CADWELL 2

CADWELL 2010 RACE 2

After some Saturday’s antics it was clear that Chris Palmer was the man on a mission. It was imperative that he win this race and take full class points to stave off the assault of the two Harrisons. If Alex Harrison won the class with fastest lap, and his brother did the same trick in class D today, Andrew would end the race as XJS champion with two races in hand.

For Palmer to have any hope of retaining his crown he therefore had to beat Alex Harrison here. For the sake of his class E title the same deal applied, if he did not take points back off him today they would enter Snetterton on level points but with the momentum against him.

For the various contenders then this was a very different race. Alex Harrison wanted a clear opening lap to buy some clean air to run away. Andrew Harrison wanted to get up the hill out of trouble and then snooze to victory. Palmer wanted to pass everyone and if possible set them on fire. Lyddall wanted to win the race. He had gone so far as to strap onto his car a set of completely-destroyed R1Rs that the Bear had discarded as too rough even to test on, and hoped that this might be the magic bullet he needed.

As the red lights went out and the engines roared it was Andrew Harrison from p2 who got the best of the starts, briefly shading his brother. Quite clearly with a plan in mind Harrison senior moved his car to the left of the track to block any overtaking attempt from row 2, closing the door on Palmer, whose only option would be to go right round the lead duo. A poor-starting Lyddall, despite the new grip, made it a chaotic melee on row 2, and the loser was indeed Palmer yet again.

With no gap ahead due to the blue car blocking the obvious route, and a feisty Lyddall alongside the way to the right was barred, and Palmer appeared to miss a gearchange, gifting Harrison a full car-length gap into which he obligingly placed a long car. Lyddall, held out wide by the 34-foot XJS of the Harrison siblings, held his outside line to steal p3 from Palmer and the Kutukans went up Coppice in 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd once again.

Much has been said about this start. It is mostly complete rubbish. See "winners and losers."

Filipe Comer makes another of his amazing starts and streaks from last but one to anything but, he takes Drage off the line from the row behind, passes Merrett, who was up there in 6^th spot, and challenges, harries and generally leans on Seath. Seriously, we want to know what recipe he has for the start, because in whatever car he uses he always makes a stormer, please tell us how you do it.

Despite a class E car, Ramm doesn’t find the same path through the traffic and fails to make ground off the line, something of a surprise, he ends the lap exactly where he started.

Merrett doesn’t get the best start of his career, and loses out on the opening tour, Webster alongside easily retains his p5, unexpectedly perhaps against the might of the V12.

Down the back straight and Bear leads his brother, but Lyddall has not yet realised the potential of the tyre and Palmer comes straight past him on the brakes at Park, absolutely mugging the V12. A furious Lyddall, angry at himself for the mistake, would now take it out on the very bald tyres and turn them into oiled glass in the space of the next few minutes.

Palmer is immediately harrying Andrew Harrison, and looks to the outside at the foot of the Mountain, an impossible move against an opponent with even half a brain, and indeed Palmer is fortunate to escape with only two wheels on the grass, his intent though clear.

Comer continues to harry, and makes it past Seath after a close side-by-side challenge through turn 3, he ends lap 1 6^th overall, and 2^nd in class. Not bad from the back row.

Seath is under some pressure from Drage, but in turn Ramm is all over Drage’s boot, and the overtake here seems inevitable.

His car now back in action, BCB is still on kippered T1Rs and has no realistic chance against the rest of the grid, though it is of note that his times are actually comparable. Knock 2 seconds off for the better rubber and what is last place here would in fact appear to have the potential to be up there with the flying Comer.

Palmer uses the horsepower to cruise past Harrison along the pit straight, the latter with no interest in anything other than the chequered flag, but unknowingly with his car already in deep trouble. Alex Harrison is 4 seconds clear already, but attacked by the complacency virus has failed to spot the change at p2.

Lap 2, and Palmer closes right in on Alex Harrison, who makes a fatal error by going defensive instead of dropping the hammer. He would later complain of understeer and general lack of grip, something even he doesn’t believe.

Andrew Harrison is slower than expected, already 6 seconds behind Palmer, and being caught by Lyddall, who in turn has a boot ornament shaped exactly like Roger Webster, the now-familiar green meanie chasing the once-unbeatable V12 at uncomfortable range.

Ramm makes the move stick on Drage, who now finds himself last but one, and Seath now has the mirrors full of orange nose. Comer, having made it through past Seath on lap 1 has been in battle with Merrett, who has regained his 6^th place along the pit straight, and this gaggle of class D cars are now nose to tail again. Seath comes back at Comer but he of the pointy beard holds the inside line into Park and wrests the position back.

Lap 3, and the smoke from Andrew Harrison’s n/s/r wheel is worsening, caught by the Lyddall/Webster battle, and indeed passed by Lyddall into turn 1. Harrison’s car immediately sheared a driveshaft as the overheating wheel bearing seized solid, the car shattering the rear upright and throwing chunks of alloy at Roger Webster before pulling off into retirement.

This of course reversed the championship position, and both Bear and Palmer in their fight for the lead were also now in a fight for the overall points lead, and the scrap for the lead became a knife-fight.

