Speed Series Round 5 Lydden Hill Circuit Saturday 13th July (or – The Computer says You Are Too Slow)
Lydden Hill is in deepest Kent. Head to the Channel Tunnel, and then go left a bit and up a bit. It is in a kind of bowl, and is a sort of bent oblong, like a boomerang, with optional gravel sections, which they use for rallycross as well as circuit racing. We tried – successfully as it turned out – to stick to the tarmac, though it was touch and go as far as I was concerned.
It is what people in the know like to call a “technical” circuit: in layman's terms, this means lots of things can go very wrong if you turn in too early, or too late, or carry too much speed here, or miss a braking point there. It has corners with quite radical and satisfying camber changes which generally work with you, if you are brave enough. And it goes up and down a lot – it reminds me a bit of a roller-coaster, and that is fun if a little alarming when going at full chat – in the downhill bits, you really pick up speed fast. A good lap must be very satisfying...
The weather was cloudy, threatened rain all day, but fortunately did not deliver any. The AMOC was an invited club for the Ray Heal Memorial Sprint organised (immaculately as ever) by Roger Grimes and his many helpers at the Borough 19 Motor Club.
Flying the flag for the AMOC were the indefatigable Guy Staudt (Luxembourg), the ever-limber Mark Chandler (West Wales) and Nigel Grice (People's Republic of Lambeth).
Guy's fabulous late Vantage V8, white, black interior, has had the racing seats fitted from his black Vantage (one Vantage is clearly not enough for Guy). However, he discovered that when strapped in, he could not reach the door to close it! Fortunately, his pit crew were able to step in (Neil and Alison Sims, who had come to cheer us on). Guy's solid anchorage made him faster (as it turned out) but more needy.
Mark was in the green supercharged DB7. Who said these things were slow? Well, if they did, nobody has told Mark, who, like Guy, blew his handicap into the weeds. Once we had bump-started the old thing that is, by running it backwards off the trailer, slapping it into gear, and dropping the clutch. The Lotus chaps looked at us a bit sniffily, I thought.
And what of your author in the venerable DB2/4 MkII? Spoiler alert: I was not as fast as the other two. The Computer (otherwise known as Anne Reed at AMOC HQ) had stipulated target times for the three of us as follows: Guy 90.29 seconds, Mark 96.00, and me 103.00.
Guy beat his last year's time and his handicap, coming in with a best run of 86.49. Mark stormed in at 93.19, nearly three seconds faster than his handicap. But I failed. By 13 hundredths of a second – 103.13. I just could not go any quicker however hard I tried – and ended up overcooking nearly everything on my final last-blast attempt and had a lap that was interesting in all the wrong ways – a classic bit of over-driving.
But we all had a great day, met quite a few old friends, made some new ones, and had many complete strangers come up and tell us how they were delighted to see the Astons out on track, howling away.
But the best bit was that Guy had had special mugs made with pictures of last year's events all over them, which he presented to Mark and me. What a gent!
Report by Nigel Grice
Photo by Andrew of M & H Photography