With a a hectic season of racing almost to a close, we were back for the 750 Motor Club Birkett 6 Hour Relay Race after skipping it in 2020. The event takes place every year at the end of October on the Silverstone GP Circuit. You can read about our exploits in the race last time on 26th October 2019 HERE .
Instead of a straight race or normal endurance format, the relay element is for the driver AND car. Basically, a car and driver goes out, does their stint (which can be anything from 1 lap up to 3hrs of driving), and when they come back in the pits, a second car and driver follows them down the pitlane. The first car peels off into the paddock, and the second is out on track. This is repeated for the full 6 hours.
There is a handy video explaining the process here:

Up to 70 teams of up to six drivers and between three and six cars can enter, with the restriction being closed wheel only, and that is about it! As the 750MC website says, there can be anything from 1960’s MG Midgets to BMW M3s, Smart cars, TCR cars, Austin A30s, Caterham derivatives and modern sports cars such as Radicals and Spires. This year we decided to have 2 teams, 13 - Darkside Developments, consisting of the Golf Mk5 TDI, one of the TT Cups and Stef's Mk2 as a backup, plus 4 - Darkside SeatSport TDI, with Nick's Leon BTCC, Michael's Ibiza and Dylan's Ibiza, all with the 1.9 PD Engines.

With such a diverse range of cars, all with differing lap times, as well as the overall (scratch) positions, each car and driver submits their best lap time at Silverstone (or another track if there is no time for Silverstone) and then the organisers give each team a handicap rating. This is based on credit laps, so the slowest cars are given the most credit laps that are deemed to have been run before the race starts. This is added on to their actual laps, and give the Handicap (gross) laps. The handicap is adjusted to take into account any safety cars, and it can be adjusted where the vehicles are quicker than expected throughout the day, or slower cars are not used as much as expected.
As you can see below, the quicker cars are given less credit laps, with the ultimate goal if the handicapper does their sums right and everyone has a perfect race is that we would all finish on the same lap. Some cars and driver combos are given a limit of how many laps they can do, and in previous years others have been given a minimum. This is if a team has a car that is significantly quicker or slower than the rest of the team, and therefore skews the handicap. In 2019 we were given 25 Laps, this year the Seats were given 28 and we were given 23.

As well as the handicap race, cars are split into four classes, two for Road / Track tyres, and two for Motorsport (Slick and Wet) Tyres.

a) SALOON & SPORTS CARS (running List 1A/1B/1C tyres) up to 2000ccs
b) SALOON & SPORTS CARS (running List 1A/1B/1C tyres) over 2000ccs
c) SPORTS RACING CARS and Sports Cars/Saloons (on racing tyres) up to 2000cc, all bike engined cars up to 1000cc
d) SPORTS RACING CARS and all Sports Cars/Saloons (on racing tyres) 2000ccs & over and all bike engined cars over 1000cc.

For the purpose of allocating classes, forced induction cars will carry an engine capacity multiplier of 1.4, i.e. a 2000cc turbocharged car will be treated as 2800cc

As we were running 1.9 and 2.0 Turbo Engines and running List Tyres, we were in Class B.

Qualifying

With the ‘grid’ already determined by your teams handicap, the 20 minute qualifying session is more about getting a feel for the car and circuit rather than outright pace. MSA Regs state that a driver must have driven a minimum of 3 laps of the circuit in that vehicle during the race weekend to be able to race, so we had to get 3 laps in each car we wanted to drive.

Whilst in the race cars can go out in any order, ideally the organisers need the cars to go out in alphabetical order, so you have to make sure that cars with driver shares are not out straight after each other. The sessions are 20 minutes each, and you had to be at the assembly area on the Copse Runway 10 minutes before, so there is an overlap.

