Inside Line- with Erik Holstein – Motorsport.ie
8 races down in the SEAT Supercup Ireland now, and it was drama city again yesterday for rounds 7/8.
There’s some top drivers in this class now, and you need your A game onboard to be at the front. I packed the wrong bag and brought my B game.
0.2 down in qualifying was only good enough for 5th on the grid, and I was struggling to go any faster. Very frustrating as I’m giving it the full berries, but it wasn’t quite enough for whatever reason and it was the third row of thegrid.
Lacked a bit of outright pace again for race 1, and got nailed into turn 3 by the popstar Rob Butler just to top it off. 4th place at the flag it was, as Niall Quinn strolled away to win.
Not good. Lucky the bar wasn’t open yet.
There was some frantic work going on under the bonnet before race 2, but there was difficulty finding a skinny person with a double jointed 6ft long arm to fit a hose which is buried under the inter cooler. There wasn’t enough time to remove the floor to get at it, but they got it sorted as usual and the bonnet was down seconds before we were called out to the grid. Game on again.
Whatever happened on the line, I had no gears as the lights went out. My mother would have made a better start in her Land Cruiser. Pathetic. Got first gear eventually but we were last into turn 1, and not in great shape. Tears weren’t far away. Next thing the red flags came out and happy days, I was going to get another stab at it. Talk about blessed! Nailed it off the line second time around and survived the first corner scrap to lead the pack.
Once I got through turn 2 it was ears back and flat to the mat. They were all scrapping behind so I was in the clear, and brought it home to take our second win in 3 races, retaining the lead in the championship by the end of the day.
Credit to Murray Motorsport as usual for bringing the army of mechanics I seem to need every weekend. I’m a little off the pace but a win’s a win and points make prizes.
Thank you again to the Enniscorthy Motor Company for the continued support, without which this racing wouldn’t be possible. Roll on the super fast Kirkistown circuit in August for rounds 9/10.
Images from Michael Chester.
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