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September 28, 2004
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September 15 2004, Peterborough, Ontario, Canada.
I sit at my desk here at home, reflecting on a remarkable eight days spent in Europe with Andy Graydon. Race car driver, F1VWC Team Owner and Manager, League Administrator, news reporter, webmaster: you would swear that he has been a sim-racing veteran of many years. And yet, as you will find out, Mr. Graydon has packed his CV in a very short time.
This article marks the completion of his third year in the sport, dating back to September, 2001. In the time since, he has progressed strongly and steadily through pretty much every career option that exists in sim-racing. And yet it has been such a natural progression that no one would ever question the speed of his ascent. On the contrary, Graydon's colleagues have always welcomed his dedication and commitment to racing, and have quickly come to depend on it.
Such pressure can be intense and stressful, but we all know that it comes with racing and makes the rewards even sweeter. For Andy Graydon, those rewards include a solid driving record and reputation, overseeing the growth of a standout sim-racing league, and the passion and excitement of nurturing a Grand Prix team from birth towards victory. Graydon talks proudly of his achievements, and the future looks very bright for this true racer.
Meanwhile, the words of his colleagues speak volumes about Andy and his team.
"[The Phoenix F1 Team] is well organized by the great skills of Andy Graydon," says Kieran Ryan. "I think he makes a most suitable manager and CEO of a team because he himself has driving experience behind him and he knows what must be done. The team is one of the most coordinated and efficient of any team I've driven for," he says.
What made Jason Endean choose Phoenix F1 for his return? "Basically the management team. I had a desire to get back into F1 again and Andy was the first to offer me something. The team has the desire to succeed and challenge for the Championships&ldots; for me it was a natural decision."
Joe Consiglio says "Phoenix F1 is a fantastic team! I think with the likes of Jason Endean and my old mate Kieran Ryan around for '05 the team can only grow and keep getting better!"
For Daniel Wilkinson, "It's great to be racing for Phoenix F1. Phoenix F1 is a solid and professional team and it's great to be teamed up with such quick and fast drivers."
Test Driver Mark Nieuwlaar says "the team spirit is great! And all of us want to do our best and give the max of our potential."
Jan Kelder: "I am very happy to be a member of the team as a test driver this year,"
And the last words to Antonio Irisarri: "commitment and friendship."
---
I met Andy on four separate occasions over the last week of August 2004, with the Phoenix F1 team generously covering my travel expenses to Yorkshire and Spa Francorchamps in Belgium. As you can imagine, Andy Graydon is an extremely busy person to pin down but we managed to find just enough time. He watched me guzzle English beer in a Leeds pub, and we saw F1's next stars at the Wombwell Kart Circuit south of Leeds (old stomping ground of Justin Wilson).
Next we visited the Phoenix F1 factory outside of York, a short drive from Leeds, before meeting up again at Spa during Qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix. All told, the travel and adventure alone made the experience very exciting, and that was before hearing about Andy's racing exploits.
I was fascinated to learn about the background and thoughts behind some of the races and events that have shaped the league in recent years, including the podium that was the pinnacle of his driving career, where he was when the GPVWC collapsed, Phoenix F1's first pole position and the drive to get that first win. Andy provided me with a wealth of information, which I have done my best to digest into what you are about to read. It's entertaining, and perhaps you will find it inspiring too.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday August 24, 12 Noon. The White Hart Pub, Woodlesford, Leeds.
Andy Graydon and I sit down at the White Hart, a popular local pub known for its Leeds United décor. I had chosen the location thinking it might be a popular watering hole, but Andy quickly explained that he rarely drinks alcohol so I was left to down the Old Speckled Hen myself. But I wasn't surprised to learn of his diligence since, despite racing only occasionally, Andy still keeps himself in shape and sticks close to the regime of a race car driver. I'm the one who hasn't driven in three years!
-
Andy hails from Woodlesford in Leeds, although he was in fact born in Halifax, about 25 miles away. He moved to the suburbs of Leeds in 1995 and is currently employed by a major UK bank in their Customer Relations department. Along the way, he married Jan and they have a daughter Jessica, aged 7.