It’s still going off in the midfield as Ramm gets feisty. First Comer makes it stick once again on the Merrett V12, the performance of that car seeming somehow sporadic and slowing suddenly over the Mountain, and Ramm  taking both Seath and Merrett in one glorious lap to move all the way up to 7^th.

This splits the class D fight again and seemingly cements Comer into p2, as Seath and Drage now fight over the last podium, an epic duel that will now last all race with only a hair in it.

Ever-more defensive in the lead the Bear loses handfuls of time to Palmer, showing his lack of experience as a front-runner. Whilst the XJS series is accustomed to watching him now take pole and win races, we are wise to remember that this is a pilot in just his third season, with only one race win pre-2010, and he has never been closely chased for the lead before early in any race. He makes a right horlicks of it, going defensive very early and making himself a sitting duck, wide open to attack.

With Andrew Harrison out, Lyddall lies third, but already 20 seconds off the lead and with only his green shadow for company, his class lead is really all about defending his podium. The lap times have gone out of the window as the appallingly-worn rubber simply quits.

Ramm now makes it past Comer along the pit straight, and in the process Merrett finds his form, he too slams back through at the Gooseneck. Comer clearly in the mood for some overtaking is changing places in this race faster than a girl can swap outfits during the Next sale. He is now back with the D class duo only a second adrift, Seath still with Drage so close behind he needed Vaseline.

Mid race, and the fight for the lead becomes one of inevitability. For those of us with a vantage point at turn 3 – not that I’d recommend smashing your back axle to get such a viewpoint – the different lines and grip available to the two leaders were clear. Palmer’s wider line is technically less effective, but it clearly worked for that car on that wide tyre, it was a match for the superior line used by the Bear onthe narrower rubber, their exit speeds were visually identical.

Palmer is riding the Bear’s bootlid. Once in range his trademark would usually be to simply out-drag his opponent, but the downside to those wide tyres is compromised gearing, and he hasn’t got the grunt for it.

The move comes quickly, and controversially. As the cars come into the Mountain Palmer goes for the outside move he attempted on lap 1, and there is collision between the leaders.

No-one is going to agree fault for this one. If you’re a Palmerite it was a fair move that unfortunately went wrong. If you’re one of the Bear’s disciples it was a banger racing move that ended in banger car contact. If you were a spectator in the stands you went to find the red car’s pilot afterwards to tell him he was robbed. This report will not deal with that collision further, though we would note that there has been some attention to the matter in one publication that should know better than to offer an opinion within the not-so-subtle wording to its own report. For the most impartial comment we defer to the wiser words of the JEC’s report on the matter. There was an incident. Who dare argue with that?

The facts are simply therefore that there was contact at the Mountain, allowing Chris to scrabble through into the lead, whilst the Bear span off the road to the left, dropping 13 seconds to the new leader.

The move was enough to finally shake the Bear out of his daydream, and set off in pursuit. Something of a tall order against a car that caught you up and is now that far ahead, there was little hope of it ever working.

P3 is so far adrift by this point, 26 seconds, that catching the leaders even had both come off in this incident was never on the cards, Lyddall has Webster still under a second behind and closing on him in the twisty sections, it is only V12 power saving the day here, and his exits from critical corners such as turn 3 are such that Webster’s power disadvantage is not pronounced. Video confirms that the corner exits are where Lyddall is losing vast oceans of time.

Ramm is now settled in p5 and comfortable, in fact here he will now stay for the afternoon, slowly clawing his way towards the Lyddall/Webster duel at a second per lap, but he is ten adrift and there is just not enough time.

Merrett too has stabilised his pace and made p6 secure, he inexorably draws away from Comer and pulls a nice 2 – 3 seconds per lap on the pursuing group. Not a big favourite of the driver this track, and a V12 not an easy car to handle, Merrett was open about his need to set the machinery up properly, and racing as an intensive test session, fair play for bringing the car home intact and ever-faster.

It’s those pesky D class boys all still at it. Some of them with eyes had spotted the stranded blue car of erstwhile class leader Harrison and worked out this was a scrap for the class win. Some, with painted-on eyes, hadn’t. A sniff of a chance is all you need to offer Drage, that Dyno-rod livery makes it inevitable that we now conclude he overtook Seath like a rat going up a drainpipe. Thank you, I’m here all week.

BCB is still running, but he cannot hold the sticky shod cars, he is holding his head up on the T1R but the gap is increasing to the R1R brigade, simply the harsh reality of the rubber, and a sad indication that the series has indeed become one in which opening your wallet can make this sort of difference. We take our hats off to him.

What is odd is that with this melee behind, Comer has failed to make hay. His pace is fluctuating, clearly another man who needs someone to chase to find his ultimate speed he is now slower than before, despite clear air. He is not under pressure. Yet.

Clear of Seath, Drage takes two full seconds off the dozing Comer in a single lap, and battle is rejoined. Defensive lines take more time off, and lap nine sees Comer grab 5^th gear instead of 3^rd, and Drage make it stick for the class lead, a great job given that three laps earlier he was the very last of the R1R runners.

