At the No Name Racing Club run on the Bolwextric track I am currently running a Fly Porsche 908/3 in the Fly Classic class. It was originally in the No 4 Martini colours but I fancied a change of livery to make it stand out more. Inspired by the Porsche RS Spyder currently running in the ALMS I thought I'd try a DHL livery.
original image from "the-paddock.net"
All the decals apart from the white background number squares were made by myself. A very simple change of colour from silver to yellow and I didn't go over the top with the DHL livery. I thought the red rear view mirror and rollbar helped with the colour scheme. The driver figure is painted up in the style of the modern DHL Porsche RS Spyder drivers. Putting the side numbers towards the rear helps to make it look a bit sleeker I think.

Today I said farewell to my Triumph Trophy 900. Its been a long time coming. On 5 August 2006 a driver emerged from her driveway on my left no more than 50 feet away and I had no chance to avoid her. T boning her off-side front wing effectively wrote off my motorbike.

In November the "other side" sent me a resettlement cheque for the bike and at the start of this year another cheque followed (slowly) for the scrap value and personal injuries claim. I then had to chase up the "other side" to come and collect "their" bike, which they did this morning at 7:30 am.

So its farewell Triumph Trophy 900 and hopefully very soon hello Triumph Sprint 1050 or Honda Super Blackbird.

Well we're a third of the way through the year and at the No Name Racing Club, which is run on the Bolwextric track, we're starting our third series of the year. Each series consists of four classes run over four rounds every fortnight. We also run crash and burn i.e. once your're off you are off. The latest classes are:

SCX/Modern Scalextric NASCAR - stock
Mosler (Ninco or NSR) - stock
Fly Classic (with free tyre choice and Ninco sprung guide)
Porsche 934 (Ninco or Fly) - stock

I have to be honest and say that I wasn't looking forward to these classes at all. The SCX NASCAR is apparantly the car to have but I've already got a modern Scalextric and I don't particularly like SCX cars. After the rave reviews of the NSR Mosler I got one of those only for Jim and Ruebens to turn up with Ninco Moslers in a previous class and demostrate how good they were! It would seem that my Porsche 908/3 would be up against it in the Fly Classic class against the Ferrari 512's and Lola T70's. Finally I didn't have a Porsche 934 but they just filled me with visions of top heavy cars over powered with an NC5 motor tottering around the track.

NASCAR started with a surprise, I came second but only because everyone else came off. Generally I only made up the points in this class by staying on and this way amassed 20 points out of 36. Another club member Jim also ran a Scalextric car for three races but didn't have much success with it either. For the Mosler class 3 NSR's were pitted against 4 Ninco's. Generally the NSR's were absolutely rubbish and the Ninco's were dominant, the only exception being Peter's NSR Mosler which was quick and very smooth. My car seemed slow and lacking completely in any grip in the rear tyres. In the last two races the car seemed to gain some speed but 9 points out of 36 tells its own story. So would it get any better for my Fly Classic. Yes, I won the first race but again four others fell off within two corners. Get the wins when you can I say! Actually this class wasn't too bad for me as I got another win and some good places. My Porsche had good acceleration but seemed slightly down on top speed but that seemed to get better during the night. Jim's Ferrari 512 and Tony's Lola T70 were the class leaders though. I don't know my point score in this class because I had lost interest somewhat. Well what to expect with the Ninco Porsche 934. Again a surprise as they seemed quite drivable and I enjoyed some good racing with it. Ruebens seemed to have the fast one though.

The next round is in two weeks time and I intend to change the liveries on at least two of my cars. I might even try to improve their performance .

This started life as one of the Fly special anniversary models in two tone blue with a central stripe if memory serves me right. I should remember but it must be an age thing . Anyway Ruebens is THE young one at our club which is not hard considering everyone else is over 40 at least. He asked me to re-paint the car in black which I was happy to do thinking it would be an easy job. Having stripped the car down and cleaned it up it was a straight forward job to spray it black. Easy you would think but when it was hard dry the finish was a bit disappointing. No orange peel or runs but just a bit disappointing. Well you can't win them all.


As you can see there isn't a Ferrari badge on the bonnet as my home made ones aren't good enough to go over a black finish.

I finally finished my "Eterna Watches" NSR Mosler today and I have to say that the actual slot car is really quite a nice model. It certainly does seem to be a "competition bred" race car with some very finely made components. The bodyshell with all its ancillaries just click together, which is rather reminiscent of a Tamiya kit. I was originally going to buy the DMC Eterna decals from Pendles but they are currently out of stock so I decided to make my own. I still have the problem when I make my own decals of spacing everything out too much and having printed them off, deciding I should have made even more generic type fillers. I'm still learning. To be honest I'm delighted how the yellow paintwork Eterna decals suit the car. Well in my eyes anyway.




The car gets to race this Thursday in the "Any Mosler" class and as I've previously mentioned Mr.M (Jim) seems to have a very fast stock Ninco Mosler and whats more he knows how to race it! I like to think I can win races with my car but if nothing else I reckon I will have the best looking car on the grid.