"My daughter likes to watch me when I drive on the PC, and the wife knows my interests and luckily enough she lets me get on with it," says Andy.
With a busy family life and career, it is quite a challenge to find the time to take care of racing obligations, but Andy appears to be very successful at time management! -
"I spend a lot of time on the PC with the league, in the late evening or early morning. I try and snatch as much time as I can whilst balancing my work and family. It is something that I find hard to do sometimes, because I don't like to let people down - family wise or League wise," he says. But he knows when to make the tough decisions: "Although the time I spend now as an administrator of the league is far less than when I drove in 2002, I knew I was spending too much time on the driving, which was one of the reasons I retired!"
On the wall above the table next to us, there is a picture of Nigel Mansell in all his 1992 glory. "Motorsport is popular across the UK, and there are many circuits across the country" says Andy. "I've followed F1 since I can remember, and definitely since it first appeared regularly on British TV - that would have been 1976 when the BBC started showing races. I used to take pictures from the TV screen, as we didn't have a video recorder back then!" Andy brings a strong depth of knowledge and appreciation for F1 history: "I tend to brush off the recent popular comment that Michael Schumacher has made it boring by winning all the time. In the last 28 years that I've watched it, there have often been periods of domination by teams or drivers," he says. But he doesn't confine himself to just Formula One, as he follows the World Rally Championship and Moto GP as well.
One of Andy's most endearing qualities is his appreciation of F1 history, particularly his personal memories. "My favourite driver of all time has to be Ayrton Senna, 'he says. "Simply the best, both as a driver and a human being. I used to be an ardent follower of Nigel Mansell too, but in recent times I particularly follow Jenson Button and Kimi Raikkonen. Mika Hakkinen was also a favourite, even when he was driving alongside Johnny Herbert at Lotus." And a great story for all you Tifosi: "The first time I actually went to a Grand Prix was at Silverstone in 1989. That was Mansell's first year at Ferrari, and I managed to get a Friday Pit Walk pass. I actually touched Mansell's Ferrari, which at the time was - WELL - I'm getting goose bumps just thinking about it now!"
---
I was particularly interested in what brought him into sim-racing, especially after being an F1 devotee for so long. It turns out he is one of the lucky few to have driven every version of the Grand Prix series.
"I had driven the original Microprose Grand Prix and then Grand Prix 2 when it came out, and really enjoyed the games. When Grand Prix 3 was released, I decided to search the internet for leagues to see what the community was like and what was involved," he says. In August of 2001 this search brought him, like many drivers before, to the LFRS championship, probably the first major sim-racing championship in the world.
Debut in Sim Racing - LFRS 2001 Class B (100% Time Limited Racing)
Austrian GP Qualifying in the Red Bull sponsored BSR 01
"I came across the Alpha F1 website, and from there contacted Ben Saunders of the BSR team who was recruiting drivers for his new team. I thought I'd like to give it a go, just to see how good (or bad) I was!" It turned out to be a very successful venture: "I ended up getting hooked pretty quickly, to the extent that the keyboard driver I had always been went and learned to drive with the steering-wheel-and-pedals format that would prove so successful for me." The rest, as they say, is history.
---
We're due to head out to Wombwell in a few minutes, where we'll look at Andy's driving career in more depth. I'm curious about his computer game catalogue though; surely an avid racer must have a good collection! And Andy doesn't disappoint:
"On my PC I currently have:- Mobil 1 Rally Championship, Grand Prix 4 and Grand Prix Legends. But I'd have more apart from the fact that I've got an old PC with little hard disc space!! I have Indycar; Colin McRae Rally 2, Grand Prix 3; Grand Prix 3 2000; F1 2002; and F1 Challenge '99 to '02. However, I need a more powerful PC to run some of the EA Sports games!"
Andy has in fact been simulation buff since the 80's, "When I was a teenager, I used to have a ZX Spectrum! I always wanted to have the perfect PC F1 simulation, and basically as technology moved on with PC's and Games and Graphics, I've just kept up to date with it. I still think of myself as young. Thanks for reminding me that I'm not!"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday August 24, 2 pm. Wombwell Kart Circuit, Barnsley, South Yorkshire.