Qualifying started at 9:00 promptly!
I was straight out in the Golf, our best lap time previously on this track was a 2:24.662, but with traffic the best I could get was a 2:27.09 before the session was over, this put me 9th overall. Dylan posted a 2:33.85 in the Ibiza, against a 2:34.36 from last year, so a decent improvement in both car and driver.
Ryan was next for group B in the TT, which had never been round the GP circuit in this spec, he was 0.02s quicker, with a 2:27.07 on his 5th lap, enough for 8th in his group. Michael did a 2:34.14 vs 2:31.70 from the SuperCup earlier in the year, so he was struggling with traffic in the Ibiza as well.
In Ryan's words - How the TT was going to perform was unknown to us going into qualifying, we had earlier that week carried out an entire re-work of the cooling system with very little testing. The first lap or 2 was used to warm the tyres while creating some clean air but also keep an eye, ear and nose on the vitals. Immediately I could see the coolant temperatures were stable, down from 120c to low 90s and Oil took a lot of abuse to get over 100c, which was drastically better than the 140+ we saw at Snetterton. The Inlet air temps had dropped by 30 degrees too, which should help the misfires we were facing previously, but those still never totally went away...
I quickly jumped into the Mk2 and was there just in time to head out. It was only the 2nd time this car had been out since it's full respray and rebuild, so I took it easy, only posting a time of 2:36.63, way down in 27th! Nick is missing from the list with a transponder issue!
Group D was Ryan's turn in the Golf, and he lapped in a 2:25.42, much closer to its actual pace, putting him in 7th. Dylan and Michael decided not to qualify in each others' cars, so missed this session.
For Group E, the grid was starting to thin out, so traffic was not a problem. It was the first time I had driven the TT on track since the day we bought them and tested at Donington. It did not feel as planted as the Golf so I could not push as hard in the high speed corners, but I still posted a respectable 2:25.86, which put me 1st in the group. It was Brad's turn in the Leon and he did a 2:35.67 for 9th.
Finally it was Ryan's turn in the Mk2, and he was able to do a 2:34.96, which was closer to the expected pace of the car.

Not that the positions mattered, we were starting on row 8 of the grid, in 16th, and the Seats were on row 14 in 28th position regardless of what happened! Basically the grid is supposed to represent the speed of the teams, so the quickest start pole, and it gets slower the higher up the grid you get.

With Qualifying taking up over 2hrs, by the time the cars were all back in the garage, it was well past 11:00, and we had to be at the assembly area in the first car for 11:20. There were no issues with the Golf or TT during quali, so a quick refuel and check over, we headed over to the assembly area to wait for the grid!
The Seats had a decent test as well, and it was elected for Brad to get in the car first. We knew from the last time at the Birkett that the 80L tank in the Leon would last a fair old while, so the 90 minutes planned should be no trouble. The Golf only has a 60L Tank, and the TT 57L, so we were unsure if we would get there.

Race

Stint 1

Driver - Scott - Car -VW Golf Mk5 TDI - Planned Time - 90 minutes - Position - 16th

By 11:30 we were gridded up and waiting for the green flag. We were to do a full lap behind the safety car before it peels into the pits and racing begins! We still can’t overtake until we pass the green flag at the Start / Finish line, so the idea is to stay close until that point.
Unlike last year, the front of the pack remained pretty tight, so as we crossed the line, it was a fight to turn 1. Immediately the Lotus to my right was misfiring and dropped back. Up to 15th already!
Into Turn 1 I made up another place, then another into Maggots around the outside of a Civic. That was 13th place. Next were the E46 and 370Z out of Becketts. 11th.
Under braking at Stowe, the Orange Lotus hesitated so I made my move up into 10th, but understeered wide and lost a bit of ground.
Through Abbey I caught up with the white Civic, but could not find a route past without taking too many risks, so left it for the Loop. Onto the Wellington Straight I was up to 9th but with a big gap to the Caterham in front, who was battling himself. So 1 lap down, 7 places gained. I was pretty pleased considering all those in front are supposed to be faster teams, but with such a wide range of drivers and vehicles, it was hard to say where we should have been on pure pace.
Brad had kept it clean and was up 2 places to P26 by the end of the first lap.

Just as we crossed the line for Lap 2, the E46 had finally got into the rhythm and used it's superior straight line speed to get back ahead at Copse. I was able to stick with them as we pulled a substantial lead on the rest of the field
Brad was up to P22 so making good progress.

The rest of my session I was battling with 3 other cars for position, and by lap 4 we were already having to negotiate traffic as well. I'd got up to 8th as two of the guys pitted, but the Billy Boys Caterham was proving difficult to pass. After 52 minutes of battling, I got lucky as I passed Brad in the Leon and made a break for it in 7th position.

