SJH Motorsport

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The early wakening + warm up... Not in the top-10 in my favourite actions, but so far so good. Engine feels to be working well and now we are getting ready for the Q1 (10:20).

Practising some difficulties...

Today's free practises didn't give us yet the evidence of our performance in Val de Vienne. We had some problems like a broken 3rd gear in the first stint, a loosen tyre in the second one and a total engine damage in the last practise session. The big end bearing at the front crank shaft just blow off. Now the night shift will be busy for changing the engine and the practising continues at 8:30 in the morning. There are still some new tuning parts to be tested. :)

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After disappointing Assen weekend we have had 2 months racing break now the very technical and narrow circuit of Val de Vienne is ready to be the arena of the next round of the French Open event. On Thursday we will have 3 free practises (15:00, 16:15 and 17:35 local time) and one more on Saturday morning. Then 2 time qualifications (10:20 and 13:30) and first race (16:55) on Saturday and second race (13:50) on Sunday.

From 1000 to .. 100 hp!

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Some Burned tires and a broken 3rd gear... 

Start went quite good and for a while it looked like I might have a chance to respond to the pace of Frenchmen. Then Rob overtook me easily at the backstraight. I hung on with him some laps until the 4th gear jumped off and broke the 3rd one. Then the end of the race was a struggle with the gears and try to keep the pace in the 3rd gear corners. That ruined my tires totally. P6 was a disappointment, but still gave me valuable points in the series. 

The overall situation after Nogaro: 1. Vinuales 133 pts, 2. Vayssie 116 pts, 3. Lehtinen 79 pts, 4. Parkes 57 pts, 5. Harvey and Chilcott 51 pts, 7. Kinsey 49 pts. 

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Malcom and Jarmo are reducing the wing to get more straight speed to the Sunday's race. 

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Today was a busy day with practise, briefing, 2 quals and one race. 

The second qualification started with a small shower, which made the track wet again. Some guys improved their times, but I was stuck to the traffic and made 4th best time in that session. 

In the race I started from the P5 and got a dream start turning at the P2 to the 1st corner. That fun didn't last long because John and the fast Frenchmen overtook me in the long backstraight... too easily. When Rob overtook me a few laps later in the same place and John didn't finish, I was 5th in the first race. This result keeps me still at the 3rd place in the overall results of the series.

Better race pace tomorrow... hopefully. 

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The Redspeed team 2011

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The 1st qualification in Nogaro ended with a sudden rain. Luckily we managed to hit our best laptimes with the new tires before the track got slippery (John 2., I 5th). 

The chassis has become better to handle with every small set-up improvements we have done so far. I believe that the chassis set-ups will be in the keyrole in the races. If you fail with that you will burn out the front tyres after 6 or 7 laps and at the end of the race there will be the big troubles...

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I was in the middle of a crash in the first chicane. Nevermind the plastics - I spun but continued the race. The ignition got a hit and begun to misfire. So I came to the pits after a few laps.