We're here at the Wombwell Kart Circuit just outside of Leeds, a popular regional karting track. I have to admit I'm surprised to hear that Andy hasn't been here before, but then I know he's exceptionally busy. But it turns out there are more than just time issues: "I've never driven karts, probably as a result of a whiplash injury I sustained in a no-fault car accident way back in 1998. I still suffer from it on a regular basis, and my neck couldn't stand the strain [of karting] I'm afraid."
---
It's a rare sunny day here in England, and we head up to the grandstands to take in the action on track and discuss Andy's own career. His first sim-racing contract was with BSR Racing, in September 2001. Despite joining late in the season, Andy was very encouraged by what he saw.
"It was Ben's enthusiasm, the fact that he had a web site up and running which was very user friendly, and it was also a fairly new team - those were the things that attracted me to them. BSR only decided to expand in July/August 2001, and it tied in with me looking for a race seat for the first time in the internet racing community."
LFRS is a big league, which can be either intimidating or less enjoyable for many drivers. "I know what you mean regarding its size," says Andy. "But I was one of the few who wanted to race 100% distance and time-limited. That takes a lot of commitment. So the field was often limited to between 15 and 20 cars on average. I was impressed by the LFRS, but they decided to ditch 100% racing for 2002, plus they used GP3 2000 - and that didn't appeal to me at the time."
Andy finished a respectable 10th in his sim-racing debut at the 2001 LFRS Austrian Grand Prix, followed by a solid 5th place at the very next race in Germany.
-
LFRS 2001 - Hockenheim. In only his 2nd sim career race Andy qualified 13th but raced to 5th at one of his favourite tracks!
"As a Keyboard Driver at the time, I didn't have great speed over 1 lap. But come race day I could hold my own with my consistency over a 100% race distance."
Helmet design at the time was a copy of Kimi Raikkonen, with the blue and silver replaced with red and yellow. For 2002 Andy would design his own helmet from scratch. -
It didn't take long for him to score his first career podium, which came at the LFRS Australian Grand Prix in Adelaide. He finished 3rd for BSR after qualifying 14th on the grid.
"I was absolutely elated. Really. Being a keyboard driver I often qualified towards the bottom of the field, and the wheel drivers were substantially quicker than me in Qualifying," he says.
His excitement grows as he describes the event. "But what I found was that I was very consistent with my race pace - again not lightning quick, but closer in terms of lap time in the race to the top guys than I was in qualifying. Plus I could race on track against the cc opposition quite well."
He pauses for a moment: "Adelaide was 80 plus laps of sheer hell - the kerbing into the first corner was quite hit and miss, and I know a lot of the other drivers fell out of the race due to problems there. I knew I had achieved something good in finishing the whole race, but I didn't in my wildest dreams expect a podium. I was blown away, really proud of myself at that moment."
It was truly the first of many highlights over the next year.
---
In three months, Andy did six races in the LFRS for Ben Saunders Racing (BSR). His time there was highlighted by three top ten finishes but also three DNF's.
"The learning curve was in setting up the car for each track," he says. Hungary was the low point, a crash and subsequent disqualification from the results. "Up to the first pitstop I was constantly watching my back as the cc cars tried to get past. When I came out of the pits, they had too much pace for me. I tried to respond but as a result simply lost it on the kerbing and put the car into the barriers."
Belgium wasn't much better: "I remember crashing out at the exit Bus Stop chicane, losing a wheel in the process. In Qualifying I had had a major crash (whilst trying to learn to drive with my rarely used Steering Wheel), rolling the car umpteen times in the run up to the Bus Stop, so I knew it was a hit and miss corner for me," says Andy.
