In case anyone is interested, here is a fairly brief report on my first hillclimb event last weekend.

I picked up the car from the rolling road on Friday evening; as I mentioned in a previous mail it was producing 132bhp at the wheels; concensus says this relates to 165bhp at the crank, about right for a standard motor on K&Ns and tubular manifolds.

I got the car home and fitted the last two "features"; an oil catch tank, simply an old 1 litre paint stripper tin strapped to the battery tray support with the rocker breather going into it to prevent oil spillage on the track, and a new seatbelt mounting more central behind the seat. This went into the fuel filler mounting turret, with reinforcement plates and a Nyloc nut to hold it tight.

After a late night Friday (party!) I was up at 6.30 to get to the hill on time to sign on at 8.30. I loaded up evrything I could think of - trolley jack, drills, toolboxes, socket sets..... and set off in convoy with John, my "mechanic" (receiver of free ticket) in his minibus. On the back road towards Cheltenham every bump produced a worrying scrape from the O/S/R wheel - the new 205 section tyre was rubbing on the arch. After transferring the kit into John's car all seemed OK.

[Do I relieve the lip of the arch or go back to standard height springs? - opinions please!]

At Precscott we found our place in the paddock, unloaded everything, and met the competition. There were 13 TRs there, 6 of which were 7's. 3 tuned roadgoing V8 cars including me, a fully modified Sprint, and 2 fully modded V8s. I was up against another novice and a guy who had raced the sprint last year - his dad was in it this season.

After scrutineering - they didn't like my battery strap - I guess it isn't standard, and allows the battery to rock a bit - we got to first practice. This was delayed after a tragic accident in which a goreous 1913 racer, with long brass steering column and wicker and leather seats came off at the semicircle, a long, blind 180 bend over a crest and buried itself in the hedge. Driver broke some ribs and I think punctured a lung, and the car was bent but not entirely wrecked.

Eventually our turn came, and I managed a fairly convincing wheelspin in the tyre warming area (!) followed by 63 seconds of panic as I discovered how my car, which I have never got to unstick on the road, oversteered, slid and skidded up the hill. Round Orchard, the first long tightening left hander, slow into Ettore's, the very tight hairpin, pull 6500 in third (oops!) up to Pardon, a steep left hand hairpin, along the top "straight", through the Esses completely over the limit, sliding and skidding everywhere, and then my turn at the semicircle - car sideways, I'm going over the edge too.... hang on while the car scrubs off some speed.... I made it!

I made within 0.2s of the other novice, a good start. The more experienced guy in our class, Dale Pearce, made 5s better time, about a 58.

Second practice, the others improved about a second, I did a 2.5 second run - I only made about 20 yards beffore the fuse on the fuel pump went! As Damon says, that's racing!

Sunday morning dawned bright and sunny, so after locating the source of my problem - the DPO connected the electric fans direct (no relay!) to the same fusebox terminal as the fuel pump! Disconnected one fan, put in a bigger (25 A) fuse just for the day, dropped tyre pressures 3psi to try to get some grip, and we're ready. First run delayed again, this time by a Ferrari failing to negotiate the Esses and stuffing his suspension up under the wheelarch (expensive!), necessitating the course Land Rover to drag him out.

I tool my first competitive run as a practice, holding lower gears and trying to get a smooth line. The control was much better, but I overdid the gentle approach and it went out to a 67s run. Ugh! Not exactly competitive. However, the car was running fine, and so I resolved to really go for it on the second run.

Much quicker overall, holding third rather than second throught the twisty bits and using the torque made the car far more controllable, and it came down to a 62.8 - hardly record breaking but a more reasonable time. 2s behind Fred, the other novice, but I'll get him next time! Looking at a video afterwards, my braking was far too early, so I'm looking for some high tensile steel nerves to replace the rather frayed ones I'm using now!

In the fully modified class Larry Jeram-Croft set a new class record of 50.99s in his 4.2litre, 350ish bhp slick-shod monster - the swine! Deserves SERIOUS respect!

To add insult to injury I didn't connect the other fan for the trip home and it spewed coolant everywhere about 5 miles from the circuit - luckily a friendly local gave us some water, I hooked the fan back up and away we went.

This weekend I will be wiring a new switch, a relay and using the spare fusebox connection (aircon feed) - my problems will be solved at least in that department!

Ian Ellison 77 TR7V8 hillclimber (it really is now!)