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June 3/4 BRANDS HATCH (Page 2)

The afternoon, for Kevin at least, was not much better. In the very first session whilst negotiating the fast sweeping right hander at Hawthorn, he encountered an MGF that moved across his path causing him to hit the rear off side corner of the MGF and lift him up across the back of the MGF. Fortunately both drivers were uninjured in the incident but the damage caused to the Civic was such that Kevin's testing was over for the day. The front suspension had been badly damaged along with quite extensive damage to the front near-side body work. The Synchro team though, once again, put in some sterling work to replace the suspension and put the bodywork back into a reasonable shape for the qualifying the following day.

Bill, though, managed to progressively lower his times down to the low 1m 42's that, under the circumstances, was a very respectable time. He mentioned that the car still had a misfire and the brakes were grabbing occasionally. Both of these areas would need addressing before tomorrow's qualifying.

Saturday started warm and humid with a fair amount of cloud that could potentially give a little rain at any time. Qualifying, as normal, was due to start at noon. For this round the National Saloons had been allocated garages which gave the team a much better environment in which to work.

The session actually started very late at 12.49 in bright sunshine with a record entry of twenty-two cars. Both Kevin and Bill could not get any clear laps during the early stages and they were both languishing near the bottom. After six laps the red flag came out and halted the qualifying for five minutes. During this time the front tyres were changed on both cars. When the session resumed, Bill quickly proceeded to knock one and a half seconds off his lap time to reduce it down to 1m 42.183 and jump him up to twelfth place. However, on his second lap out, smoke had started to appear from the under the car and he pulled over to end his session.
Kevin, meanwhile, continued to improve and he too improved by one and a half seconds and finished fourteenth with a time of 1m 43.183. On his last lap, his exhaust came loose and he had to abort the lap.