Well, despite being visited by my sister and brother in law I managed to record and subsequently watch the whole six hours of the first round of the Le Mans Series (LMS) from Monza on MOTORS TV. At one stage they wanted to see what was happening in the Formula One race from Bahrein and I managed to jump in at an advert break to see that Lewis Hamilton was in second place behind Massa and that it was set to stay that way. So only a brief interlude in my LMS recording. Just as well as it was a historic win for Peugeot with their new diesel LMP1 coupe. Mind you they didn't have it all their own way with the Pescarolo team managing a second place. The team that I support, Rollcentre Racing did pretty well. They had to start from the pit lane but at one stage were up to third place. Unfortunately, in the last fifteen laps, they had a suspension problem which meant they needed an extra pitstop to tighten up a bolt. This dropped them down to seventh overall. LMP2 was almost a typical last man standing race which saw the Horag racing Lola take the win. The Alphands Corvette team took first and third in the GT1 class and Ferrari 430's swept the GT2 class.
The start of the Monza 1000kms race
The second place Pescarolo car
A good run for the Rollcentre Racing car albeit only 7th in the end
The GT1 class winning car of Luc Alphonds
I really enjoyed the watching the whole six hours. There was some terrific racing with 46 cars taking the start and some fraught overtaking going on. The next round is in Valencia in three weeks time. Don't forget that MOTORS TV are showing the entire six hours live.

If you have ever been to a real motor race you would no doubt have seen the signs which say "Motor racing is dangerous" dotted around the circuit. Well, the Le Mans Series (LMS) race at Monza provided a dramatic example of how dangerous motor racing can be. The Alphand Aventures Team had a scary moment during practise when they had a problem with the refueling rig which seemingly split whilst they were refueling the No 73 Corvette. A large and frightening fire ensued but was soon put out by the Monza fire crew and supporting race teams.


Two of the crew were hurt, one of them suffering 35% burns but the team took a joint decision to repair and run the car in the race. They were rewarded with a first and third place in the GT1 class. All we need now is news that the team members are on the mend as well.

One of the forthcoming classes at the Bolwextric Club is for the Mosler. The reason this was chosen is because one of the club members has bought about half a dozen NSR Moslers and was keen to run it! The club rules state that there has to be other slot versions of the car available and the alternative is of course the Ninco version. Well I have to say that after all the rave reviews on just about all and any slot related site it seemed only sensible to opt for the NSR version. But I didn't want to buy an existing race car I wanted to make my own one up so it was the plain white version I was after. Sod's law then came into play as all the white cars on the UK sites were sold out at the time I was after one and there didn't seem to be much prospect of a re-stock before I needed one. One of the club members suggested I tried Crazy4Slot in Italy, which I duly did, discovered they had the white one in stock, registered and bought one. Well it arrived today and to be honest I was really excited at obtaining a race bred slot car from Italy which was also the most expensive slot car I've bought to date! It certainly looks the part and I have high hopes for it.


Within hours I had cleaned the bodyshell up, primed it and spray painted it yellow because it is either going to be in the colours of "Eterna Watches" or "DHL". It should stand out from the crowd.
The only concern I have is: we were running an Open GT class in the last series and in the last round, one member turned up with a stock NSR Mosler and another turned up with a stock Ninco Mosler. Well, to cut a long story short the stock Ninco Mosler beat the NSR Molser and all the Fly Racer Porsche 911 GT1/98's seemingly with ease . Oh well.

Its one of those weekends in the motor racing calendar when everything seems to be on. You've got a choice of Formula One from Bahrain, Le Mans Series from Monza, American Le Mans Series and Champ Cars on a double header from Long Beach, GP2 from Bahrain and World Superbikes from Valencia. Whats more its all on TV here in the UK.

So what am I going to watch. Well I've been telling my girls that I'm going to record the Le Mans Series for some time now and I can't go back on that which means I'm going to miss the live broadcast of the Formula One and possibly Lewis Hamilton's first victory.
Le Mans Series, a "must watch" for me, its great
I have a similar problem with the Champ Cars and GP2 later in the evening although a bigger problem is that one of my girls wants to watch a new series on BBC1 which starts at 9pm and runs for an hour. The American Le Mans Series is OK as its a delayed transmission starting at midnight but will mean I won't get the Formula One highlights either. I'm resigned to catching a repeat of the World Superbikes sometime during the week. A possible bigger fly in the ointment is the fact that my sister and hubby are visiting for the weekend and are only likely to want to watch the Formula One if anything.

It never used to be like this as you never used to get anything except Formula One. Now I'm spoilt for choice.

Well done Lewis Hamilton, his second race and second place this time. Is it too much to ask that he can carry on the sequence and secure a win in his third race? I think his results are a combination of several things. Firstly, he has been consistently racing over the last few years and winning races as well. Perhaps more importantly he has also been winning important championships, securing the Euroseries F3 Championship in 2005 and then the GP2 Championship in 2006. This gives him the edge over other racing drivers who are either trundling around at the back of the field or have only had a testing contract for the last few years. He has also profited with joining McLaren as they come back with a proper competitive car. It will be interesting to see what happens should Alonso retire from a race that Hamilton does well in. Will the team's support start to swing the other way?

Malaysian Grand Prix, Sepang, unofficial result (56 laps)

1. ALONSO Mclaren 56 laps
2. HAMILTON McLaren +17.5s
3. RAIKKONEN Ferrari +18.3s
4. HEIDFELD BMW +33.7s
5. MASSA Ferrari +36.7s
6. FISICHELLA Renault +1m05.6s
7. TRULLI Toyota +1m10.1s
8. KOVALAINEN Renault +1m12.0s