Drift Cup Rd2 – Adrian Flux Arena

This weekend was a mix of highs and lows, with the car sporting a new look courtesy of a set of Cosmis Racing XT-006r wheels, a Kinzuru Kits V2 Rocket Bunny style arch set and with a fresh coat of paint in our signature Walton Super Turquoise from Dave Bastin of DB Paint it was certainly ready for action. With the car ready for the competition so early, on Friday evening we actually went out to the local pub for a few drinks and dinner, making an unusual change from our marathons struggling to get the car ready into the small hours of the morning before the events.

Saturday Morning, we were up and ready for action, all we needed to do is get to the Adrian Flux Stadium in Kings Lynn from our Buckinghamshire HQ. Setting off in good time we quickly came to a standstill on the M25 due to a Volvo loosing its tyre in the middle lane and the police closing the road (hopefully that wasent a sign of things to come). Luckily the motorway was back flowing at its usual slow pace within about half an hour and we just rolled into the pits moments before the drivers briefing started. Our pits was setup next to our good friends at Team 1340 inlcuding Adam Elders Kinzuru Kitted S14 and Andy Stroud in the incredible M5 powered Skyline R34.2. To the other side we had Hayden Cruickshank and of Flat out Factory. We knew we were in good place to borrow a tool or two if we needed it, there is always something that gets forgotten. Out onto track for practice and it was quite quickly apparent that this is one slippery track, For those of you who haven’t been to the Adrian Flux Stadium, the track is surrounded by a dirt speedway track, and as a result a lot of dust makes it way on to the inner concrete surface reducing grip levels even further. Mike headed round on his first practice session and quickly finds out that this track is not as easy to drive as it looks. Mike was struggling to stay on line as well as having to constantly adjust suspension and tyre pressures after the suspension modifications that had been made between rounds Between practice and qualifying a few tweaks to the suspension settings, some invaluable advice from some of the spectating BDC Pro class drivers and of course nothing to loose as with his current driving he would be lucky to qualify, Mike hit the track and pulled off a fantastic run to score 81.7 putting him into 2nd place behind Round 1 winner Mark Webb. In those two qualifying runs Mike went from near bottom to near top of group. With a newfound enthusiasm for the track Mike and the team checked the car over, cleaned out the air filter as the amount of dust was clogging it up which may be the reason behind some of our competitors misfiring problems? First battle and Mike was up against Mike Jackson in the Jackson Competition Engines Subaru Impreza, Incredibly both drivers were very evenly matched and ended up running one more time, and then One more time for the second and final time. The judges called that Mike Walton had won the battle of the Mikes!  

Mikes Top 16 battle was against one of the few female drifters, Zanna Young in her BMW E36 (see the write up of Zanna on http://www.driftcup.co.uk/zanna-young-2/). