After several foreign raceweekends, the Spork Racing Team travelled to the UK. During the Britcar Silverstone 1000k, they competed with their well-known golden Seat Supercopa ‘Goldie’ in the six hours race. Team Cullum, existing in Rob and Jon Cullum, would guide the car to the finish, assisted by Jimmy Adriaenssens, who didn’t say no to a stint on this beautiful English Grand Prix circuit.
Rob Cullum “The Britcar Silverstone 1000k 2013 was the first race event that me and my brother would compete in. Obviously every second of tracktime was welcome and with several practice sessions, warm-ups and qualifyings on Saturday and Sunday, we found our rhythm again. The car felt great, although I had to get used to the oversteered nature of the car. It wasn’t slower, but it had to be driven in a way I wasn’t quite used to.” One moment Rob risked to lose his confidence when he had to drift through Copse in opposite-lock but after the warm-up Sunday morning he was clearly ready to start the race.
Jimmy Adriaenssens would only do one stint out of five, but was very much looking forward to his ‘Moment of Glory’ on this new track. “After the brothers Cullum both had done their stint, I took my place in the rather striking Supercopa of the Spork Racing Team. Although the track was completely new to me, a few virtual training sessions and some tracktime the day before were enough to get me going. We had worked on the setup of the car on Saturday, so we all had a good feeling in the race. Unfortunately after about twenty minutes of racing, I had to return to the pits because a bolt of the suspension on the rear left side got loose. Luckily the repair didn’t take long but in the interest of the team we decided to have Rob taking over although my stint wasn’t finished. This way we wouldn’t have to do an additional pitstop and still make a chance to end up on the podium. Pity for me, but sometimes you need to take a bullet for the team.” The car got refueled and rejoined the track, driven by Rob Cullum.
About ninety minutes before the end, Jon Cullum took over from his brother. He was looking forward to his prolonged stint and with some quick tips and tricks from BTCC driver David Nye, Jon joined track. “David suggested me to try and drive the car more by the throttle and the brake. I had to benefit its oversteered nature to corner smooth, but fast. Initially a difficult task, especially if it’s your first actual race weekend in a year, but lap by lap I improved. The most important thing to know is how the car reacts, if you only miss once, you could end up hitting a wall and of course that… we wanted to avoid!”
After the six hours attrition, the English-Belgian team got classified fourth in class 2. A result that motivated them to compete in the UK more often. Meanwhile the Spork Racing Team is busy preparing their other Seat Supercopa for the upcoming Supercar Challenge event. September 28th and 29th the one to last race weekend of the European championship is held at Spa-Francorchamps. Free entrance, so be there!
See enclosed PDF-files for the downloadable (Dutch) race reviews.