Spa Francorchamps, the formidable 4.2 mile alpine track set in the beautiful ardennes region of Belgium played host to the 5th round of the Britcar Championship at the weekend. Where Jensen Lunn and Sarah Bennett-Baggs contested their Adrian Flux sponsored BMW E46, with limited testing time and just 30 minutes to qualify both drivers on a damp track. Conditions were tricky, but Jensen put in a stunning flyer of 2.41.509 qualifying the duo 13th out of 26 runners and 2nd in class.
Discovery of a cracked block after qualifying looked like the BMW might not even make the race start, but the Strata21 team rose to the challenge to strip down the engine through the night and resin fill weld the crack. With Sarah taking the start of the 100 minute race, everyone was aware that the car may or may not make it to the end.
Sarah got ahead of the pole sitting Seat of Cunningham off the line but lost places into La Source and Eau Rouge to fall back to 5th position, in the first couple of laps she was in the thick of the leading production pack, quickly pulling back places to get up into third place behind the Ginetta of Mercer & Smith.
High track temperatures, and the car losing oil, contributed to a slightly oversteering car, and a long pit stop to refill the oil and make engine checks allowed the Ginetta of Smith and Mercer to pull half a lap on the BMW.
With Jensen now in the seat, still chasing the Ginetta. It wasn't long before he reported a problems with the diff and rising engine temperatures forcing him to slow track speed and go for the finish. It was a nail biting final 30 minutes as the oil pressure continued to drop, and oil smoke starting to come from the stricken BMW. The class leaders Car 88 Clarke/ Gibson retired moving the Ginetta into P1 and the BMW into P2 but at one point the chasing Seat no. 11 of Cuningham started catching up forcing Jensen to press on to keep position. On the last lap a garbled radio message looked like all might have been lost, as Jensen reported smoke pouring from the car, but the E46 just made it to the chequered flag to take P2 resulting in a huge cheer from the pit team.
Jensens comment:"It was a great result following a tough time by the team, testing showed we had front running pace then qualifying produced a cracked block on the car, the crew worked hard to get the car fixed for the race in which we started in P2. Sarah had a fantastic drive whilst fighting a sick car, after the driver change I set about catching the lead car which our pace showed was possible within 5 laps, then the car problems returned and it was agreed with the engineers to hold for P2 and nurse the car home rather than push our luck. It was hard having to back off and I repeatedly had my engineer on the radio telling me to slow down! With one lap to go the 3rd place Seat car appeared behind me and I had no choice but to push the car to the flag, which I managed to do, the car however was dead, with 1.9psi of oil pressure remaining as I entered the last corner it doesn't get any closer than that! We are now looking forward to Castle Combe as now we are GTN Class 1 leaders."
Sarah's comment "Spa is a punishing circuit for both car and driver, we were lucky testing time was so short in the end, otherwise we never would have even made the start of the race. Once again Strata21 team did us proud and pulled it out the bag, who would have thought we could still come 2nd with a crack in the block! Once again my co-driver Jensen was a superstar did a mega job nursing it home."
This is the 3rd podium the duo have taken in successions, the next round is 23-4th July at Castle Combe.
