Noosa Hill Climb Nov 2016 – Lotus Club Queensland

Year’s end and we’re back for the Southern Cross Sheds Summer Noosa Hill Climb.

By Dick Reynolds

Jason McGarry (Caterham), Shane and Jenny Murphy (Lotus Seven S2), Jon Young (Caterham), Zaid and Gail Latiffe (Exige), Peter Quinn (Elise), Pat Richards (Elise), Peter Boel (Lotus 23B) and Rob Manning (Mitsubishi FTO) plus yours truly (Caterham) lining up once again.

Jason arrived very early and set up our pits in a great location, out under the eucalypts. The Elise guys domiciled ‘around the corner’ and Peter nestled in with the race cars out front. The usual teething problems with any big event occurred. But mostly, we had to endure delays through accidents on the track. Unfortunately, this prevailed for most of the weekend.

With 160 or so entries there were lots of cars and no shortage of competitive spirit. Declared a “fast” track, the competitive spirit, quick cars and over-enthusiastic driving meant quite a few offs resulting in some severe car damage. Thankfully, little in the way of injury. The guys running the event performed admirably to ensure we still carried on – well – admirably! The first run is a so-called sighting run. Check out the track, sort the car and generally get into a bit of a groove.

First competitive run:		Final quickest times:
Dick Reynolds	64.41	Peter Boel	63.62
Jason McGarry	65.96	Dick Reynolds	64.41
Zaid Latiff	66.40	Zaid Latiff	65.88
Peter Boel	66.45	Jason McGarry	65.96
Jon Young	68.47	Jon Young	67.47
Peter Quinn	68.76	Peter Quinn	68.17
Pat Richards	69.25	Pat Richards	68.67
Shane Murphy	69.47	Rob Manning	69.44
Rob Manning	72.73	Shane Murphy	69.47

The weekend progressed with all the usual shenanigans – what happens on the track stays on the track! The only mechanical failure was Rob having a front-end collapse in the FTO. No offs that I am aware of.