Thunder Road Cars, The Home of the Cobra Replica

	Triumph at the Spa 6 hour!

	TRC prepared a TR4 and Cheng shared the driving with owner Dominic Spicer and fellow Cobra owner John Dickson. We started 88th (out of 106 starters) and finished 47th. We were pleased with the result, especially considering it was our first attempt. There were a couple of problems, without which we could have finished in the top 30. Near the end of the first hour the fanbelt got destroyed. Fortunately John and Dom had been briefed on what to do, and what signs to look out for in that eventuality. When the red alternator light came on, John realised quickly what had happened. He managed to stop the car before it overheated, and at a safe place where he could work on it. He changed the fan belt with the spare belt and spanner that was in a "spares box" in the car and returned to the pits for a quick check. Everything was fine so we changed drivers, and Dom, the owner took over. John had been so quick to spot the trouble and fix the problem, that the lap and stop had only taken 11 minutes! John had done our fastest dry lap of the race at 3mins 13seconds. Dom went out and was flying. Within two or three laps he was down to 3mins 15 but suddenly came into the pits. He was complaining of funny handling. It turned out that the flange that holds the rear wheel on to the halfshaft had sheared, so the left rear wheel was very floppy (to use the technical term). We were very fortunate that the wheel didn't part company with the car! It would have been all over. Dom got out and assumed that we were finished, but we had been prepared. We had taken half a TR in spares, just for this eventuality, so the whole team descended on the car.
	The team (of Pete Cook, Paul Edney, Barry Jones and Cheng) replaced the halfshaft in 16 minutes (somebody said) and sent Dom on his way. The whole pitstop, the slow lap in with the wobbly wheel and the time in the garage had taken just 25 mins in total. He completed his planned hour and a quarter (actual driving time) stint without further incident and came in for the next driver change. Cheng took over and did the only refuel. We were lucky to have no queue in the fuel station. Spa has a funny refueling system for the Six hour event. You have to go into what looks like a regular petrol station and fill up from a normal pump. it's not uncommon to take 15 minutes if you have to wait for other cars. We were lucky, and so Cheng's stint of one and a quarter hours passed without a problem. He did say it was the longest time he'd ever driven in one go, and when he had seen the "45mins to go" lapboard he thought "oh no!", but did settle down and have fun, making up a few places on the way. Dom took over again. He had said he didn't fancy driving in the dark, but because of the delay with the halfshaft, it was just about dark. To make matters worse, it started to pee down, and so despite gamely trying for a few laps, Dom came in very soon to hand over to John. Once again the team jumped in.This time it was to change to wets. There was organised chaos for a short while and then John was off. He drove very well in appalling conditions and made loads of places before handing over to Cheng for the last half hour. This went well and Cheng made some more places before taking the chequred flag. We had finished at our first attempt and were very pleased with ouselves! The poor MGB that we had been sharing a garage with had a halfshaft fail with 2 laps to go! Bummer. We had to admit to being very fortunate. The wobbly wheel could have parted company with the car which would have left Dom stranded by the side of the track, and the rain had reduced the time difference from the faster cars, and meant we didn't need a second fuel stop. This allowed us to make up many places we had lost in delays. All in all everybody had a great time and we hope to return in 2011.
	Some photos courtesy of AlbertMensingaCreative.nl