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Mad Ax

Mad Ax's Crazy Tamiya Junkies / Iconic Cup Epic Road Trip Adventure Review

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Wasn't really sure where best to put this, so I'm going with here :)

It's no secret that my first away-event of the belated 2021 season was a combined visit to Tamiya Junkies at Robin Hood Raceway, then round 1 of the Iconic Cup at Carlisle Model Car Club.  Both are a long drive for me so it was great to be able to join these into a single epic road trip to kick off the racing season.  What follows is a word-heavy and pic-light review of the journey, the trials, the tribulations, and the lessons learned in what I will always remember as one of the best road trips and one of the most challenging weekends of my RC career.

While the story really began over a week ago with almost an entire weekend spent checking, fixing and boxing my off-road runners, I'll start this one on Friday when I set off.  Packing was the first major challenge to overcome - I had around 20 runners for the Junkies meet, 2 cars for the cup plus 2 spare cars, a drive-away awning, pit tables, chemi-khazi, spares, tools, overnight bag and enough food and drink to last the entire weekend.

Boxing up full-size monster trucks is always a challenge

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iconic cup race cars and buggies for junkies

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and the monster trucks

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I needed to get creative with packing to get all my food in

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to be continued...

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Back of the van fully loaded

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I had to remove the passenger seat to get the rest in

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It was around 14:45 when I set off from West Wilts, heading north on the A420 through the drizzly Cotswold countryside, battling Bank Holiday traffic all the way.  Google's estimated travel time continued to go up with every mile and after a few hours on the road I started to wonder if the motorway route might have been better after all - it's a longer journey and much more boring but it does tend to flow better.  Still, I like the countryside route, I like being able to stop when I want to stop and not when an exit comes up, I like passing through attractive little Cotswold towns and wondering how nice it might be to visit them for a day or two if ever I stop going on RC events and start going away with my family.  However, as I approached Warwick, the satnav told me it could save a few minutes by putting me on the motorway, and having already had my fill of A-roads and roundabouts, I called time in my cross-country effort and diverted onto the multi-lane highway.

Which in short order turned into a car park.  The satnav still insisted it was quicker to sit in stationary traffic, but the only way to keep time was to go onto the M6 Toll, which added an extra £6.90 to my already sky-high travel costs.  The toll road was indeed quiet, almost empty, and delivered me onto a good dual carriageway that took me almost all the way to my overnight stop in Ripley, Derbyshire.

Had I left home earlier, or not got stuck in traffic, I might have had a couple of hours to kill wandering the Derbyshire Dales, but it was gone 7pm when I got to my hotel room and I was ready for dinner.  Having a camper is a good way to save money, but as you can see from the photos above, cooking in the van just isn't possible unless I fully unload, and I didn't really fancy doing that in the hotel car park.  In fact I had planned to eat in the hotel restaurant, but a week before departure they informed me it was closed for refurbishment.  I drove into town and found a nice fish restaurant that had recently re-opened.  Normally when I go away I like to find a nice quiet bar (the hotel restaurant is perfect for this) so I can drink some beers and work on my novel without being stuck in a lonely hotel room, but the restaurant closed at 9pm and I had to drive back to the hotel, so I had a short writing session and a quick solitary beer before heading back to the hotel.  I grabbed some cold beers from the van fridge to carry on writing, but in the end I was too tired from all the driving, so they stayed unopened and I got an early night.

Up bright and early on Saturday morning, a bit more writing and a good shower (essential when you plan to spend two days in a field), a quick jaunt into Ripley centre to get a breakfast bap - I would have preferred the hotel breakfast buffet!! - and then back on the motorway for a clear and quiet run to Robin Hood Raceway.

to be continued...

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Friday's drizzle had given way to bright skies with scattered clouds.  The UK had its first hint of summer weather this week - I know moaning about the weather is a British pastime, but it really has been a long winter and I still had the central heating on in the house and an extra blanket on the bed until a few days ago.  So it was nice to have a break from the wind, rain and cold for the start of the day - in fact rain would have made a weekend with this many cars a real challenge.

My first mistake (although I didn't realise it until a bit later) was parking too far away.  I should have got closer to the track - it wasn't exactly far, but in the heat and with so many cars to run, the constant trudge back and forth got tiresome.  I should know better but actually I've never been to RHR in dry weather before, so I normally just unbox everything into the barn and play on the indoor track all day with bear-minimal walking to do.