"Entering Blanchimont everything seems OK. The car has always been twitchy here if the line taken is too near the left hand curb on the exit, but the car is in the middle of the track. It drifts out to the right hand curb. Foot flat to the floor and the car rides the curb. Suddenly the rear of the car steps out at 190mph. The rear digs into the gravel and sends the car into a shocking series of barrel rolls. Footage confirms the car rolling 10 times, the driver's head bouncing around the sides of the cockpit as all extremities of the car are ripped off. The car lands upside down c. 50 meters from the Bus Stop chicane against the left hand barriers." Extract from BSR Racing Magazine Issue 1 (Nov 2001)
"In Japan I was lapping a backmarker who basically moved over and put me into the barriers. That was a racing incident, but symptomatic of Time Limited racing - you very rarely get more than one chance to get it right! Overall the BSR-01 was OK to drive; it was my driving skills with the keyboard that were at fault!"
-
"Lap 42 of the Japanese GP at Suzuka. I'd just come out of the Pits and was behind a backmarker, trying to lap them. In hindsight I tried a foolish manouvre by trying to overtake him on the outside through Dunlop Curve. As I pulled alongside he moved over and put me onto the grass. After that I was just a passenger and slammed violently into the barriers."
The image to the left shows the aftermath of yet another major accident from an inexperienced Time Limited driver! The car is facing backwards down the track (Degner Curve is in the distance). -
---
Most drivers who have tried Time Limited racing speak very highly of the experience, and Andy is no exception. "Time limited racing was fantastic. It really is an adrenaline rush, when you know that after the first lap you have just got to get on with it, not make a mistake, watch for the traffic, think tactics whilst racing - and all whilst not being able to save your game. As real as racing could get. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and would recommend it to anyone. But 100% distance only. Any shorter distance takes some of these elements away - the fatigue side after driving for 1.5 hours, concentration span etc. You just have to try it if you haven't already done so!"
After the 2001 season finished, Andy left the LFRS save for a one-off race in May 2002. "My experience in the LFRS as a driver was one of enjoyment at competing against other drivers who were committed enough to take on 100% race distance and Time-Limited racing," he says. Before long he would move on to bigger and better things in IGP3C and GPVWC, but his LFRS experience would prove to get him started on the right foot.
To Be Continued
I sit at my desk here at home, reflecting on a remarkable eight days spent in Europe with Andy Graydon. Race car driver, F1VWC Team Owner and Manager, League Administrator, news reporter, webmaster: you would swear that he has been a sim-racing veteran of many years. And yet, as you will find out, Mr. Graydon has packed his CV in a very short time.
This article marks the completion of his third year in the sport, dating back to September, 2001. In the time since, he has progressed strongly and steadily through pretty much every career option that exists in sim-racing. And yet it has been such a natural progression that no one would ever question the speed of his ascent. On the contrary, Graydon's colleagues have always welcomed his dedication and commitment to racing, and have quickly come to depend on it.
Such pressure can be intense and stressful, but we all know that it comes with racing and makes the rewards even sweeter. For Andy Graydon, those rewards include a solid driving record and reputation, overseeing the growth of a standout sim-racing league, and the passion and excitement of nurturing a Grand Prix team from birth towards victory. Graydon talks proudly of his achievements, and the future looks very bright for this true racer.
Meanwhile, the words of his colleagues speak volumes about Andy and his team.
"[The Phoenix F1 Team] is well organized by the great skills of Andy Graydon," says Kieran Ryan. "I think he makes a most suitable manager and CEO of a team because he himself has driving experience behind him and he knows what must be done. The team is one of the most coordinated and efficient of any team I've driven for," he says.
What made Jason Endean choose Phoenix F1 for his return? "Basically the management team. I had a desire to get back into F1 again and Andy was the first to offer me something. The team has the desire to succeed and challenge for the Championships&ldots; for me it was a natural decision."
Joe Consiglio says "Phoenix F1 is a fantastic team! I think with the likes of Jason Endean and my old mate Kieran Ryan around for '05 the team can only grow and keep getting better!"
For Daniel Wilkinson, "It's great to be racing for Phoenix F1. Phoenix F1 is a solid and professional team and it's great to be teamed up with such quick and fast drivers."