12:45 - 1 Hour in

13 - Darkside Developments - 7th Scratch / 18th Handicap
4 - Darkside SeatSport TDI - 20th Scratch / 32nd Handicap

With 1:07 elapsed, I started to feel a bit of fuel surge around the last corner, so got on the radio for the guys to make sure Ryan was ready in the TT. Over 20 minutes ahead of schedule, but it was not worth the risk in cutting out on track! Ryan was ready to go so I made my way into the pits for the first cross over.

Actual Stint time - 67 Minutes - Best lap time - 2:23.84 with ideal from the VBOX of 2:22.18

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Stint 2

Time - 12:52 - Driver - Ryan - Car - Audi TT TFSI - Planned Time - 90 minutes - Position - 7th

There is always a sense of calm in the garage right until the radio call comes through and you then realise you need a pee! haha. Still, I was ready to have a crack and see how long I could go for, since the TT had only ever done just over 35 minutes due to a shortened race when we were out at Snetterton. Straight out of the pits the car felt good and I ended up right behind the White and Yellow Lotus that was similar paced to the TT. We both had to navigate a lot of slower cars, but I managed to get around before the end of my outlap. The live stream only resumed as I was mid battle, despite our best efforts to clean out the interior and chassis, it still sounded like half a gravel pit was flying around inside the car with each direction change. My first flying lap was fairly clear meaning I knocked two tenths out of Scott's best Quali lap in this car. The next lap was quicker, a few hesitations when overtaking lost a bit of time but after that I just had to keep chasing my lap. This car seems softer than the Golf and hurts the tyres a bit more, or at least that's how it felt when pushing deeper into the stint.
After 4 full laps I managed to overtake a Leon TCR which was surprising, as was overtaking a Noble whilst navigating through a gaggle of other cars. After 10 hard laps coming back onto the National Straight I could feel a slight hesitation, knowing I'd just taken 2 fast right handers I thought it must be fuel surge, so would have to manage it until I'd gone a bit deeper into my stint, 25 minutes was not enough!
13 laps in I had a huge moment where a Ginetta had slowed to a crawling pace as I was hanging it around the outside of Farm curve at 100mph. A quick tap of the brakes unsettled the car too much so I had to power on and luckily the MR2 I was overtaking had see the car sooner and given me valuable escape room!
Each lap required a slightly different approach to keep the engine running, sometimes I had the room to weave around, others I had to back right out until the fuel pump could catch up. On the start of lap 15, I'd not lifted enough while trying to get around some other cars and into Copse the car had no power, almost stopping going into Maggots and Beckets. I had to shift to Park (This car has no parking pin!) and press the brake pedal hard enough for the car to be happy to restart the engine, luckily it did but the ordeal cost me 11 seconds! I got onto the radio for Scott to get ready, to hand the baton over to him. I came in at 13:35 after 43 minutes, less than half of the 1 hour 30 minutes we hoped to do!

Actual Stint time - 43 Minutes - Best lap time - 2:25.10 with ideal of 2:23.54

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Stint 3

Time - 13:35 - Driver - Scott - Car - Golf Mk5 TDI - Planned Time - 70 minutes - Position - 7th

Ryan's shorter than expected stint meant that I had what felt like about 2 minutes in the garage before I was getting ready to jump back in the Golf, just enough time to release some fluids and take some more in!
I quickly got back into the swing of things, and my lap times were what we expected them to be.

13:45 - 2 Hours in

13 - Darkside Developments - 8th Scratch / 9th Handicap
4 - Darkside SeatSport TDI - 16th Scratch / 15th Handicap

The Pit stop had dropped us back to 8th on Scratch, but I began to claw places back as others pitted or had issues. In a long race like this, your overall position can be up and down while your pit stops are out of sync with the other teams.

14:45 - 3 Hours in

13 - Darkside Developments - 5th Scratch / 1st Handicap
4 - Darkside SeatSport TDI - 16th Scratch / 21st Handicap

After the last stint, we had calculated we still had ~10 litres of fuel in the tank, so it was just a case of managing it a bit around the final corner, the only place it seemed to surge in both the TT and Golf, to extend the stint a little longer. I managed 1:23 which made up for the shorter stint in the TT earlier.

