Brands Hatch Indy Round 11-12

Bicester, England – Well the challengers have arrived. Brands Hatch has quickly become one of my favorite tracks in England, but this weekend left me frustrated. As we get closer to the Formula Ford Festival at Brands, many of the top yearly contenders come out to shake the rust off. Since this United Formula Ford round was the final race at Brands Hatch for Formula Ford before the Festival, some of the top rung drivers came out of the woodwork. For me, this was exciting. To finally have a chance to size myself up to some of the names synonymous with modern Formula Ford was something I had been waiting for.

Qualifying is one of my weakest points of the race weekend, and each event we do, I work hard to find pace quickly, and set myself up for the races. Unfortunately that is still a work in progress, and I ended up qualifying in 8th. Not my worst qualifying by any means, but it always helps to start further up the road.

Race one started well, after a red flag, in which all drivers were okay, we held a standing restart. I was able to gain one position off the line, and then another spot shortly after. I had a solid gap to the cars in front of me, and was catching the car in front, when a safety car came out. On rolling restarts, the leading car chooses where to start, this time, the leader started on the exit of the final corner, Clearways. This meant I had a bad run coming out of the corner, and was immediately under pressure to the cars behind. The pressure mounted and into Paddock Hill, I out braked myself and went wide into the gravel, going from 6th to 12th. I was able to recover back to my original position of 8th, but the race left me wondering what could have been.

Race two was where I was hoping to make up for the mistakes I had made in race one. This year is about learning, and if I can make sure I don’t repeat the same mistakes, then I’ve succeeded. Starting in 8th, I made a pass for 7th a few laps in, and then two cars in front of me tangled, putting me up to 5th. Then, one of the best Formula Ford drivers, who started from the back, was able to just barely get by myself and the car in front of me, relegating me back to 6th.

One of the biggest adjustments I’ve been having to make since the beginning of the year is changing my expectations. As the year goes on, harder and harder competition shows up to these events, and my team keeps having to remind me that the only ones that are beating me are those that have been driving the same cars on the same tracks for longer than I’ve been racing cars altogether. While I didn’t meet my own expectations this weekend, I now know exactly what to expect when we get to the Formula Ford Festival in just a month’s time.

This weekend also marks the second episode of “Race Day”. After taking some feedback from the first episode, this one is shorter but with a lot more action.