Test Driver Mark Nieuwlaar says "the team spirit is great! And all of us want to do our best and give the max of our potential."
Jan Kelder: "I am very happy to be a member of the team as a test driver this year,"
And the last words to Antonio Irisarri: "commitment and friendship."
---
I met Andy on four separate occasions over the last week of August 2004, with the Phoenix F1 team generously covering my travel expenses to Yorkshire and Spa Francorchamps in Belgium. As you can imagine, Andy Graydon is an extremely busy person to pin down but we managed to find just enough time. He watched me guzzle English beer in a Leeds pub, and we saw F1's next stars at the Wombwell Kart Circuit south of Leeds (old stomping ground of Justin Wilson).
Next we visited the Phoenix F1 factory outside of York, a short drive from Leeds, before meeting up again at Spa during Qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix. All told, the travel and adventure alone made the experience very exciting, and that was before hearing about Andy's racing exploits.
I was fascinated to learn about the background and thoughts behind some of the races and events that have shaped the league in recent years, including the podium that was the pinnacle of his driving career, where he was when the GPVWC collapsed, Phoenix F1's first pole position and the drive to get that first win. Andy provided me with a wealth of information, which I have done my best to digest into what you are about to read. It's entertaining, and perhaps you will find it inspiring too.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday August 24, 12 Noon. The White Hart Pub, Woodlesford, Leeds.
Andy Graydon and I sit down at the White Hart, a popular local pub known for its Leeds United décor. I had chosen the location thinking it might be a popular watering hole, but Andy quickly explained that he rarely drinks alcohol so I was left to down the Old Speckled Hen myself. But I wasn't surprised to learn of his diligence since, despite racing only occasionally, Andy still keeps himself in shape and sticks close to the regime of a race car driver. I'm the one who hasn't driven in three years!
-
Andy hails from Woodlesford in Leeds, although he was in fact born in Halifax, about 25 miles away. He moved to the suburbs of Leeds in 1995 and is currently employed by a major UK bank in their Customer Relations department. Along the way, he married Jan and they have a daughter Jessica, aged 7.
"My daughter likes to watch me when I drive on the PC, and the wife knows my interests and luckily enough she lets me get on with it," says Andy.
With a busy family life and career, it is quite a challenge to find the time to take care of racing obligations, but Andy appears to be very successful at time management! -
"I spend a lot of time on the PC with the league, in the late evening or early morning. I try and snatch as much time as I can whilst balancing my work and family. It is something that I find hard to do sometimes, because I don't like to let people down - family wise or League wise," he says. But he knows when to make the tough decisions: "Although the time I spend now as an administrator of the league is far less than when I drove in 2002, I knew I was spending too much time on the driving, which was one of the reasons I retired!"
On the wall above the table next to us, there is a picture of Nigel Mansell in all his 1992 glory. "Motorsport is popular across the UK, and there are many circuits across the country" says Andy. "I've followed F1 since I can remember, and definitely since it first appeared regularly on British TV - that would have been 1976 when the BBC started showing races. I used to take pictures from the TV screen, as we didn't have a video recorder back then!" Andy brings a strong depth of knowledge and appreciation for F1 history: "I tend to brush off the recent popular comment that Michael Schumacher has made it boring by winning all the time. In the last 28 years that I've watched it, there have often been periods of domination by teams or drivers," he says. But he doesn't confine himself to just Formula One, as he follows the World Rally Championship and Moto GP as well.
One of Andy's most endearing qualities is his appreciation of F1 history, particularly his personal memories. "My favourite driver of all time has to be Ayrton Senna, 'he says. "Simply the best, both as a driver and a human being. I used to be an ardent follower of Nigel Mansell too, but in recent times I particularly follow Jenson Button and Kimi Raikkonen. Mika Hakkinen was also a favourite, even when he was driving alongside Johnny Herbert at Lotus." And a great story for all you Tifosi: "The first time I actually went to a Grand Prix was at Silverstone in 1989. That was Mansell's first year at Ferrari, and I managed to get a Friday Pit Walk pass. I actually touched Mansell's Ferrari, which at the time was - WELL - I'm getting goose bumps just thinking about it now!"
