touring 70's between the Clarkes' Dolomite & Simon Diffey in the 2002 epitomised, for me, what racing at this level is all about - they were racing, if I remember correctly, for last place!

[Alan Raine]

I was there pretending to be a photographer

A slightly odd meeting but very entertaining.

Start of the Cloth Cap/XK Challenge


Paul Campfield was very entertaining taking most of Gerrards sideways....


....and if there's no space to overtake, just use the grass!


Several cars had also been out at Goodwood, including Henry Mann's Ford Prefect.


Henry also spent a lot of time getting his Mustang sideways.


Jeremy Cooke's Martini Porsche RSR looked and sounded good


Jag fins.


I've put a few more photos on Flickr and will add more later.

[MartinSmith]

Great stuff guys and you made our lives easy in Race Control (although the pit did cause a couple of tyre smoke lock ups ...listen at the Drivers briefing next time! lol) but all in all a nice end to the season and even if it was cold, at least it wasnt wet.

And thank you all for not hitting my car (even though sometimes it looked VERY close when Terry was pulling off on the pace lap! )

[Moosehead]

Originally Posted by ClaireSmith

And thank you all for not hitting my car (even though sometimes it looked VERY close when Terry was pulling off on the pace lap! )

Was there a reason for not using the normal pit lane entry for the pace car as it certainly looked a hairy exit off the track and then a bit of a dash through the paddock?

[MartinSmith]

Originally Posted by Moosehead

Was there a reason for not using the normal pit lane entry for the pace car as it certainly looked a hairy exit off the track and then a bit of a dash through the paddock?

It is a great debate and indeed was debated at the debrief after the meeting. I cannot go in to too much detail on here but in short, it is the result of an MSA directive as to why the pit lane was how it was.

In respect of the dash through the paddock, I agree and in hindsight a suggestion may have been for Terry to "wait" at the exit he was taking and then follow the pack past the start/finish line and come into the pits that way.

[grantp]

Originally Posted by Dave Brand

That was in the All-Comers race; good entertainment! A good race-long scrap in the Stars/Touring 70's between the Clarkes' Dolomite & Simon Diffey in the 2002 epitomised, for me, what racing at this level is all about - they were racing, if I remember correctly, for last place!

I think it was also for the class win. And a top ten finish I think .....

Henry Mann had a busy day and seemed to spend almost every lap of his Anglia race dicing furiously with someone. As far as I can tell from my photos he kept the thing unmarked as well. Not sure how he managed that.

[terence]

Originally Posted by ClaireSmith

It is a great debate and indeed was debated at the debrief after the meeting. I cannot go in to too much detail on here but in short, it is the result of an MSA directive as to why the pit lane was how it was.

In respect of the dash through the paddock, I agree and in hindsight a suggestion may have been for Terry to "wait" at the exit he was taking and then follow the pack past the start/finish line and come into the pits that way.

As we have already discussed Claire,we certainly do need an alternative route.For the first race I had to wait until the paddock gate to be opened,
not much help when your have to be back in position a.s.a.p!
I had thought about using the Bike Kink just before the Elbow.

[terence]

Originally Posted by grantp

I think it was also for the class win. And a top ten finish I think .....

Henry Mann had a busy day and seemed to spend almost every lap of his Anglia race dicing furiously with someone. As far as I can tell from my photos he kept the thing unmarked as well. Not sure how he managed that.

Must say that car sounded just a bit like an F3 out along Stebe.

[thebullet]

Heres a few arty ones as my telephoto decided to give up.

Excellent racing! and not much variety here, only did one qualy session.

[Alan Raine]

Originally Posted by thebullet

Heres a few arty ones as my telephoto decided to give up.

Excellent racing! and not much variety here, only did one qualy session.

I like the slow shutter speed

A few more from me.

[acespeed72]

Great pics and thankyou to all marshals and officials for your efforts on such a chilly day. Was a mixed day for Whizzo and me car great qualified well but had a coming together with a Cortina at the hairpin. Think i was being a little ambitious but we were going well. Thank you to race control for not being too harsh on me when i was summoned to race control. Any arty pics of car no72 mini?

Cheers Andy Harrison Acespeed

[thebullet]

Originally Posted by acespeed72

Great pics and thankyou to all marshals and officials for your efforts on such a chilly day. Was a mixed day for Whizzo and me car great qualified well but had a coming together with a Cortina at the hairpin. Think i was being a little ambitious but we were going well. Thank you to race control for not being too harsh on me when i was summoned to race control. Any arty pics of car no72 mini?

Cheers Andy Harrison Acespeed

I was so gutted when I saw the damage. I know my dad got a picture of you two togethor with the cortina spun! Being a mini owner myself I was loving the minis on sunday they all went really well and you weren't giving up on some of those bigger cars! Great stuff.

I only have 1 picture of your mini but sadly it was the same lap as the damage and not my best effort! But you can have it anyway!

Good luck with your racing in the future and keep up the good mini work! I hope to see you out racing again soon.

Matthew

[Alan Raine]

Originally Posted by acespeed72

Any arty pics of car no72 mini?

Are these arty enough?

[acespeed72]

Great pics thank you and thanks for the comments. We were giving it to those bigger boys just a shame it ended like that

[thebullet]

Originally Posted by acespeed72

Great pics thank you and thanks for the comments. We were giving it to those bigger boys just a shame it ended like that

It was good to see it go so well, I've just done alot of work to mine on the engine and about to get it Rolling road tuned It just makes me want to get my working well

[johngee]

Originally Posted by acespeed72

Thank you to race control for not being too harsh on me when i was summoned to race control.
Cheers Andy Harrison Acespeed

As George Burns said about acting, "When you can fake sincerity, you've got it cracked" .