Having found the right gear it’s another case of holding the inside line for Comer, and he slots back ahead of Drage into Coppice to retain the class lead.

At the front as the last lap commences the Bear has taken a huge lump of time off the leader, there isn’t a bollard left standing anywhere as he mercilessly flattens the lot, the car now with the headlight surrounds hanging and broken as he lays out the markers in his quest for speed. Palmer had nearly 13 seconds and loses nine of them to the flying Bear, but then he could afford to, he wins the race a little over three seconds clear to take the championship battle for both class E and overall to Snetterton.

Lyddall holds third from an ever-closer Webster, a permanent boot ornament for Lyddall in this latter half of the year and clearly brimming with confidence in that car now, he keeps his challenge for 3^rd in class E alive by a comfortable finish once again clear of Ramm.

Ramm had closed on the duel as Lyddall got ever slower and wider to hold off Webster, but there was never enough time for it, he takes 4^th in E, and 5^th overall.

Merrett’s car, whatever it’s early race issue, fought back strongly to 6^th, and as the smoke and chaos clear it’s the class D battle that needs a winner. Filipe Comer, from the back row of the grid, takes the class win, Drage in pursuit to seal another second place in that battered car. Seath takes third again, the battle between the pair for 2^nd in class D is still on.

BCB is last of the runners, but on the wrong rubber it’s enough firstly to finish without damage, but moreover a check of the times means a change of rubber could indeed have put him up there with the Comer/Drage duel.

A close, hot race, the battle for almost everything heads to Snetterton, there is literally no position determined anywhere in any class, save that class D has already been won by Harrison. Every other position in every class can still be won, or lost, at the Snett double-header, making this the closest end to a season for some years.

Simply put, one clean set of points in D, or even a pair of last in class finishes will hand the overall title to Andrew Harrison.

Palmer can retain the championship really only if Harrison suffers a DNF, but he also has to beat Alex Harrison in his own class or he could steal both E and the overall title! It is, realistically, a 3-way fight, with sibling rivalry to add to the mix.

In G Lyddall can still be beaten by Coppock, a DNF would potentially lose him the title. In D Seath and Drage are competing for second place, and in E there Webster/Ramm fight is for third. Each of these drivers will be out for maximum points at that last double-header.

WINNERS:

Palmer – controversial, but he did it, he won the race and the class, and kept the title hunt alive. It’s still a tall order, but he did what he needed.

Comer – class win from the back row. That is not the normal way of things.

Webster – once again scaring that poor white V12 in that lime green monstrosity.

The commentator -  he at least had things to talk about.

Andrew Harrison: Post race there was a great deal said about apparent team orders at Kutuka. The allegation was that the three drivers had fixed the start. There were even compliments on just how beautifully we’d done so. It was great praise indeed, but misdirected. There was no team plan, no team orders. There was a person with a plan for the startline, and that was Andrew. His move to box Palmer in was not only basic startline etiquette, but carefully examined and ruled wholly legitimate after the event. That it worked so well that all three of them were accused of orchestrating it is in fact the best praise you could have offered him, and he was exceptionally smug about it afterwards. Winning class D was also a bonus, and he still looks favourite to win the outright title next month.

LOSERS:

Andrew Harrison – mechanical DNF with yet another rear hub issue takes the title hunt to the season end instead of wrapping it up today.

Alex Harrison – had it in the bag, lost it. He was quick enough, he proved that after the crash, so why wasn’t he quick enough before it?

Stewert Lyddall – the car is now tarnishing her own legendary reputation, after four wins here it’s now struggling to hold onto third.

The impartiality of a certain race report. - It had much to say about the Bear and Palmer incident. It describes damage apparent to Bear’s offside wing that everyone could see. Really? You can see damage to the offside when a car drives past presenting its nearside to you? A few points.

1. You can’t.
2. In fact, the damage referred to on Palmers car was a revisit of the door he stuffed the day before.
3. There was in fact no visible damage to the Bear’s car other than a tiny crack in the bumper.
4. Palmer was not punted onto the grass, he was heading there come what may, he was there on lap 1 trying to pass me at the same spot, overcooked it and was half off the road then too. We do like it when facts are invented to bolster a theory someone had. It’s one thing not to know what happened, but it’s quite another to invent a number of facts including fictitious damage in order to support one’s friends and allies. A report is meant to try to be neutral, not further an agenda. Even we throw rude words at Kutuka drivers for mistakes, there is no pulling of punches in these pages and we don’t hide the errors, and this is a team website that is allowed to be partisan, not a neutral one servicing Jaguar enthusiasts globally. Perhaps what I should have written in the above report instead should have been partisan, something like:

Chris Palmer lost his rag and tried a suicidal move at the Mountain that was never going to work in a million years. He realised quite rightly that with Andrew Harrison out of the race and his own car already looking like it had been in a demolition derby it was better to go crashing into the Bear in a do or die move and DNF than lose to him. It was a stupid, desperate move that was always going to end in tears, and really what is most annoying about it is that Bear was too polite to just bury his foot on the way in and put him into the wall good and hard.

But I haven’t said that. I said there was a controversial collision. No further comment, no editorial. And that’s a crash that took out my kid brother. See how neutrality works?