---
I was particularly interested in what brought him into sim-racing, especially after being an F1 devotee for so long. It turns out he is one of the lucky few to have driven every version of the Grand Prix series.
"I had driven the original Microprose Grand Prix and then Grand Prix 2 when it came out, and really enjoyed the games. When Grand Prix 3 was released, I decided to search the internet for leagues to see what the community was like and what was involved," he says. In August of 2001 this search brought him, like many drivers before, to the LFRS championship, probably the first major sim-racing championship in the world.
Debut in Sim Racing - LFRS 2001 Class B (100% Time Limited Racing)
Austrian GP Qualifying in the Red Bull sponsored BSR 01
"I came across the Alpha F1 website, and from there contacted Ben Saunders of the BSR team who was recruiting drivers for his new team. I thought I'd like to give it a go, just to see how good (or bad) I was!" It turned out to be a very successful venture: "I ended up getting hooked pretty quickly, to the extent that the keyboard driver I had always been went and learned to drive with the steering-wheel-and-pedals format that would prove so successful for me." The rest, as they say, is history.
---
We're due to head out to Wombwell in a few minutes, where we'll look at Andy's driving career in more depth. I'm curious about his computer game catalogue though; surely an avid racer must have a good collection! And Andy doesn't disappoint:
"On my PC I currently have:- Mobil 1 Rally Championship, Grand Prix 4 and Grand Prix Legends. But I'd have more apart from the fact that I've got an old PC with little hard disc space!! I have Indycar; Colin McRae Rally 2, Grand Prix 3; Grand Prix 3 2000; F1 2002; and F1 Challenge '99 to '02. However, I need a more powerful PC to run some of the EA Sports games!"
Andy has in fact been simulation buff since the 80's, "When I was a teenager, I used to have a ZX Spectrum! I always wanted to have the perfect PC F1 simulation, and basically as technology moved on with PC's and Games and Graphics, I've just kept up to date with it. I still think of myself as young. Thanks for reminding me that I'm not!"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday August 24, 2 pm. Wombwell Kart Circuit, Barnsley, South Yorkshire.
We're here at the Wombwell Kart Circuit just outside of Leeds, a popular regional karting track. I have to admit I'm surprised to hear that Andy hasn't been here before, but then I know he's exceptionally busy. But it turns out there are more than just time issues: "I've never driven karts, probably as a result of a whiplash injury I sustained in a no-fault car accident way back in 1998. I still suffer from it on a regular basis, and my neck couldn't stand the strain [of karting] I'm afraid."
---
It's a rare sunny day here in England, and we head up to the grandstands to take in the action on track and discuss Andy's own career. His first sim-racing contract was with BSR Racing, in September 2001. Despite joining late in the season, Andy was very encouraged by what he saw.
"It was Ben's enthusiasm, the fact that he had a web site up and running which was very user friendly, and it was also a fairly new team - those were the things that attracted me to them. BSR only decided to expand in July/August 2001, and it tied in with me looking for a race seat for the first time in the internet racing community."
LFRS is a big league, which can be either intimidating or less enjoyable for many drivers. "I know what you mean regarding its size," says Andy. "But I was one of the few who wanted to race 100% distance and time-limited. That takes a lot of commitment. So the field was often limited to between 15 and 20 cars on average. I was impressed by the LFRS, but they decided to ditch 100% racing for 2002, plus they used GP3 2000 - and that didn't appeal to me at the time."
Andy finished a respectable 10th in his sim-racing debut at the 2001 LFRS Austrian Grand Prix, followed by a solid 5th place at the very next race in Germany.
-
LFRS 2001 - Hockenheim. In only his 2nd sim career race Andy qualified 13th but raced to 5th at one of his favourite tracks!
"As a Keyboard Driver at the time, I didn't have great speed over 1 lap. But come race day I could hold my own with my consistency over a 100% race distance."