Actual Stint time - 83 Minutes - Best lap time - 2:23.85 with ideal from the VBOX of 2:22.72

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Stint 4

Time - 15:03 - Driver - Ryan - Car - Audi TT TFSI - Planned Time - 45 minutes - Position - 5th

Scott's long stint helped a lot and I had a decent amount of notice to get ready so I felt relaxed. As Scott shot past at 60kph, I had to wait for a slower moving car to pass which cost a few seconds. I had a fresh pair of (Cold) front tyres for this stint and on the pit exit I had a squeeky bum moment and nearly tapped the barrier. Lucky for me the live stream didn't sync for another 20 seconds or so, meaning the fans at home had no idea! haha
I had to let a couple of cars past knowing my tyres needed a corner or two to get heat into them, but I quickly made those places back up, overtaking the Z4 into the Loop hairpin, one of my favourite spots to overtake on the GP track.
Knowing we had an issue and that I had to manage the fuel surge later on, I pushed as hard as I could on my outlap and then knocked 1.5 seconds off my previous best time, also beating the Golf, but it was a flash in the pan and the car fell back into the 2:25 a lap groove the next lap.

15:45 - 4 Hours in

13 - Darkside Developments - 4th Scratch / 1st Handicap
4 - Darkside SeatSport TDI - 15th Scratch / 11th Handicap

This stint I stayed out 44 minutes, only 2 minutes after the 4 hour mark and a lap earlier than we planned really. We need a bigger fuel tank for sure (or a TDI Conversion)!

Actual Stint time - 44 Minutes - Best lap time - 2:23.59 with ideal of 2:22.87

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Stint 5

Time - 15:47 - Driver - Scott - Car - Golf Mk5 TDI - Planned Time - 80 minutes - Position - 6th

Back in the Golf for some more Quali laps, every lap! The car still felt great despite having 2.5hrs of abuse already! The laptimes were still up there with the first session.
Unbeknown to me at the time, while I was out on track, one of the guys from the 750MC had come to speak to Ryan about our vehicles. We had not used the Mk2 as it was brought purely as a backup, and they were asking if we did plan to use it. Ryan said we didn't, so they were going to need to adjust our handicap from 23 laps to 21. This dropped us from 2 laps in front to being on the same lap as the top 8 of the field.

This must have jinxed us, as ~47 minutes into my stint, the car started to splutter and misfire. I was pretty sure it was not fuel starvation as we still had 25-30 minutes to go compared to the previous sessions. I radio'd to the guys to get Ryan ready, and as I went past the pit entry, they asked me to stay out another lap as he was not in the car. This proved to be fatal, as it kept cutting out and was way down on power. Eventually it died completely on the Hangar Straight and I had to pull over and jump out of the car. As I unplugged the radio I told the guys to release Ryan, as we were no longer moving in the Golf, it was allowed.

Actual Stint time - 49 Minutes - Best lap time - 2:23.85 with ideal from the VBOX of 2:22.72

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Stint 6

Time - 16:38 - Driver - Ryan - Car - Audi TT TFSI - Planned Time - 45 minutes - Position - 5th

Scott breaking down 30 minutes before the end of his planned stint really messed up the strategy, as we had over an hour left, with a car that would only do 45 minutes at a push. I got my head down and kept the laps consistent whilst trying not to be completely flat our for the full lap.

16:45 - 5 Hours in

13 - Darkside Developments - 6th Scratch / 11th Handicap
4 - Darkside SeatSport TDI - 18th Scratch / 21st Handicap

The lifting and coasting helped a bit, with me being able to extend the stint by 5 minutes longer than expected. A couple of Safety Car laps probably helped as well.

Actual Stint time - 50 Minutes - Best lap time - 2:24.92 with ideal of 2:23.69

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Stint 7

Time - 17:28 - Driver - Scott - Car - Golf Mk5 TDI - Planned Time - 20 minutes - Position - 6th

While Ryan was out on track, Paul and Reuben were busy looking over the Golf to try and figure out the cause of the issue. The Rail Pressure sensor had a load of debris on it, we cleaned that off and it started and ran fine. It must have been as a result of running the tank right down in the last stint, as we normally leave 5 - 10L in for the races we do.
When it was finally time to go out, I only managed 2 laps as the car was massively down on power. The VBOX delta time was counting up constantly on the straights. It was not worth the risk despite there only being 20 minutes to go, so I waited until the guys confirmed the TT was refuelled and Ryan ready, and they sent him back out to finish the race.

