We'd decided between us, The Boss and I that it was more likely for us to be able to make the final round at Portimao if we pooled our limited remaining resources and drove down to the Algarve circuit..this would have been a good idea if we'd had a couple more days either side to do it. As it stood though we both had working commitments and had to drive down in one hit as well as return in one long non-stop run too...We've made better decisions.. 29hrs straight in each direction is a long long way to drive...I feel like the car has become part of me...As road trips go that was one of the longest I've done!
We arrived in time for lunch on the Friday test day and took the opportunity to get a few exploratory laps in..Portimao is my new favourite circuit; The gradients, blind brows and long opening radius curves are a complete racer's joy and there's so many lines to choose from it makes for great racing... The lack of performance on our was still evident and taking us through into Saturday qualifying and the afternoon sprint race (5th place) we were starting to come up with a few ideas. I'd picked up a second time improvement with a couple of suspension setting changes, and another couple fitting a brand new set of sumptuous Conti medium slicks, the last front was 8 races old but still not finished with!.. We were still a few seconds adrift which just wasn't right, we were gaining ground in the heavy breaking and long corners but loosing out on the gradients and straights which make up most of the circuit..
We spent the evening scratching our chins and working out what we could do..We decided that as we were paying to ride this satellite bike and Zonshen had done all they could to address the difference that it was time to take matters into our own hands. We downloaded the control software for the controllers on this DC powered bike and investigated the controller settings..sure enough we spotted a few obvious settings that would immediately coax a little more torque from the little Agni Saietta motors without sacrificing any reliability.. we also noticed that the commutators in both motors (the round copper bit that runs on the carbon brushes) were rough and dirty and needed cleaning up, the long straights and regular gradient changes were taking their toll on the hardware...This coupled with a gearing change based on optimal motor speeds would theoretically redress the the deficit...
I slept badly running through all the possible combinations of the following day. I was in second place in the championship The Zongshen rider Chun Kay Kwok was fit enough to ride following his shoulder injury and was riding well.. in order to maintain second place I needed to beat him in both the remaining races which seemed a tall order given the performance of the bike in the Saturday race..We'd made these changes and were confident it would improve the performance but had no idea if it would cause the motors to get hot or 'over current' burning the brushes which we've seen from both the other Zongshen bikes this season when they turned them up too far...We squeezed out in an early warm up to quickly check if what we'd done had worked but were only allowed one flying lap..performance was definitely up as I took over 4 seconds off my previous best lap time (equalling Chun Kay Kwok's best time) but we still didn't know if the changes would be reliable; Motor, battery and controller temp's were all below what we'd been seeing all weekend so it looked encouraging at least! :)
In the first race of Sunday it was immediately obvious that the changes were spot on and we all got away together and I stayed with both the other Zongshen bikes as usual but after the second lap instead of watching them both pull away from me I began to gap them... I kept the pace up for another lap and glanced back a few times to check they were still tripping each other up...for the final lap, as I had no hope of catching the other faster bikes, I decided to knock the pace off a bit and protect the motors and remaining available voltage, I kept an eye on Chunn Kay Kwok as he began to reel me in and in the last few corners upped my pace back up...I hadn't banked on him knocking a further second off his best laptime and we crossed the line through the chequered flag in a photo finish! Take a look at this! Slow mo' of photo finish.
So mission accomplished for race one..just.
For the second 'endurance' race Zongshen usually turn down both bikes to maximise reliability and ensure we have enough volts remaining in the cells so we don't ruin them..On this occasion though we'd decided we wanted to keep the settings we'd used in the first race (cos we liked them!) and manually manage the power usage...We'd asked to do this before but Zongshen had declined to allow it. On this occasion they weren't able to access the bike.. :) The plan was to tail Chun Kay (if I could) using his slipstream to improve my efficiency and also mask the positive changes but also gauge my speed with his..I only needed to beat him..nobody else really mattered... I got away with Chun Kay and as planned stayed in his slipstream, a fly in the ointment was his team mate Ho Chi Fung (Chinese Superbike champion) he always gets away well in the endurance races and is able to make the most of the small lighter single motor'd Moto3 style bike..He stayed with us for a couple of laps, the race was in full wet conditions and we began to pull away from him. It crossed my mind that I could pass Chun Kay quite easily and get a good gap on him but as this was the first time we'd used these settings I had no idea if I'd make the end of the race if I made that kind of jump in power usage.. so I had to stay with him... My plan was to pass him in the last few corners which felt like it would be a fairly simple task..We were piggy backing a track day endurance series with minimal marshalling and in previous races there had been no lap countdown and no last lap flag...and as we embarked on our penultimate lap everything was going to plan, as ann added bonus we started to reel the third placed Brammo pretty quickly to..As we both set our sites on him Daley 'Daisy' Matheson blasted through between all three of us on the Nottingham University missile (21mins 19sec on the video)..
As I was so focused on my task it didn't occur to me that being lapped by Daley knocked a whole lap off the length of the race and as I settled into Chun kay's slip stream for another lap we both breezed past the Brammo and the chequered flag came out ....WHAT? Nooooo! As we passed the chequered flag I was still tucked into the slipstream preparing for another lap..
I'd miscalculated the number of laps and when the flag came out I was sat in 4th place in Chun Kay Kwok's slipstream envisaging a pass somewhere out on the next lap..and with that one of the closest finishes for the remaining podium places so far in the MotoE championships.. I slipped to and finished in third in the championships. Despite having led the championship at one point and with a little grit and cloak and dagger we had a good chance of holding onto second, we ultimately finished third. something we're very proud of and hadn't in our wildest dreams thought was possible at the start of the season.
With all the thanks due to our sponsors there is really only one person who made this happen and with out him we wouldn't have even made it to the first round, team Boss extrodinaire Alex Aitchison...take a bow.. :)
Plans for next year are not yet firm but it'll be Me, Alex and Darvill racing that's for sure.. watch this space for updates.. :)
