Shop Online

Donnington Double for Championship leader Freddie Lee

Rounds 14 & 15 Donnington

Freddie arrived at Donnington with a 23 point lead of the championship and the knowledge that, having tested at Donnington some weeks earlier, the truck and Freddy had half a second over the rest of the field, suffice to say we were quietly confident of some good results.

With a capacity spectator crowd and perfect weather conditions for maximum grip, everything seemed in our favour, however race weekends are dramatic by their very nature and this was no exception.

Saturday:

Practice;

As Freddie left the pit lane the Truck dropped oil pressure and misfired badly. With race control reporting that a truck was losing fuel, Freddie returned to the pits, where following a brief visual inspection, which determined  it was not Freddie dropping fuel, we retired from the session and the team swung into action to investigate and remedy the misfire ahead of qualifying.

Qualifying :

With the misfire resolved and all checks completed we entered qualifying with a clear strategy  to pick up the ‘on pole’ points to increase our championship lead.

Session 1: Navigating the grid to place the truck in clean air Freddie delivered a blistering 1.17.76 on lap 5, securing the 20 ‘Pole position points’ and leading the grid by a quarter of a second.

Session 2: In lap 2 Freddie delivered another blistering lap of 1.18.12, which secured our 2nd  lot of ‘Pole position points’.

Sunday:

With two 15 lap races ahead of us, and the evidence in the TSL Live timing information that we had the pace to race, Freddie went on track composed and focused.

Race 1. Starting on the 3rd row, because the championship runs a reverse grid, Freddie quickly picked through the pack and by lap 6 he was P3 racing against  truck  93 (Michael Smith) and truck 43 (Lee Wood)

The three trucks delivered thrilling crowd pleasing mid pack hard, but fair, full on racing.  By lap 12 truck 43 had succumbed to the relentless pressure from Freddie and Michael, and by lap 13 Freddie led, and whilst the two continued to battle, in the end Michael just did not have the pace and Freddie took the checkered flag  and secured his first win of the season and those all-important championship points.

Race 2.

Starting again on the third row Freddie made his way to P4 by lap 3. At which point our mystery misfire reappeared. Liaising with our engine builder and calculating the points effect, a safe strategy was evoked and Freddie deploy all his ‘defence’ driving skills to achieve a mid pack result of P7, avoiding a DNF, and ensuring some championship points.

Freddie did however incur a small amount of front wing damage when he hit the ‘Restart’ button, whilst still traveling at some considerable speed, when the truck stalled in lap 13.

Unfortunately truck 82 (Paul Jones)  was involved in the collision but was very gracious and we thank them for his  understanding.

The overall results of the weekend:

2 x Pole Positions

Fastest lap of the weekend

1 x Win

1 x 7th

And an increased the lead of the championship to 37 points. – It was a good day at the office!

Championship positions:

Overall championship = P1 by

Rockingham Oval championship = P3