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Michael Gibbins, a Whyteleafe based teenager in his final year at Caterham School took part in the first round of the Sports 2000 Duratec championship at Silverstone on 24 and 25th April.
Having had only one test session, back in March, before taking delivery of the car on Friday morning, Michael and crew had very little chance to get familiar with car ahead of qualifying on Friday afternoon. Nevertheless, Michael topped the time sheets for the first 5 laps of qualifying, then, inexplicably, Michael's last three qualifying laps were slower, whilst others went faster, leaving him third fastest overall. On checking over the car on Friday evening, the reason became clear – in the hastily completed checks earlier in the day, tyre pressures had been left somewhat higher that they should have been for optimum grip.
Further teething problems occurred on Saturday when the engine cut out on the grid ahead of the formation lap, and a weakened small on board race battery was unable to restart the engine. As the engine would not fire up again on the small, weakened, on board race battery, the track marshals, after a half hearted attempt at bump starting the car, insisted on pushing it into the pit lane, where, once the pit crew had started the engine, he could only start the race once all other competitors had passed the end of the pit lane, and also without the benefit of a warm up lap to heat tyres and brakes.
Obviously, Michael was now seriously fired up, given the huge task he now faced; however, he proceeded to drive the race of his life, passing 6 of the 32 other competitors on the first lap, reaching 3rd place by the 13th and penultimate lap, and took the lead on the third last corner of the last lap of the race – to record a pit lane to race win in his first Duratec race!! He set the fastest race lap in the process, 1.5 seconds faster than the next quickest competitor.
Michael would like to thank his sponsors, local companies Croudace Homes and Berringtons of Caterham for their continued support.
The next race is on the Brands Hatch GP circuit in two weeks time. This time, hopefully, less drama will make the event less stressful for the driver.
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