Anyway, I wanted my Junkies event to be as much a showcase of what I've been working on as a chance to run it on track, so I got everything unboxed and on display

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I'm pretty sure I had the biggest collection on the site that day :o 

I took a few quick snaps of the area and some cars, but I put the camera away to focus on some much-desired track running

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I got the time to run most cars - not everything, actually I knew from the outset that running everything would be a challenge - but at least everything that I wanted to run.  I won't do full in-depth reviews of all the runs here - check the project threads later as I unbox the cars, inspect the damage and remember what I learned - but I at least ran the Manta Force wet-weather car, which was absolutely horrible to drive (at least in the dry) and needs loads more setup and some parts replacing as they failed early in the day, and the recently-upgraded Blitzer Storm, which had plenty of traction but still lifts the front even with a bunch of weights over the nose and feels too soft in the back end.  A shorter, stiffer spring in the back is my next step for that car.  Also the tyres kept coming unglued despite the amount of mess I made gluing them last week.

Otherwise it was great to catch up with old friends (including one who I didn't even recognise until he took his mask off at the end of the day), I watched Jamie Booth and Lee Broadhurst having some fairly epic battles with their Revival cars (I did my best to stay out of their way when I was running my comedy cars), and even in shorts and T-shirt (first time in shorts in 2021, possibly even first time outside without long sleeves on!) I still managed to get seriously hot and sticky.  According to the weather app it was only 21*C, but it felt a lot warmer, and was pretty humid.

I started packing up around 3:30, ran a couple more cars, then headed off before 5pm, stopping at the nearest services for a quick shower (they now have private booths so it's not the sweaty trucker shower scramble it used to be) before the long drive north-west to Carlisle.

to be continued...

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Sounds like this was nothing short of a perfect weekend, great review and thanks for sharing! Took me a lot to be able to see the pictures but it was well worth the wait. I don't know what's best, really... the road trip, the beautiful British countryside, the van fridge beers... or doing it all for a vintage rc revival cup?? WOW!  Well done buddy!

I so wish there was something like this around here, vintage/iconic car oriented mild racing where I could participate and run my cars... I would dart to such event in a heartbeat! Unfortunately as far as I know they only race soulless, modern nitro buggies in my area, although I did look up a couple awesome tracks that I'm planning to visit in the near future. I don't expect to see anything iconic though...

Anyway, thanks for posting and looking forward to reading more about your epic weekend!

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That's quite the trip with that many RC vehicles. I had to take 3 short trips to load and offload my 2 RC cars most recently to run them. You doing that with 10x more vehicles is quite the chore.

You do know the food and drinks need to be packed with a lunch box... I'm considering a similar storage method for the upcoming kits that will be my runners. It's going to be 3-4 containers to store them but I have yet to see what box size is needed.

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Glad you enjoyed Junkies @Mad Ax. Was nice to catch up, albeit briefly. Saw a couple of your trucks on trqck looking great, but it was a shame we didn't get to run together much. Looking forward to hearing about Carlisle. The Broxtowe boys found it pretty tough. 

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2 hours ago, isomer1 said:

Is that a WR-02 monster-mini cooper? :wub:

That's my Wild Mini.  WR-02C with WW2 rear wheels fitted at both ends.  Actually didn't get a chance to run that one.  Back in the Before Times, we would often have a grid of 30+ wheelie cars running during the lunchbreak of Iconic events, usually on a last-car-running-wins basis, it was one of the few events I could place well in because with Torque Tuned and a 4000mAh LiPo it runs for longer than anyone with hotter motors or older NiMHs and it's never broken on track.  Well, I lie, usually 15 minutes in it loses a step screw from the front upper arm but it can drive just as well without it.

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Thanks for documenting @Mad Ax. I managed to grab a small beer and a quiet moment to have a read! It sound like it was worth it, looking forward to the next instalment (and the build log updates!). Thanks again!

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It was nearly 5pm when I left Blythe Services on the A1M and set off northbound.  The weather was still good if a little cloudy, the air was warm and traffic was light.  From Blythe to Leeds the A1M is just another motorway (albeit one with a silly name - it is the rock star's daughter of motorways) but north of Leeds it becomes more scenic.  Just after 6pm I joined the A66, a modern road across an ancient landscape, with the Yorkshire Dales to the south and the North Pennines to the north, both of which can be seen from the road.  The clouds thickened as I climbed over Stainmore Summit and it started to rain as I descended the other side, but it didn't detract from the views, and for a moment I wondered if I would have a better time if I'd left the toy cars at home and just gone on a sightseeing trip instead.  This is a beautiful part of the country and one I must make a point of visiting properly in the future.

