ROUNDS 7 & 8 – ELF Renault Clio Cup, Oulton Park, Cheshire, 30/31 May 2009
First podium of the season at sunny Oulton Park

Rounds 7 and 8 of the ELF Renault Clio Cup, visited the picturesque Oulton Park in Cheshire, home circuit for Amery Motorsport and a favourite with most drivers due to its challenging corners and the need for total commitment.

With a sunny weekend forecast, all three Amery drivers found the warm conditions affecting their set-up during Friday’s practice sessions and too much rear-end grip was the main problem and the cause for most concern prior to qualifying.

Following discussions and a few set-up tweaks, the drivers set out on the 30 minute qualifying session on Saturday morning. After a few initial laps to heat the tyres the drivers pitted to have new rubber fitted to the fronts, however Dave Newsham could not improve on his testing pace as he sat 7th fastest with only minutes left. Pitting again, the crew added a second set of new tyres on the front and reduced the pressure on the rears and on his final lap, Dave managed a superb P3 grid position for race one, with his second fastest lap time giving him P4 on the grid for race two.

Dave Shepherd was also struggling and could not improve his times even with new rubber, it was only when Dave opted to use 1st gear through the hairpin as instructed by the driver coach, that he managed to gain a few more tenths and finish with grid slots 14 and 15 respectively. Darren Wilson, still on a steep learning curve, cut a significant amount of time off his practice pace, but could still only manage 24th position for both grids.

Late afternoon on Saturday saw all 24 drivers line-up on the grid to start race one. Confidence was high in the Amery camp with fast starter ‘Dave Newsham’ sitting in 3rd place on the grid. Unfortunately as the lights went out to start the race, Dave made his worst start of the season as he wheel-spun off the line, fortunately so did Herron on the grid alongside him and Newsham managed to stay ahead and finish the 12 lap race with an excellent 3rd place, giving him and the team, their first podium of the season.

Unlucky Shepherd tangled at the first corner with Osborne in car 29 and struggled for the rest of the race with bent steering, managing to finish in 16th place. Wilson meanwhile kept out of trouble and ended the race in the points in 19th place.

The glorious sunshine on Sunday saw crowds in excess of 30,000 swoop on Oulton Park to enjoy the action-packed British Touring Car event. Tyre settings were going to be crucial to success in the mid-day heat, of the hottest weekend of the year to date. From 4th on the grid in race two, Newsham was looking to move-up a step or two on the podium as his confidence ran high leading-up to the start of the race.

This time Newsham made one of his usual good starts, just edging past 3rd place Robinson going into the first corner, however Robinson managed to regain his place coming out of the corner and Newsham slotted back into 4th place. Dave then had to defend his position from rival Aron Smith in car 10, eventually by keeping his cool Newsham pulled a gap on Smith and struggling with grip, settled into 4th place where he finished. The race was ended prematurely by a red flag incident, caused by three cars colliding, with considerable damage to the cars and barriers, but fortunately nobody was injured.
Dave Shepherd drove a good race from P15 finishing 12th by the time of the red flag and could have been in the top ten had the race ran its full distance. Steady Darren Wilson again drove without any mistakes finishing 19th again and enjoying every minute of it.

A delighted Dave Newsham said after the race, “After a disastrous weekend at Donington I’m delighted to get my first podium of the season and a fourth place at Oulton, the team worked very hard in difficult weather conditions to give me a great car and my season is back on track, so roll-on Croft!”.
Team principal Martin Amery added, “The team had a great weekend, securing our first podium of the season and the weather was brilliant. In Friday’s testing we struggled for pace, but managed to turn things around for qualifying and managed to get some good results for our drivers in both races. Now we look forward to Croft next, as in testing we set the fastest time around there, so maybe we are hopeful for a race victory”.

Amery Motorsport would like to say a special thanks to all the crew, for all the hard work over the weekend and to their sponsors ALP (Auto Legal Protection) for all their support.

You can watch the ELF Renault Clio Cup live on ITV4 with further coverage on Motorsport UK and Men & Motors, check programme listings for times.

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