Actual Stint time - 5 Minutes - Best lap time - 2:27.92 with ideal of 2:27.67

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Stint 8

Time - 17:33 - Driver - Ryan - Car - Audi TT TFSI - Planned Time - 12 minutes - Position - 6th

Another unexpected and untimed stint! This time with only 5 minutes to rest after 50 minutes in the car. I guess that is the penalty for having 2 drivers in a 6 hour race! With the light fading, everyone seemed to have slowed down a bit, and it showed with the lap times. It was a case of nursing the car home, and after 58 laps in the TT, the chequered flag was waved!

Actual Stint time - 12 Minutes - Best lap time - 2:25.36 with ideal of 2:24.74

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So the first 5 hours, despite the stint times not being where we expected, was pretty much a dream race, both cars were consistent and on the pace for a 3rd or 4th in the Scratch and 1st overall in the Handicap, but it all went wrong in the last hour or so.
I think a combination of running the tanks to almost zero, plus doing almost an hour longer than we expected in the Golf compounded our issues.
The recalculation of the Handicap knocked 2 laps off us, but we were lapping pretty well compared to the guys above, so it was more than possible that we would have still at least got a Trophy for the Class win, but the breakdown cost us at least a couple of laps, and we were 3 laps down by the end.

17:45 - 6 Hours in - FINISH

13 - Darkside Developments - 7th Scratch / 18th Handicap
4 - Darkside SeatSport TDI - 22nd Scratch / 20th Handicap

7th in the scratch was still 1st in Class B, with only one Class A team on Treaded Tyres ahead, the rest were on Slicks. We were pleased with that, as it showed the cars had good overall pace, especially considering most of the cars ahead were 5 to 19s a lap faster!
With the TT doing much shorter stints than expected, I did 86 laps to Ryan's 58, we were hoping for more of a 50/50 split. Our best lap times were very close, with Ryan just pipping me. He needs to stop saying the TT is slower than the Golf when I beat him!

Brad and Nick did 22 laps each in the Leon, so it looks like that car does not want to do more than 22 laps of Silverstone! I am not sure why they have Dylan and Michael down as doing stints in both Ibiza's each, but they stuck to their own cars, with Michael doing the longest stint after Dylan had a driveshaft issue near the end.
With all the chaos I was struggling to follow what Michael, Dylan, Nick and Brad were up to, but they had a couple of untimed stops due to minor issues which lost them a couple of laps, so they were only 2 places behind us in the Handicap, and 3 laps from the win! In the Scratch Race they were only 3 laps behind a top 10 finish, so that was a great result.

Out of 271 Cars / Drivers we were 26th and 27th fastest on lap times, a decent improvement on 2019, especially considering it was dry! Brad was in 73rd, Michael 102nd, Nick 109th and Dylan 119th.
Something else interesting was the number of laps we did. The Golf completed 86, the next nearest was Chris Short in a Radical SR3 on 81 Laps, then Matt Jones in another Radical SR3 on 72 with Phil Knibb in a Cupra TCR and Samantha Bowler Mini Cooper S on 71 laps. Had the Golf survived the last stint, it might have been closer to 100 laps!

The event was Live Streamed on YouTube and Facebook by the guys at AlphaLive, you can watch the full video below if you have a spare 6 hours! All the tasty parts of our cars have already been added to our video:

We also Live Streamed from inside and outside of the cars, it was our first time doing it this way so apologies for some of the issues we had, but overall it seemed to go pretty well! As above, we have pulled out the best bits for the VLOG already.

Kit used for Live Stream:
VBOX HD2 HDMI
LiveU Solo HDMI
4 x Huawei E8372H-153 4G LTE USB Dongles
2 x EE 4G Data SIM
Vodafone 4G Data SIM
GiffGaff 4G Data SIM
Lightstream Studio

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