Cadwell Park: 16th May

Ian's debut at the Cadwell Park circuit in Lincolnshire got off to a dreadful start when the head gasket on his Van Diemen RF83 failed after just nine laps of testing; this emant Ian would go into the qualifying session on Sunday with minimal circuit knowledge and severely on the back foot.

If Ian and the team thought the weekend could not get any worse then a rare mistake by Ian on the second lap of qualifying, putting the car into the barriers, showed that it certainly could. Ian commented "I just got caught by a bump that unsettled the car, before I could do anything I was heading towards the barriers backwards. Fortunately, there are some safety barriers there and the car is not too badly damaged. We should get the car back out for the afternoon".

With his Van Diemen RF83 repaired, Ian lined up last on the grid with a lot of passing to do on a track that is notoriously narrow and difficult to pass on. Ian did not make a particularly good start and was still last into the first corner but by the end of the lap he had passed four cars and would pass a further six before the red flags came out on lap 6.

Unfortunately the re grid for the re-start counted back a lap and moved Ian back to 8th position. Fortunately for Ian but no for others his luck was about to change for the better with two drivers retiring on the first lap of the restart. At the end of the lap and after passing three cars, Ian was up to 3rd and by lap 3 was up to 2nd. Unfortunately, despite Ian's best efforts and taking 2.5 seconds out of the leader, Tony Hancock, he proved just out of reach at the flag.

Considering the weekend Ian had had, 2nd was a brilliant result. Ian commented, "I'm over the moon with this result, I had a couple of good hard clean fights out there, to come back to 2nd feels like a win today".

Ian now heads to Brands Hatch on the 5th June with an 18 point lead in the championship.

Picture of Ian in car