Down into Penrith, a short run up the M6, and I arrived at Carlisle Model Car Club just before 7:30 to find one remaining camping spot left to park my van and set out the awning.

to be continued...

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Sounds a great weekend @Mad Ax!

Your organisational skills are better than mine, I normally end up with cars poking out between headrests! 😳

 

 

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Great write up of a busy weekend @Mad Ax. I'm glad you posted photos of the Junkies event as I didn't get chance to take any.

We spoke briefly :ph34r: at the Junkies meet while we were both running our (very different) Clods, and I enjoyed watching you run your Sand Scorcher on the Astro track later in the day.  Looking forward to the next instalment.......

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I only managed a couple of laps with the scorcher - it was impossible to corner without spinning. I didn't help myself by running the buggy champ tyres, I had some hornet tyres which would have been better but I just couldn't be bothered to out them on :p 

 

Next time I will bring less cars and spend more time running them. Maybe if there's another before the revival I will get in some proper tracktime with the manta force and blitzer beetle as neither were much fun to hustle around.

Was fun blatting our clods around together and good to meet you @Ministrone

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20 minutes after arriving, the inflatable awning was up and my hard work was done for the day.  It was time to put on some dinner and relax.

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We complain a lot about the weather in Britain, but when it's good, there's no place better.  I'm sure of that.

And everybody likes a good view with their meal.

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After that I went a-wandering across the campsite and found some other campers under an awning.  Some of them I knew from one of my local clubs - it was nice to hear some familiar accents, have a good conversation and listen to the stories of some people who have been racing at national level for a long time.

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Finally off to bed before 11pm - all-in-all a pretty well-behaved night, these tarmac racers are a different breed to the hard-drinking hard-partying sand-covered astro-dogs who stay up until 3am on Revival weekend.

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I was up bright and early on Sunday morning to pack out my pit tables and cars.  The track was quite a trek from the parking area - one lesson for next year: bring a pit awning and relocate everything trackside first thing.  I must have walked a few miles to the track and back, and it was hard to hear the announcements from my table so there was the constant stress of potentially missing a race.

I was placed in heat 1 for the FF, so I was one of the first on track that day.  I went with the FF01 (I prefer it to the 02, it feels more complete and less of a parts-bin compromise), wearing 28s up front and 24s rear and otherwise left the car alone - it had handled reasonably well at West London last summer so I didn't feel the need to change it.  Out on track it handled well once it had a lap in to heat the rear tyres, but as the skies were perfectly clear and it was already starting to warm up, I figured I'd want hotter tyres as the day wore on.

I was in heat 6 for M-chassis with my old M03 wearing its Civic body.  I hadn't intended to enter M-chassis - I'd thought I was entering as a reserve class but I misunderstood the entry form and got entered anyway.  When I realised how much walking I'd have to do and how busy the day was going to be I almost pulled out, but the trusty old M03 was so good in practice on a nearly-new set of Sweep 25s, I opted to stay in class and enjoy the tracktime.

For the first round, Adie from Racecraft R/C recommended I try my frontie control tyres on the FF01.  Sure enough it handled OK with them, but I felt it had more to give, and after racing the scrutineer said they weren't the right tyre for this track and I'd be better with slicks, so I went back to the pit shop and got myself a pack of Contact 34s.  34 front and 28 rear would be the order of the day for the FF class.

I was surprised to find I was doing so much better in M-chassis.  I had some real good heats with the M03 and really enjoyed the racing, even the dreaded grip-roll didn't rear its head until mid-morning when the track got really hot.  I didn't want to mark my pristine tyres, so I pulled a much older pair off the spare car and put a ring of superglue around the sidewall and around a quarter of the contact surface and fitted them to the front.  During my carpet days that was a treatment done maybe once per season, but on hot tarmac it's something I'd do after every race :o  in fact I could feel the point where the glue wore off completely, in the final minute of the session when I suddenly had to change my driving style to keep the car from going over.

