[Author Prev][Author Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Author Index][Thread Index]
Castle Combe grp B car club and audi q track day (long)
Well it was quite good really. Don't expect many technical details or lap times
from the testing that the group b cars were doing as I didn't take any.
There were about 40 odd coupe quattro's, one non q 100 and my 80 q there.
There was a rally/sprint prepped (fibre glass panels and a roll cage +/-)
coupe q with a 20v motor in it, a few chopped coupe quattro sport lookalikes
(what's that all about then?) and one proper sport quattro there. Also in
attendance were numerous Nissan Skylines, Subaru Imprezas, two RS200's, a
Lancia delta s4 (wow, he had the back raised so you could see the tubular
chassis and twin shocks at each corner....), about four or five De Tomaso
panterras (excuse poor spelling), an old Mitsubishi turbo, two datsun 280z's (?)
with quite amply proportioned straight six triple carbed blocks under the
bonnet and a few sierra cosworths with very shiny engine bays. A couple of
Renault 5 turbo 2's and there was an RS2 there as well, almost forgot. I was
surprised there weren't more neck injuries when it pulled in to the car park.
Anyhow, situated at a sharpish right hander I was looking out for handling
from the 4wd's. Most seemed quite understressed (noone was pushing particularly
hard I guess) with minor squeeling all the way round from most at some point.
The exception were the Skylines. These seemed to be lurching round a bit. They
may, of course, have been pushing harder (and one was blowing oil on hard
acceleration and changes later in the day, hope it didn't turn out to be too
expensive!) than the rest, one was certainly on slicks which may have also made
a difference. I was wondering if this was the active diffs (which the skyline
has????) 'working'? I only saw one rear end step out from the Nissans and it was
only slight. The Subaru's weren't pushing hard enough for me to notice what
happened to them, the coupe q's (the only two I saw were swb sport copies) I
saw going round looked slightly quicker than the skylines round the corner but
I would place as much confidence in that observation as you would in something
you've not much confidence in! The quickest subjectively round were the rs200
and an oldish 911. The most impressive was a 26 yr old mk1 escort with a 2litre,
twin something carbed, cosworth engine and rear leaf sprung solid axle that
exited the corner sideways every time. It looked like fun and that engine
sounded amongst the four best with the rs200, datsun and audi. You had to
struggle to hear the skyline.
Sorry for the relatively low q content but after my car was overlooked for the
q club photo (unintentional I am sure, sniff) I sulked and lusted after the 26
yr old escort for the rest of the day! At least the guy from London and his
son were appreciative and photographed my car earlier in the day. Was he unique
in having fitted a new gearbox to his coupe q? Probably, with fewer than 80 k
on the clock of a y reg (1983 ish).
Graham.
P.S. for the uk listers I think I met Roger Galvin, briefly, and I did meet
David Preece. Which I am sure you were fascinated to know!