Adam Howe (Top Photon Driver) reports on the excitement of the 1st BRCA National at Mendip:
 

Top Racing (UK) has entered four team's of drivers into this year's constructors cup, I'm sure that the championship will be really close this year.

TOP Racing UK Top Photon Team T

-Brian Eldridge

-Adam Howe

-Stewart Noble

-Reserve driver-Christopher ODonoghue

Race report-

Arriving at the track at about 4pm on Saturday to see a very tidy track, all track markers had been re-painted and the grass had been freshly cut, Mendip RC made a fantastic job with the event last year and I am sure it will be voted in next year.  We set the new Top Photon team gazebo up and helped with some track side banners and headed to out to our hotel 5 minutes from the track.

The previous weekend was the BTCC so we all went down and got some practice ahead of the national event and got some good setups for our cars which set us in good pace for the BRCA series.

Saturday-

We woke up Saturday morning to see blue sky and a clear sunny day ahead of us.  After a drivers briefing outlining the criteria for the days racing, practice commenced with all the team taking to the track to get use to their cars and find the fast racing lines, 

Brian Eldridge seemed to be his fast usual self with his car looking very planted around the Mendip circuit, for Adam Howe it was a start of a series of electrical faults that really held him back when his brand new fastest speed controller blew up after 4 laps and took the motor with it, leaving him with last years speed controller to work with, that just could not compete with the latest generation speedos

I kept my confidence and knew I had a fantastic handling car so it was my intention to knuckle down and drive as fast as possible throughout the infield. 

I remember a time when Stew Noble was winning championships and was among the front drivers but this was Stew's first time racing since September due to university commitments which is very understandable but he still looked quick and adapted well to the track showing good speed.

Chris ODonoghue was waiting in the wings if unexpectedly a driver dropped out, Chris was quite new to the team but was a good edition showing speed and consistency throughout.

Overnight qualifying:

Brian Eldridge had a mishap in Q2 but apart from that Brian had made two fast sessions to put him with the elite of the BRCA drivers recording a 9th and 10th fastest time and was well setup for a A final showdown.

Adam Howe with his electrical failures only managed to complete one full run on Saturdays qualifying and was a nightmare start for me on this years national, i was way down the qualifying positions but did manage a 32nd fastest time to keep me in the running for Sunday.

Stew Noble got of to a fantastic start recording a 16th overall fastest time but had a couple of problems going into round 2 and 3. Stew was 36th on the overnight positions and got back on the pace after his 8 month stint without racing.

Chris ODonoghue was very consistent throughout his qualifying recording times of 27th,32nd and 32nd fastest.

Sunday qualifying-

Sunday had a massive change to weather conditions heavy rain a wind played its part and the team prepared there wet cars and got ready to take to the track. It looked like Brian Eldridge needed one good run to get him in the A final, Adam Howe was glad it was raining as it slowed the cars straigh tline speed down and i managed 6th fastest in the rain at mendip btcc rnd 1 the previous weekend. Stew Noble needed two more good runs to move him down the qualifiers. Christopher ODonoghue was looking to improve on his already consistent times.

Brian Eldridge had a mishap in his qualifying with a servo failure and the team pulled together and sorted the issue out putting him back in the running with his car looking very good, Brian had managed to qualify 12th overall just missing out on the A final.

Adam Howe needed to finish both of the qualifying runs on Sunday and did it in style with a 29th fastest and 12th fastest after a last ditch decision to run the wet tyres in the dry car when the track had dried for ten minutes in the last qualifier, this put me 6th in the D final which i was quite happy with as we just did not have any straight line speed. I noticed in my final that most of the drivers were running new speed controllers so i was quite happy that we had done as well as we did with our old running gear.

Stew Noble managed to qualify 33rd with Chris ODonoghue in 36th they lined up 3rd and 6th in the D final.

Finals:

The finals started with a dry track after a day of mostly rain and got some grip in the surface now.

Brian Eldridge qualified the highest place driver in the modified Photon cars and was on the pace from the first leg where he was on old tyres but still managed to put his car in 3rd place, into the second leg Brian was on new tyres and was pushing hard but couldnt find away past Phill Chambers and finally the last leg Brian was all over the back of Phill and put a superb move down the inside of him and drove very proffesionally to the line taking the win.

Stew Noble and Chris ODonoghue were both in the modified D final and Stew Noble dominated the front runners in this heat recording two 2nd places and a fourth place finishing third overall. Chris had gained a bit more speed for his final and placed his car 6th after three legs.

Adam Howe placed in the D final in pro stock managed to get off to a great start off the line passing a few cars but after a massive wipeout by another driver twice at the bottom of the straight managed to finish 6th in leg one, leg two we managed to finish 6th again but in the third leg the car managed to be one of the faster and managed 5th overall to finish the heat in 6th after 3 legs.

Overview:

The team worked well all weekend with the new photon international limited edition kit proving it self to be one of the faster cars.  Brian Eldridge was a massive support for the team helping drivers develop their cars as well as setting up their cars.