If I'd found a rhythm with the M03 then I hadn't with the FF01.  To be honest, I wasn't really enjoying it.  I just couldn't find any pace.  I've never been a particularly fast racer, I don't do it often enough or consistently enough and I think there's some fundamental technique that I've yet to discover, but usually I can find some kind of rhythm on track and at least get a few laps together.  Even with 34s up front I had to watch for grip roll, although the rear end was very planted.  My method for avoiding grip roll is to break early for the corners and let the car settle before turning in - it's something I've heard much faster drivers talk about and it worked for me, but meant I was slower into the corners than the other drivers and I couldn't get that pace back with a faster exit.  Also being wary of the front end means I distrust my steering wheel, and sometimes drive myself right off track because I just don't give enough input.  Grip roll has got to be my nemesis - maybe I should switch to F1..?

And the weather was hot.  I know, it's a British cliché to complain all winter about the weather and then when the sun comes out, complain it's too hot.  According to the weather forecast it was about 22*C, which is about right for the time of year and not exactly hot by most standards, but after such a long cold spell if felt more like 30, and I spent most of the day trying to find some shade.  I could get under my awning in the pits, but then I had no airflow so it was baking.  The only trees were above the rostrum.  Otherwise, it was beaming sunshine all day.  And because last summer feels so long ago, I'd completely forgotten about this thing call sun screen.  Typically I don't wear it anyway - if you go far enough back I'm of Portugese descent and my family has retained the kind of skin that just goes brown when the sun comes out, so generally I only wear it if I'm on holiday.  I never burn in the UK.  But, then again, I'm generally sensible and don't spend too long out in the sun if I can help it.  This weekend I couldn't help it.

At least I had a bandana to cover my ears and neck, but I finished the day with a mask-tan (lilly white mouth and strap-lines across my burnt cheeks) and arms as red as a strawberry cheesecake.

In round 3, my FF01 cut out before the end of the heat.  I thought the 1060 ESC had overheated, but it wasn't actually that hot to touch.  The motor was, but not the ESC. I could swap in the ESC out of the spare car to see if that would help, but first I had another round to do with the M03.

With a car in heat 1, a car in heat 6, and 11 heats in total, and a trudge in the heat between each one, there wasn't really and long sensible time to do and proper work on the cars.  So for round 4 I decided I'd take the FF02 out instead.  At West London last year it was just as quick as the FF01, and there were plenty of 02s beating me at Carlisle, so it must be possible to go fast with it.

Well, maybe, but not with my setup.  It was awful.  The merest sniff of steering and it would flip over.  If it didn't do that, the back would step out.  Or it would understeer.  So little consistency, it was painful to drive.  I had a truly horrible session, then ran back to the pits for the M03.

That went well enough, but just as the round was ending, it cut out.  Again the ESC (an Etronix Probe WP this time) wasn't really hot, but the motor didn't want to go.  I stopped in the pit shop and handed over more money for a small fan.

Back in the pits, I swapped the ESC out of the FF02 into the FF01, I used zipties to attach the fan to the FF01's ESC and quickly soldered up an adaptor to fit both the fan and the power cap at the same time (I run ORX receivers which are notorious for browning out and switching off when used with hi-power servos).  Back on track for my final, all I wanted was to get in a good, clean race, avoid trouble and cross the line.  I didn't even care where I came.  I'd qualified last in the slowest final - after all these years of part-time racing you'd think I can do better than that - so any places gained were a bonus.  My start wasn't too bad, but then I had an epic crash coming onto the back straight.  I'm not sure if I turned in too early and clipped the kerb (Carlisle's kerbs are vicious) or if the car broke.  It rolled, flipped up into the air, cartwheeled half-way down the straight, shedding parts as it went.  I thought it was still driveable, but I pulled into the pits half a lap later because something wasn't right on the rear end.  The rear shock tower had broken.  Not sure if that caused the crash or was caused by it.  Either way, a disappointing end to a hard day.

Still - at least I had the M03.  I put switched it on, complete with cooling fan, and pulled the throttle.  Nothing.  Dead.  It had been OK in the pits, but now trackside, nothing.  The lights on the ESC were normal, indicating full forward and full brake, but the motor wasn't moving.  Even with the usual pushy-forward-backward as you'd do to free a sticky brush didn't work.  Perversely, wiggling the gold motor terminals that I'd soldered onto both cars just a week ago did the trick.  Car on its spot, up onto podium, drive to the grid...  Nope, dead again.  Back down, another wiggle, off we go.  Onto the grid.  The mid-track marshal's post was right in front of my car, but that doesn't matter - you go straight off the start, right?

Countdown, go!

