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The Inside Track with Power Maxed Racing: We learnt a lot at Brands Hatch - and it was all good!

By Power Maxed Racing / MJP Media | 8 April 2015

Freshly wrapped cars, heavy traffic, a top 10 finish and beating three former BTCC champions - it was an eventful weekend at Brands Hatch for Power Maxed Racing!

We arrived at Brands Hatch ready for the weekend with one nearly new car and one very new car, both freshly wrapped and both looking sensational. We set everything up and were ready bright and early Saturday morning for some action.

In the first free practice session it was hard work because it was cold and damp. This is a bad combination for any racing car as it is difficult to get a lot of warmth in the tyres and that means there isn't a lot of grip to go round so setups, tyre pressures and the way we collect data from the cars are all compromised. Having said that, we have two outstanding drivers on board and at the end of the session we were sitting with Josh in 3rd and Dave in 5th. That leader board had a real wow factor for us as a team and gave us a lot of confidence.

The second free practice session allowed us to concentrate on trying lots of different things that we needed to test, whether they be good or bad. Suspension settings, wheel cambers, tyre pressures and all of the other variables were tested without the intention of setting super-fast times. This session was all about collecting data. Then we had qualifying and whilst it didn't go quite to plan, both cars were in the midfield and we managed to have Dave ahead of one of the Mercedes and one of the Audis, so it was by no means bad news.

Race 1 on Sunday was cold again and saw Dave unluckily held up in some traffic whilst Josh did a fabulous job and made up 7 places during the race. Race 2 was based on the fastest laps in Race 1, as both Dave and Josh had had traffic we started 15th and 16th, and ended up 14th and 15th. This gave us more laps under our belts and showed we were at least as competitive as those around us.

Race 3 was a bit warmer and the sun had come out so we felt that this would provide us with a better idea of where the cars were up to. Drama struck however when we lost Josh on lap 3, however we soon realised just how competitive Dave and the car were, with him making up a lot of places during the race and giving us our first top 10 of the season with a fantastic 9th place finish. What can we say when we ended up ahead of Jason Plato, Colin Turkington and Andrew Jordan. Yes, we know it might not happen often, but interesting none the less!

So what do we take from our first competitive outing? Well, we proved we were ready and thoroughly organised right out of the box. We know that the cars are competitive and that we definitely made right choice of drivers. We also know (well, we already knew) that the team work well together and do a fantastic job.

The big thing we are looking forward to now is Donington Park next week, where the track is much longer and much wider so it will be interesting to see some real overtaking. We look forward to seeing you all there!

Power Maxed Racing

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