.....and there's always next year

[grantp]

Much already said about the slightly thin grids and of course that was a little more obvious at the end of the day with a few of the Allcomers having dropped by the wayside in earlier sessions. Nonetheless there was, as has been sai, some excellent and entertaining racing to be enjoyed. If occurs to me that, to some extent, the smaller number of cars on track may have helped with that. It's not too often you see quite as many intense race long dices in one day.

Excellent photos already posted - I'll try to avoid the obvious duplicates of Alan's and Matthew's work - but a few may slip though!

A few from qualifying to start with.

First row.

Ford Falcon - more of that later; the Blue A40 before the front n/s wing was re-shaped; the superbly presented Borgward.

Second row.

Alan Daffin's Capri - before the front o/s wind was re-modelled; A superbly presented Porsche (much more later) of Mark Bates follows one of the Manthorpe Capris round the Hairpin; The other Manthorpe Capri slows to an eventual halt just out of the hairpin having already set the pole time. The problem can't have been serious as it was pushed back down the hill to the paddock and appeared in the next session and a number of races during the day.

[Alan Raine]

We must have been standing quite close to each other at times during the day. It would have been nice to chat with you and Matthew.

[Alan Raine]

Originally Posted by grantp

A few from qualifying to start with.

I'd like to see some of the later pics.

With the sun being low at this time of year, it was interesting how the light changed as the day moved on. Gerrards was pretty good, the Esses difficult from the outside but the hairpin really changed from morning to afternoon.

Not that I know what the hell I'm doing half the time

[grantp]

Originally Posted by Alan Raine

We must have been standing quite close to each other at times during the day. It would have been nice to chat with you and Matthew.

I was thinking the same. Mind you one is always standing relatively close to someone at Mallory, it's friendly like that and at least half the people you see are carrying cameras that are more than point and shoots.

I popped over the bridge at lunchtime with the intention of saying hello to the race control and safety car teams but had forgotten that the lunch break was not so long (by then, as I had been chatting to a pal) so only a small part of that mission was accomplished. That's the problem with race days - racing gets in the way of socialising.

I think there should be a 10 Tenths 'facility' at the busier meetings where people can stop by, use it as a meeting place and maybe offer a schedule for the likely locations during the day in order to further the cause of the Tenther's network. Alternatively I suppose some sort of recognisable regalia would offer some means of identifying each other.

I did have quite a long chat with Jeff Bloxham and co. during the afternoon. There seemed to be a fairly constant (though forever changing) group of people with big lenses down at Gerards and so some useful experiences to chew over. No working commentary though - so it was also useful to be able to draw on other's observational skills to work out who was where in the race!

[grantp]

Originally Posted by Alan Raine

I'd like to see some of the later pics.

With the sun being low at this time of year, it was interesting how the light changed as the day moved on. Gerrards was pretty good, the Esses difficult from the outside but the hairpin really changed from morning to afternoon.

Not that I know what the hell I'm doing half the time

It is quite challenging - especially with such a bright sun and then the odd cloud passing over later in the day - plays havoc with anyone using mostly manual settings - especially white balance! Focus systems too when it goes darker for a few minutes - unless you have very expensive 'fast' glass.

[grantp]

Right - moving on ... still during qualifying.

The Mk 1 Escort looked very nicely presented and quite quick on its slicks.

The Pearson/Devine TR4 slightly locking up going into the hairpin.

The Manthorpe Capris again - a bit of duplication I'm afraid but I sort of like the way they both appear in this shot. The UFO car seemed to be in everything and looked and sounded superb. The blue one, however, seemed to be suffering from extreme understeer when I first saw it but seemed to have been sorted for the next qualifying session in which it appeared.

The Pearson/Devine TR4 having ... well, I assume locked up again although I didn't notice a lockup, it seemed to go off onto the grass at not too great a speed but, the grass being wet, fast enough to reach and nudge the tyre wall. Not a big enough nudge to end its day.

Rob Hartley enjoying his Mustang.

Dave Devine in the other Pearson/Devine car - the Lotus Cortina that was one of several cars not to make it all through the day to the Allcomers race.

Not the strong sun and the way it offers opportunities to attempt 'portraits' of the drivers - especially for the LHD cars. The 'correct' type of helmet helps as well .....

[grantp]

Moving to the racing ...

One of the nice things about Mallory from a photographic point of view is that there are many accessible locations with a reasonable view of the track action. And with the sun, if any, behind you most of the day if you move around a little..

One of the nice things about XKs is that they are reasonably fast but not so fast they defeat attempts to create acceptable pan shots. And they usually have enough details around to give the camera auto-focus systems plenty to work with. For that they get 3 shots.

The 4th shot is, of course, Andy Harrison's mini going at the larger stuff with a chasing Henry Mann hanging the tail out Healey style.

5 just seemed to be a nice juxtaposition of the sizes - lappery occurring as I recall.

6 is Henry Mann again showing a tendency towards interesting facial expressions when driving. Apologies for duplicating what other have already posted for Henry but I rather like the expression.

[DaveGT6]

Originally Posted by thebullet

Heres a few arty ones as my telephoto decided to give up.

Excellent racing! and not much variety here, only did one qualy session.

Arty you may call them but to my mind these are far better than the totally in focus completely freeze action type shots. These portray the movement and dynamism of racing which is sadly missing from the clinically clear shots we normally get. I'll probably incur the wrath of the photographers but as a racer I get prints thrust at me at every race and they all look like a completely posed shot - the car looks like it was set up static for the shot - boring. A good panning shot with the background blurred and a focus upon a key point on the car with perhaps the rest in slightly out of focus - the Porsche #86 being to my mind an absolutely spot on example - great picture- implies speed, excitement racing!