Full throttle, my M03 appeared from behind the marshal tracking a perfect line to the first corner.  Except the car in the spot ahead of mine was stalled.  I'm not sure if I'd have seen it sooner if the marshal hadn't been in the way, but I had to take late evasive action.  The hard turn unsettled the car and put it in the grass.  Dang - all that hard quali work wasted on the start line.  Never mind, now it's a race for fun - no pressure, it can only get better from here.

Or, alternatively, the motor could cut out on lap three, just as I've made up some places.  This time, no amount of marshal fiddling would get it going again.  It dead.

And so ended round 1 of the Iconic Cup.

In my favour, this year (due to smaller grids due to social distancing) the championship points are being counted from quali times, not finals, so if I cared about my championship position then I haven't really lost out, but it was pretty tough to work hard all day in the heat and have both cars fail, especially since my FF quali had been compromised by the same electrical gremlin that had ruined my M-chassis final.

So my next proper workshop day needs to focus on these cars and work out what's going on.  There are two common denominators: the motors (Team Powers Cup Racer V3 - the control motor) and the gold-plated plugs.

Possibly the plugs are badly made.  They're from a bulk pack I got from China.  I'll have to check that.

Or possibly the motors are faulty.  The V3 motor was new for last year, but due to the pandemic we were allowed to run the older V1 and V2 motors at the one-day showdown at West London, so I only bought one, which went in the FF02.  This year I didn't want to mess around changing motors if I decided to switch cars, so I bought two new V3s, one for the M03 and one for the FF01.  Both ordered and delivered together and fitted same day.  So is it possible there's a bad batch of motors?  I'll have to put the cars on stands and check.  Of course, being an intermittent (and possibly heat-related) gremlin, it's possible it won't rear its head again until I'm pushing hard on track, which might not be until the next Iconic Cup round.  Perhaps I can justify membership at Cotswold just so I can have an extended test session to try to force a failure...

to be continued...

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Wow that certainly looked like you had a great time although a lot of travelling in a short time span, but after 2 lock downs was worth the effort to get back to some sort of normality. At my age 67 and just retired I don’t think I could drive that far in that time frame so a big thumbs up to you and it sure looked like fun.

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I didn't take any photos of the racing, being too busy trudging back and forth from track to van and back again, but here's a few taken by series organiser John Weston, taken from the Iconic group on Facebook.

My cars are the white and red Isol-8 Accord (FF01), white and blue Isol-8 Accord (FF02) and Frog Civic (M03):

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Frontie class wheels look so much better than stupid discs.  Who ever thought discs were a good idea?

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My original plan had been to camp over at the Carlisle track on Sunday night and make a lazy way home during Bank Holiday Monday, but for various reasons I decided not to.  First, some of the Bristol contingent said it was going to be a long enough drive without Bank Holiday traffic, and if I didn't get out of the North before mid-morning then I was going to spend the whole of the day in traffic.  According to Google Maps, it's a 5 hour run from Carlisle to my home assuming no traffic but that could have a few extra hours added on once I've hit the bank holiday tailbacks and found somewhere to get some lunch on the way.

Second - nobody else was camping over.  Although I'm usually happy in my own company, I'd taken the passenger seat out of the van so I didn't have anywhere comfortable to sit to work on my laptop.  Also, my plan for Sunday evening had been to drive to the coast for an hour kicking along the sand, but if there was nobody on site then I couldn't leave all my cars there, I'd have to pack everything away, then unpack again to do some cooking later on.

Third - I was sweaty and filthy after a day's running back and forth in the beaming sunshine, my arms and face were sore with sunburn, and there were no showers on the Carlisle sight (actually there were, the toilets are in the same block as the local sports field's changing rooms, but there were cordons across the showers which meant they were out of action.  In normal times I might have snuck in later when everyone had gone, but given the pandemic and everybody's preoccupation with sanitising everything, I figured it would only end in tears (or, indeed, tiers)).

However - to drive home direct from Carlisle would have got me home sometime after midnight, after a long weekend's racing and heat, with the potential for exhaustion to strike half-way home and leave me with no choice but to try to sleep in a layby somewhere and continue, sweaty and stinking and hungry, the next morning, and lose most of the Bank Holiday Monday to feeling tired.

