By Team Trackdaze 11 Junior
September 17 2003

“Our luck ran out here. Oschersleben will be better,” says team manager Jeff Collins. Trackdaze overcame more problems in one weekend than most teams have to face in a season when it competed in round five, a split six-hour race at the A1-Ring in Austria.

Crashes and mechanical failures plagued the team that had drafted in 2001 World Endurance Champion Heinz Platacis from Germany, and Australian Works Kawasaki rider Damian Cudlin, to ride alongside impressively fast Brit Nick Pilborough on the junior number 11 bike. With a seventh place in the championship to defend, the team decided it needed World class talent on board and was overjoyed to recruit Heinz and Damian to replace James Hutchins and Kevin Falcke, who were riding for another team.

Nick Pilborough commented: “It’s great for me to have Heinz and Damian on board. Heinz is a former World Champion and has a lot of experience. Damian is a great guy and a solid rider. It’s good because we are all pushing each other faster in every session.”

Commenting on the rider changes, team manager Jeff Collins said: “In order for us to evolve we knew that there would have to be changes, and with Heinz, Damian and Nick on board we’re fielding a very strong line up. This is what we have to do if we are to have any chance of moving up the championship table.”

During free practice and qualifying, everything was going to according to plan. In first practice on Friday, Damian provisionally qualified in eighth place, with a fastest lap time of 1:35.388. This was less than two seconds slower than local heroes and provisional pole sitters Yamaha Austria, with a time of 1:34.118. Team-mate Nick Pilborough laid down a 1:36.902, which was just over one second faster than Heinz.

After second qualifying on Saturday, the junior team moved up to seventh after Damian again went faster, recording a 1:34.819 on the virtually stock Suzukis. Unfortunately, the senior team slipped back one place to 22nd with a lap time of 1:40.309 after the German PS Schlesinger team, which was behind them in first qualifying, managed to find an extra second to move up two places.

When the flag dropped at the start of the first three hours of racing, Damian got a flyer and quickly moved up to challenge Suzuki Police Nationale bike which had catapulted past pole-sitters Zongshen 2, championship leaders Zongshen 1, Suzuki Phase One and Yamaha Austria from fifth on the grid. The bike set up allowed him to run comfortably with the leaders but by lap three, he had been overhauled by flying American Jason Pridmore on the Phase One Suzuki.

Soon Damian and the bike found a rhythm and were running in sixth when, on lap 29, the bike stopped and he was forced to push in. The mechanics quickly diagnosed a fuel system fault and after a new relay was fitted, Heinz jumped on board to rejoin the race. Unfortunately, the fault did not clear and Heinz was forced to return to the pits for a new ECU. In total, the fuel problem had cost the team more than ten laps in repair time and, in a short race, this amount of time is impossible to make up even for talented riders such as Heinz, Damian and Nick.

When the flag waved to signal the end of the first part of the race, the junior bike was in 19th place, not where they had wanted to be. At the head of the field, Zongshen 1 were in control with Zongshen 2 trying to close the gap in second. In third, French team GMT94 was a lap down.

Overnight, the bikes were kept in Parc Fermé. At 12.27pm the next day, the mechanics wheeled them back to the pits for just five minutes of repairs before the riders gridded up for the second Le Mans style start.

Thinking that all the bad was behind them, Trackdaze felt optimistic about part two. Unfortunately that was shattered when Heinz lost the end can of the exhaust and crashed fifteen minutes after the start, forcing him to push in. Heinz suffered a grazed knee but he managed to wrestle the bike back to the pits for repairs. Unfortunately the exhaust was too badly damaged to refit, so the mechanics bolted on an entire system including headers before Nick jumped on board to try and pull back some of the lost time.

Nick went out determined to claw back that valuable time, and in doing so unlapped them from a number of teams, lapping faster than in qualifying during his one hour stint.

By this stage in the race, the team had a mountain to climb in terms of the number of laps they had to complete to be classified as race finishers. There is a cut-off point of 75% of the number of laps completed by the leaders, so calculations were checked to see where both teams lay in the race, based on aggregate times for the two-part race.

Based on the predicted attrition rate for other teams, it was decided that both Trackdaze teams (Junior and Senior) should continue, if not for points but for honour as everyone in the team had put in so much effort. Even a cracked crankcase cover was changed near the end of the race to give Damian, who was riding the anchor leg on the junior bike, a chance to go out and put in some quick lap times, showing everyone what he and the bike were capable of.

Despite the less than ideal finishing position Pilborough was still up beat about things. He had this to say: “Of course we are all very disappointed not to finish in the top four, which is what we wanted. The team worked very hard and, thanks to the mechanics, we were able to finish. We are looking ahead to Oschersleben now, and we again have a strong line up so we will be gunning for that podium.”

The team still maintains a top ten World Championship position, and will be fiercely competing to pull themselves back up the order. The next round of the World Endurance Championship, the 24 hours of Oschersleben, takes place Sat/Sun 23rd and 24th August 2003.

Watch this column for regular updates or visit us at www.Trackdaze.co.uk
Or check out www.WorldEndurance.com for more updates.

Regards,
Nick Pilborough and Team Trackdaze 11 Junior