Helmet design at the time was a copy of Kimi Raikkonen, with the blue and silver replaced with red and yellow. For 2002 Andy would design his own helmet from scratch. -
It didn't take long for him to score his first career podium, which came at the LFRS Australian Grand Prix in Adelaide. He finished 3rd for BSR after qualifying 14th on the grid.
"I was absolutely elated. Really. Being a keyboard driver I often qualified towards the bottom of the field, and the wheel drivers were substantially quicker than me in Qualifying," he says.
His excitement grows as he describes the event. "But what I found was that I was very consistent with my race pace - again not lightning quick, but closer in terms of lap time in the race to the top guys than I was in qualifying. Plus I could race on track against the cc opposition quite well."
He pauses for a moment: "Adelaide was 80 plus laps of sheer hell - the kerbing into the first corner was quite hit and miss, and I know a lot of the other drivers fell out of the race due to problems there. I knew I had achieved something good in finishing the whole race, but I didn't in my wildest dreams expect a podium. I was blown away, really proud of myself at that moment."
It was truly the first of many highlights over the next year.
---
In three months, Andy did six races in the LFRS for Ben Saunders Racing (BSR). His time there was highlighted by three top ten finishes but also three DNF's.
"The learning curve was in setting up the car for each track," he says. Hungary was the low point, a crash and subsequent disqualification from the results. "Up to the first pitstop I was constantly watching my back as the cc cars tried to get past. When I came out of the pits, they had too much pace for me. I tried to respond but as a result simply lost it on the kerbing and put the car into the barriers."
Belgium wasn't much better: "I remember crashing out at the exit Bus Stop chicane, losing a wheel in the process. In Qualifying I had had a major crash (whilst trying to learn to drive with my rarely used Steering Wheel), rolling the car umpteen times in the run up to the Bus Stop, so I knew it was a hit and miss corner for me," says Andy.
"Entering Blanchimont everything seems OK. The car has always been twitchy here if the line taken is too near the left hand curb on the exit, but the car is in the middle of the track. It drifts out to the right hand curb. Foot flat to the floor and the car rides the curb. Suddenly the rear of the car steps out at 190mph. The rear digs into the gravel and sends the car into a shocking series of barrel rolls. Footage confirms the car rolling 10 times, the driver's head bouncing around the sides of the cockpit as all extremities of the car are ripped off. The car lands upside down c. 50 meters from the Bus Stop chicane against the left hand barriers." Extract from BSR Racing Magazine Issue 1 (Nov 2001)
"In Japan I was lapping a backmarker who basically moved over and put me into the barriers. That was a racing incident, but symptomatic of Time Limited racing - you very rarely get more than one chance to get it right! Overall the BSR-01 was OK to drive; it was my driving skills with the keyboard that were at fault!"
-
"Lap 42 of the Japanese GP at Suzuka. I'd just come out of the Pits and was behind a backmarker, trying to lap them. In hindsight I tried a foolish manouvre by trying to overtake him on the outside through Dunlop Curve. As I pulled alongside he moved over and put me onto the grass. After that I was just a passenger and slammed violently into the barriers."
The image to the left shows the aftermath of yet another major accident from an inexperienced Time Limited driver! The car is facing backwards down the track (Degner Curve is in the distance). -
---
Most drivers who have tried Time Limited racing speak very highly of the experience, and Andy is no exception. "Time limited racing was fantastic. It really is an adrenaline rush, when you know that after the first lap you have just got to get on with it, not make a mistake, watch for the traffic, think tactics whilst racing - and all whilst not being able to save your game. As real as racing could get. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and would recommend it to anyone. But 100% distance only. Any shorter distance takes some of these elements away - the fatigue side after driving for 1.5 hours, concentration span etc. You just have to try it if you haven't already done so!"
After the 2001 season finished, Andy left the LFRS save for a one-off race in May 2002. "My experience in the LFRS as a driver was one of enjoyment at competing against other drivers who were committed enough to take on 100% race distance and Time-Limited racing," he says. Before long he would move on to bigger and better things in IGP3C and GPVWC, but his LFRS experience would prove to get him started on the right foot.
To Be Continued
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