So as soon as the racing was done I got out my chopping board and started prepping the onions and sausages for my plainly awesome camping stew, which I pie-munched down in between packing away my boxes, then did a search online for hotels on my homeward route, and booked myself into a Travelodge on the M6 near Stafford.  That gave me plenty of time to enjoy the journey down, the benefit of a proper bed and a good shower, and a decent table from which I could do some writing before bed and again before I left the next morning.  Stafford is a fairly easy run from my place (I sometimes race at Stafford on a Sunday, I leave home around 5:30am, have a good days racing, and am home by teatime) so I wouldn't have to worry too much about the drive home.

I noticed another little mistake when the booking came through: M6 Northbound.  A closer look at the map showed that the Stafford services on the M6 are actually two distinct locations - one southbound, one northbound, and operated by different franchises.  The southbound carriageway is served by Days In, the northbound my Travelodge.  So I couldn't even transfer my booking.  Oh well, it would add another 20 miles total to my journey but as it would be motorway miles it wouldn't be too bad.  This thought would come back to haunt me later.

It was nearly 7pm when I got away from Carslisle with the satnav set for Pooley Bridge on Ullswater.

to be continued...

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1 hour ago, Mad Ax said:

My original plan had been to camp over at the Carlisle track on Sunday night and make a lazy way home during Bank Holiday Monday, but for various reasons I decided not to.  First, some of the Bristol contingent said it was going to be a long enough drive without Bank Holiday traffic, and if I didn't get out of the North before mid-morning then I was going to spend the whole of the day in traffic.  According to Google Maps, it's a 5 hour run from Carlisle to my home assuming no traffic but that could have a few extra hours added on once I've hit the bank holiday tailbacks and found somewhere to get some lunch on the way.

Second - nobody else was camping over.  Although I'm usually happy in my own company, I'd taken the passenger seat out of the van so I didn't have anywhere comfortable to sit to work on my laptop.  Also, my plan for Sunday evening had been to drive to the coast for an hour kicking along the sand, but if there was nobody on site then I couldn't leave all my cars there, I'd have to pack everything away, then unpack again to do some cooking later on.

Third - I was sweaty and filthy after a day's running back and forth in the beaming sunshine, my arms and face were sore with sunburn, and there were no showers on the Carlisle sight (actually there were, the toilets are in the same block as the local sports field's changing rooms, but there were cordons across the showers which meant they were out of action.  In normal times I might have snuck in later when everyone had gone, but given the pandemic and everybody's preoccupation with sanitising everything, I figured it would only end in tears (or, indeed, tiers)).

However - to drive home direct from Carlisle would have got me home sometime after midnight, after a long weekend's racing and heat, with the potential for exhaustion to strike half-way home and leave me with no choice but to try to sleep in a layby somewhere and continue, sweaty and stinking and hungry, the next morning, and lose most of the Bank Holiday Monday to feeling tired.

So as soon as the racing was done I got out my chopping board and started prepping the onions and sausages for my plainly awesome camping stew, which I pie-munched down in between packing away my boxes, then did a search online for hotels on my homeward route, and booked myself into a Travelodge on the M6 near Stafford.  That gave me plenty of time to enjoy the journey down, the benefit of a proper bed and a good shower, and a decent table from which I could do some writing before bed and again before I left the next morning.  Stafford is a fairly easy run from my place (I sometimes race at Stafford on a Sunday, I leave home around 5:30am, have a good days racing, and am home by teatime) so I wouldn't have to worry too much about the drive home.

I noticed another little mistake when the booking came through: M6 Northbound.  A closer look at the map showed that the Stafford services on the M6 are actually two distinct locations - one southbound, one northbound, and operated by different franchises.  The southbound carriageway is served by Days In, the northbound my Travelodge.  So I couldn't even transfer my booking.  Oh well, it would add another 20 miles total to my journey but as it would be motorway miles it wouldn't be too bad.  This thought would come back to haunt me later.

It was nearly 7pm when I got away from Carslisle with the satnav set for Pooley Bridge on Ullswater.

to be continued...

Probably not a great time tell you that you probably could have done a cheeky short cut through the staff entrance at Stafford services onto local roads :P 

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The bitter/sweet of life at the track, I think the saying is - Some days you're the dog, some days you're the lamp post! 😬😂😂

I used to travel during the night to events (drag racing events mostly), as I absolutely hate sitting still in traffic, in the heat, and much prefer to 'make progress' 🙄.....These days though, being awake for 24+ hrs is sore going, and especially if the kids are with me, I'll be needing to take more breaks.

 

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