An Irish Adventure

We set off for the English port of Holyhead on Wednesday morning with the sun shining all the way. Our ferry sailed on schedule at 3pm and the crossing was relitively smooth and fast, docking in Don Louaghaire (just south of Dublin Docks) at 5pm. The sun was still with us in Dublin but we went through a few showers on the journey up North to Belfast.

The track at Maghberry had clearly suffered from lots of rain over the last few days and weeks so we were relieved to have all the old airfield concrete to park up on. This was probably a life saver for this weekend! Fortunately, with just 260 drivers, the concrete hard ground was enough to accomodate everyone with very few chosing to venture onto the grassy areas.

Thursday and Friday were both decent days. Rick and I went out on our bikes on both days and did a few miles around the country roads. There were lots of hills though and i have to admit that i ended up pushing my bike up them a couple of times! Meanwhile the Down Autograss track crew worked hard on the track all day on Friday and created a great looking race circuit.

On Friday night the rain came and boy did it come! In fact it didn't stop until late on Saturday night. On Saturday morning we were all relieved to here the start time had been postponed until 10am, and after the rain didn't stop we were even more relieved to hear of a further delay until 12pm. At 12, with the rain still beating down, all the drivers took a vote to cancel Saturdays racing and start the meeting on Sunday at 8am no matter what.

For the rest of the afternoon the world of autograss hit the local pub and i don't think the pub knew what had hit it! Needless to say there were some sorry states by early evening and a wise move made by most to come back to the field at around 8pm for the beer shed disco.

A promt 8am start on Sunday saw the first heats over by 11am, the second heats over by 2pm and the third heats by about 4.30. Time may have been tight for those catching the 9pm ferry but I think it was a wise deicision by the BAS committee to give everyone a 3rd heat and we did indeed still have time to run the finals. The track turned out incredibly well considering Saturdays rain, the slope of it allowing the water to run off albeit creating a very muddy pits!

We made the decision to set off to Dublin on Sunday night even though our ferry wasn't utill 11.30am Monday. With all the local weather warnings and stories of roads closed and ferries cancelled, we just couldn't risk leaving it too late. So we parked up just North of Dublin for the night and set off again at 8am for the ferry. We set sail a little late at 11.50am and took slightly longer to arrive back in Holyhead but with the company of Shuke and the Price clan we couldn't complain about a boring journey.

So it was a long, expensive weekend, for weather that we could have got back in England but it was an experience, and an adventure that was well worth it. Even with only 260 drivers no-one ever expected us to complete 3 heats and finals plus champ of champs in just 1 day after all the rain on Saturday, but Down Autograss and all of the other clubs helpers pulled it off and did grassin proud.

Mens Nationals 2008

I feel like it's a bit late to be writing about the mens nationals considering it was 5 days ago but i've just been too busy to write anything before now. That's no excuse really considering MY BROTHER IS A NATIONAL CHAMP and i should be shouting it from the roof every day!!

The nationals hosted by the Wiltshire league at Stroud was as well organised as we all expected. They've hosted enough nationals on their spectacular venue now to know excatly what is required of them and once again they didn't fail to come up to scratch.

My brother got off to a fantastic start on day 1 with 2 wins in his own class 8 and 2 wins in our dads class 5. He was on form and the cars were just amazing. It was a fantastic buzz at the end of Saturday and everyone i spoke to was congratulating Mark on a successful day and putting their money on him for at least 1 win in the finals. Was that good or bad luck? He's joked about it before saying 'I don't know which car i'll race in the champ of champs if I win both finals' but all joking aside, I have to admit for the first time i actualy thought it was just possible he could win in both classes.

Both feeling a bit rough on Sunday morning (self inflicted), Diane and I were on form in Pits Control. Plenty of banter on the PA to liven things up a bit and to humour our hangovers! The racing was again fast and clean and we were ready to start finals at 1.30.

With Mark as one of the favourites to win class 5 I was seriously nervous as the race began. The usual carniage in the first corner caused by Ryan Griffiths was to be expected but fortunately Mark kept his head and made-up for this set-back by coming through to 2nd in about 1 lap! Waiting on Antony Jacksons rear bumber he made his move when Antony slipped up slightly and through Mark went. Now all Antony could do was sit and wait for Mark to do the same but fotunately he never and Mark took a fanatstic win from Antony and Dan Lewis in 3rd. I was nearly in tears at various points throughout the race. I've been in Marks position and i knew exactly what it was like for him during the race, i was just willing him to stay calm and keep up his winning driving. The cheers and congratulations from the crowds and all of our racing mates were fantastic, a well and truly deserved win to a well liked, nice guy.

The family are all really proud of him but i have to feel a little bit sorry for my dad who has tried for this title for tens of years and still not won it! Mark then goes and borrows his car for the year and is winning the BAS and claimed his first National title!

Top qualifier in class 8 Mark managed to achieve 5th in the final after major understear in the first corner. Still, he had a good battle and got as high as 3rd at one point, and he is very pleased with his performance and the performance of his car. Roll on BAS 4 in Ireland next week and then all pressure on me for the Ladies Nationals!

T-shirts for racing

With my husband being in the design and sign industry it's great for getting freebies in the way of stickers and print. The latest phase for me is printing t-shirts! Rick has the facility to print the actualy lettering and logo's for t-shirts and his brother has a heat press to press the print onto the t-shirts. My role is to order the t-shirts and bring all the processes together!


Earlier in the year we did a couple of t-shirts for me, my dad and my brother and this week i've done a couple more for us and also some for the Almond family. Check out the cute little pink ones that i've done for Shelby and Erina to wear this weekend at the nationals.

The t-shirts are great for wearing at racing. They're fairly cheap so it doesn't matter if they get mucky and worn and the design can be updated easily every time new ones are printed.

Now that Rick has a big new vinyl printer and cutter we might be able to do actual photo-prints on t-shirts instead of just 1-colour lettering and sillhoute logo's. We're also probably going to get our own press so that we can keep all of the work in one place and i can do the whole job myself rather than getting Rick and Dan to help. I'll be a t-shirt printing expert in no time!