Snetterton 30th/31st May Race

           An Historic Win for Lister!

We arrived at Snetterton early on Saturday to try and continue our familiarity exercise with the Storm. As it happened we didn't do any running which I think confused our fellow competitors. The reason was quite simple. The team wanted to concentrate on the set-up for the GT1 in the morning and it rained in the afternoon.......

A lightning Storm!

Sunday morning arrived and so did winter - it was chilly at the Norfolk track but the rain had gone so we set about qualifying. Rob went out first and set a time under the existing record which Monsieur Erdos promptly smashed again taking a full 1.7 seconds out off the time set last year... I quietly did my three laps and managed to post the third fastest time which I was pleased with... We kept running to a minimum in the afternoon to preserve our tyres and the four Lister drivers retired to the golf course! I'm pleased to say that the honours there were shared between Julian Bailey and myself.......

Ready for the off!

Race day arrived and I nervously opened my curtain to see what the weather had in store. The forecast was okay but what does that mean. The clouds were fairly high so there was a good chance it may be dry...I confess I did not wish to have my first wet "run" in race conditions. Grid time and it remained dry - I lined up next door to Mike Youles in the PK Porsche with Julian in front. I was informed over the radio who was starting the other cars in front and devised my strategy accordingly. Andy Purvis I guessed would try to block my progress through to the first corner as James Munroe was likely to be relatively slow in front of him. 

On a mission.......

As the lights changed I was proved right but still managed to squeeze through and pulled alongside the orange Mclaren into Riches. A good tight line here gave me the corner at Sear and I roared down the straight first in class and third overall. I let Geoff Lister (Blue Coral GT1) through into the Esses and just concentrated on being tidy. It seemed to work as I managed to pull out a lead and handed the car over to Rob about 30 seconds up.

Ready to pit.....

In his haste to exit the pit lane and "go and play", Rob crept over the speedlimit and to my dismay incurred a 10 second penalty. I thought we had blown it as the Marcos disappeared with Rob in hot pursuit....Two laps later saw us back in the lead with a new lap record though and the Marcos unfortunately retired shortly afterwards.

........after the penalty......

In GT1 Jamie C-W had taken over from Julian Bailey and was after the lead Mclaren. The latter suffered an engine mishap which gave Lister an historic double! The team are tremendously dedicated and seriously want to win. It was a pleasure working with them and I look forward to doing so in the future.