topletter.com Managing Director, Charles Lamb, joined the Rollcentre Racing team once again this year to compete in the Bathurst 24hr endurance race. This year's event took place on November 20-23 with a much larger and more competitive field than last year. It was always going to be faster and harder but the team also had to contend with driver illness and terrible weather. All in all this was the hardest event to date.

The team headed for Bathurst early in the week and settled into their hotels. There is no official practice for this event with the teams going straight into qualifying on the Friday. Rollcentre have been developing the Mosler MT900R over the last year to great success with a very stiff suspension setup that suited the UK circuits. However at Bathurst they tried Yokohama tyres instead of the regular Dunlops and found that the car's suspension was much too stiff. So much so that as it went over bumps on the Conrod Straight at 165mph the car's back end kicked sideways, requiring correction from the driver. This was dangerous and required radical changes to correct the problem. Since rain was forecast a much softer set-up was required and the team changed damper settings and springs in an effort to make the car more drivable over the adverse camber and bumps of Mount Panorama.

Team owner Martin Short eventually went out in the night time qualifying session and set a qualifying time around 2:18 which was enough to secure fourth place on the starting grid. This was also three seconds faster than last year's qualifying time. This was quite a relief to the team after a day of problems. Martin had also just overcome a bout of Conjunctivitis which almost forced him to pull out of the event.

Charles was one of the more experienced drivers with this car at this circuit and so he was given little time in the car on the Friday qualifying sessions, in favour of Heather Spurle and Patrick Pearce, both of whom needed track time at Bathurst.

The race started at 2.00pm on the Saturday with Martin chasing the Holden Monaros in the first few laps before settling down to a race pace around the 2:22 mark. Patrick Pearce got in next and did a full stint on a wet track. By the time Charles started his first stint the track was dry. He started circulating with times consistently in the 2:20 region. This was a hot pace and required maximum effort in the car, which still did not have power steering. The safety car came out after an accident and as the cars slowed down Charles noticed that he was feeling unwell. The team called him into the pits to refuel during the safety car period (which would have meant a double stint of around 3 hours in the car) and then a couple of laps later Charles' condition worsened and he spun the car as his concentration faltered. He called into the pits for an unscheduled driver change and Heather Spurle continued. Charles was taken to the medical centre for a check-up. He was suffering from exhaustion and dehydration due to the very high levels of effort required to drive the Mosler quickly over a long period of time, combined with lack of sleep and proper diet running up to the first stint in the car.

As the night went on the remaining three drivers took turns whilst Charles had a nice sleep back at the hotel. Charles retuned to the track around 5.00am feeling much better and started another stint around 6.00am on a drying track. This time he had eaten plenty of pasta before hand and put in a strong stint circulating in the 2:19 region most of the time with a best lap of 2:17.5 . Charles was again taken to the medical centre after his second stint suffering from milder exhaustion.

The team suffered more bad luck as Martin Short suffered dehydration after his stint and required two drip feeds of "go-go juice" to perk him up. Heather Spurle also had a small accident in the car whilst overtaking a slower car. The other car ended up running over the nose cone of the Mosler causing significant damage to the carbon fibre body which cost the team a few laps. Patrick Pearce was the unlucky one that got to drive during all the rain storms that occurred over the weekend. He was also driving when one of the wheels fell off the car.

Martin Short put in some strong stints and set a best lap for the team of 2:15.1 which was the fastest lap of the race until the last lap when the Holden Monaros set a new best lap around 2:14.5.

The team chased hard to claw itself back up the international field and eventually finished 5th overall out of around 45 starters. The two Monaros were 1st and 2nd followed by a couple of Porsches (they have an advantage in the wet) and then the Mosler. The team were disappointed not to be on the podium this year, but happy that the Mosler car was 100% reliable even whilst running at a much faster pace than last year.

Full race results can be seen at www.bathurst24hr.com. The race is also due to be televised on Channel 5, Sky Sports and Motors TV so look out for these shows.

Special thanks to Darren Keeler for the excellent track side photos.