Wakefield Club Track Day – A First Timers View

Wakefield Garages

19 October 2016 / Andrew Digney

The planning and procrastination had begun a few months prior for the Club track day at Wakefield Park on 12th September 2016.

  • L2S Cams Licence – tick (I intended to do a few Motorsport events so may as well get the most appropriate licence).
  • Better track tyres and wheels – tick (not really necessary but with the MX-5 Clubs' plethora of activities, I decided that for multiple motorsport activities, a relatively cheap set of wheels and track tyres was a good first step).
  • Some driver preparation – tick (A day at Marulan was a great introduction to track events and only served to whet my appetite). 
  • A fire extinguisher – tick (that was the point of procrastination. Where the bloody hell do I mount this fire extinguisher in my new ND MX-5. There isn’t much room and after months of indecision I decided to drill some thread-serts into the passenger inner door sill. Can you believe I drilled holes into my brand new car)!
  • Track Day Brake Pads – tick (again not really necessary but after reading about other people doing some bigger track day events around the world in NDs and limping home on metal to metal braking, why wait? Went to fit the pads and damn, they didn’t fit. The joys of having the latest model car and the aftermarket manufacturer sending the reseller the wrong pads. Oh well, I’ll fit the right ones for the next event).

So I decided to drive down to Goulburn on the Sunday and got there in time to see the last hour of the NSW Supersprints and a certain Club President with an ear to ear grin with a new PB of 1:12:47. That evening around 40 people attended the pre-event dinner organised by Gillian Fletcher, a clear sign that the track day was going to be a well-attended event.

I arrived around 6:55am, picked a garage, unloaded the car and then started watching other people to see what to do next. Attach my tow hooks, make sure the car is empty, attach my battery location indicator blue triangle, register for the event, get my car numbers and affix them, get the car scrutineered, attend the driver meeting, attend the 1st timers meeting afterwards and then wait my turn for my first real track day event. Clearly the continuum transfunctioner comes before the pleasure (Dude Where’s My Car analogy for those that don’t know). Did I mention there were 79 drivers that competed on the day! Bloody hell, don’t people like working on Mondays?

Group 6’s turn finally arrives and I move the car to the starting area for my instructor to introduce me to the circuit for 3 familiarisation laps before my journey to Motorsport stardom begins. Peter Feutrill (thanks Peter, and the club for allocating similar car model owners to assist in familiarisation) shares his insights in Round 1 before I get the opportunity to explore Wakefield on my own in Round 2, like an inexperienced pilot going on his first solo flight. I can’t believe that I set my fastest lap in the second round and then spent the rest of the day trying to prove it wasn’t a fluke. Most memorable part though was the over-zealous power application before turn 9 that induces some serious rear wheel slide, I apply some counter steer but the tail keeps trying to catch up with the nose so I apply some more counter steer, but all to no avail, the tail is quicker than my steering, resulting in a rather fast spin out, with me looking back towards corner nine motionless and stalled. Clearly the additional infield track width in that section was prepared for my (and I am assuming, many others who have made the same mistake) only major slip-up of the day. That mistake certainly raised my attentiveness for the remainder of the day though. The next challenge was to work out how to challenge fear at Turn 1 and see just how fast I could go. Fear won on the day, tail drifting at around 150km/hr meant that discretion was maintained for the rest of the day.

Thanks to David Lawler and the rest of the organising team, the day ran smoothly and everyone got 5 rounds of driving.

P.S. And for those that have checked the www.natsoft.com.au website for their times. No, Josh Fitzgerald did not do a 0:30:1890 lap with an average speed of 262km/hr. So major modifications are not required to keep up with the Joneses or Fitzgeralds, in case you were wondering. You just have to aim for keeping up with the AC Shelby Cobra instead (ha, bloody,ha).

Click here for the Full Results

Search on Natsoft for detailed laptimes

Fastest Lap Times in Each Class

Class Driver Time
1 – Std road-reg NA & NB Mitchell Bennett 1:16.105
2 – Std road-reg NC & NB SE Bryan Shedden 1:12.410
3 – Std road-reg ND Jason Atkins 1:16.008
4 – NA & NB Clubman Graham Fletcher 1:17.107
5 – Modified NA, <1600, max 85kW Phil Mayo 1:15.283
6 – Modified NA/NB 1800, max 90kW Malcolm Steel 1:12.328
7 – Modified NC & ND (limited mods), max 110kW Lesa Bunn 1:13.835
8 – Modified turbo, max 140kW Alan Townsley 1:10.214
9 – Normally aspirated MX-5 racecars or exceed class 5, 6, 7 Ralph Thompson 1:09.157
10 – Turbo MX-5 racecars or exceed class 8 & all MX-5 on Slicks James Russell-Cook 1:12.057
11 – Members in Non MX-5 Richard Herring (AC Cobra) 1:07.399