We did our first Rockingham track day last Sunday (it’s taken me this long to blog as I’ve had broadband problems).
The day started out pretty miserable with very heavy rain. The organisers said that it was somewhat unprecedented that it was raining so hard that it was unsafe to go out. Rockingham is a very well drained track but the volume of water meant that it was still too wet.
We started the day by doing a lot of “sighting laps” behind a pace car. This got pretty boring but it was better than being sat in the pits.
The track opened properly at around 11:30 and we were the third car out on track. The car we were behind managed to lose it on the second corner but didn’t hit any of the scenery! We got past him pretty quickly and started to do some gentle laps. Gentle as it was still pretty wet.
After about 3 laps I got my first black flag ever! :( Neither Linzi or I could think of what I could have done to warrant a black flag as we were pretty sure there wasn’t anything wrong with the car. It turns out that they just wanted me to come into the pits to have the training that I had booked. All the booked times for training had got messed up as the track was effectively closed during the morning.
Hamish gave Linzi and I some training and we both really got a lot out of it. We seemed to get on well with his instruction and are hoping to use his services again in the future. I would highly recommend him if you want some track instruction.
After lunch the conditions got better and better and I started to do some pretty good laps. Dario was there so we installed one of his cameras and got some video of a few laps. I love the video – I think the mounting point is fantastic!
I was very impressed with the organisation by bookatrack.com and am looking forward to going to more track days organised by them. There is actually a bookatrack.com track day at Spa this weekend which I was tempted by but the weather looks a bit doubtful so I think I’ll give it a miss.
There are some pictures from the day here. Most of the photos are from the official photographer. I’m a bit disappointed that there weren’t any pictures taken later on in the day when it had dried up a bit but the whole day was a bit messed up by the late start in the morning.
