After the Beast from the East had forced the first round of this years Championship to be postponed by a week, a host of familiar faces gathered at Teesside for the start of the season.
Lightweights were running first for the opening round so an early start was on the cards after a relatively restless night looking after a toddler who decided 9pm was the start of play time!
Leaving Wakefiled at 06:15 I was confident that the dampness which had resulted from overnight rain would burn off as I drove up to A1, or at least I was hoping it would thinking back to the first race of 2017. This time last year we had a wet first round which resulted in a number of incidents on the first lap as eager drivers struggled on cold tyres and brakes.
As I drove north the roads did get a little dryer, but on arrival at the circuit it was evident that we were going out onto a wet track.
As always, drivers checked their weight before heading out on track to ensure they have the right ballast to meet the 70kg minimum weight. I was surprised and a little shocked to find out that I didn't need all my ballast, I wasn't sure if I should be happy or annoyed at putting on a few kgs #dadbod.
Black Flag
Things got worse as we headed out for qualifying, after the slightest of touches with a kart which spun in front of me, I saw the black flag come out. To say I was confused and annoyed was an understatement as I'd sen far worse go unpunished. Concious that qualifying was coming to an end I rushed to the pits to find out what I had supposedly done.
After stopping in the pits I was infrmed that my transponder wasn't working, it didn't twig at the time but it meant I hadn't set a lap time; to compund matters, by the time I got going again I didn't get chance to set a lap. As we were gridded up I was confused as to why I might be so far back, I thought "I'm not the greatest in the wet, but I'm not that bad", that's when the penny dropped!
Hard Slog
Facing a drive from the back of the grid and a tough first race, the marshalls made space for me on the grid in about P17 from which I managed to scrape a finish of P15 in race 1. Just making the reverse grid in race 1 proved to be fortunate for race 2 which reverses the grid for the top 15 drivers, P1 for race 2!
With a drying track and ever increasing confidence I had a great opportunity, however when one of my engines stalled on the grid I was expecting a repeat of last year when one stalled as we set off and dropped me to the back. With a marshall restarting the motor I was left revving it by hand, half concentrating on that and half concentrating on the flag dropping.
Once we were off I realised the race was mine to lose due to a clean start and pulling a small gap to those behind. I was of course expecting the likes of Adam Delmont and Karl Parkin to come storming through but it just wasn't their race. Adam, normally dynamite on track ended up in the dirt and Karl, from what I could see was in a close battle for P2 which was costing him time.
All of this meant that I could build a small lead and while I nearly threw it off the track a few times by out braking myself, I held on to the lead for the win! An awesome way to start the season with the goal now to improve my consistency and overall finishing positions.
