NZ
Festival of Motor Racing, celebrating Bruce McLaren
21-24
January 2010, Hampton Downs MotorSport Park
FORMULA
5000 ACTION – MSC Tasman Revival Series
I
(Charles Rogers) had a close up experience with Formula 5000 racing
at Hampton Downs being the pit crew for Bill Hemming (who also ran
his Elfin Catalina FJ in the formula junior races) with the Elfin
MR8-AC.
After
checking the tyre pressures and polishing the car my job was mainly
done as neither myself or Bill wished me to use the spanner! The most
important job was to remove the portable battery before Bill heading
out on to the track, & keeping it close in the case of a red flag.
At
the beginning of the weekend Bill qualified on 22nd – out of
38, and the fastest of the three remaining Australians. The sister
Elfin MR8 “Ansett Airlines” car of Ken James met an unfortunate
demise two weeks earlier at the lead-up Christchurch meeting when
the accelerator pedal stuck and caused the car and Ken into the nearby
wall at a great speed (the tacho was stuck on 7,000rpm – you
can imagine the speed he was travelling. Ken suffered a severely bruised
ancle and neck, but was at Hampton Downs in good spirits advising
the car will be re-built.
As
happens in F5000 racing many cars suffer from accident or mechanical
drama as the weekend progresses. As well as this the lap time got
better for Bill as the weekend progressed. His qualifying lap was
1 minute, 13 seconds & he set an aim of achieving 1.10 –
I advised that I would be happy with 1.07 – easy said when you’re
not the one driving!, but at weekend’s end a fastest lap time
by Bill of 1.08 was achieved while he was attacking the UK’s
Marcus Pye (Lola T400 of Frank Lyons) in the 15-lap feature event.
Sunday
for the F5000, however, was where all the action happened –
for the crew too. The morning’s 8-lap rolling start race was
red flagged (stopped) after 4 cars were involved in a collision at
the hairpin. A great amount of confusion was had by both officials
and competitors as the remaining cars stopped on the main straight.
Crews then went out (including me) with their battery packs. Bill
started the race on grid position 13. The officials ordered us to
push the Elfin up the length of the straight (about 300 metres) to
pole position? We (by this stage Jeff Brown had joined me to assist)
were as bemused as the pit crews of the front running cars of Ken
Smith and Mike Dwyer. My thought still remains that the officials
had the wrong page in front of them!, but Bill appreciated his moment
in the spotlight on pole. Shortly after things were sorted out when
we were ordered to push the car (with the fit Bill still in it) back
down the grid to 13th place. He finished the re-started race in the
same position as he started.
The
format for the races’ had Formula Junior first and the Formula
5000s fourth up.
The
action continued in the afternoon. Neither Bill nor I realised that
the Sunday afternoon race schedule would be re-arranged with the Formula
5000 feature race taking place straight after the FJ race. Our process
to date had been to see Bill in from the FJ race then walk to the
other end of the marquee to where the F5000 was to get the car ready
(the two races between enabled enough time for this, and sufficient
time for Bill to rejuvenate. We found this out as Bill was replenishing
himself with a drink after the FJ race. By the time we made it down
te marquee the remainder of the field were on their gridding up lap.
What
fell into our hands was that this feature 15-lap event for the weekend
was also going to include a pre-race ceremony to officially open the
Hampton Downs circuit. We were literally running Bill’s car
down pit lane as he was running alongside putting his HANS device
and helmet on. Bill then got into the car when an official gave him
the “it’s now or you miss out speech” and Bill subsequently
screamed out of pit lane – still to complete his harness.
On
arrival to the start grid I waved at him to arrive at grid place 21
where he did. A moving formal ceremony ensued as we set their patiently
waiting (giving Bill enough time to settle his heart rate & buckle-up).
The opening speech was conducted with speeches from venue developer
Tony Roberts (with business partner Chris Watson alongside) and the
official opening ribbon being cut by the local Mayor.
A
“Gentlemen (& ladies as Judy Lyons was competing in her
Gurney Eagle F5000) start your engines” was boomed out over
the speakers, erupting in an earth moving roar of 5 litre V8 power
as the 36 odd engines fired up. They then went on a two-lap warm up
before the rolling start.
As
the race progressed the pit lane became busy as mechanical gremlins
forced the retirement of many drivers, including two of the leading
drivers with Mike Dwyer – Lola T332 (retiring on the warm-up
lap) and Tim Rush – McLaren M22. Then in came Marcus Pye with
a broken right rear suspension upright – the experienced driver
managed to keep the car from damaging itself on a wall.
Then,
just as Bill was continuing to creep up the leader board – close
to a top ten finish he pulled in with a broken gearbox (coupled with
a 1-minute penalty received for apparently passing Marcus Pye under
yellow flag).
The
race, like the three before it for the weekend was convincingly won
by NZ legend Ken Smith. Ken has been dominating this series since
his return to F5000 racing two years ago, and also celebrated his
50th continuous year of motor racing.
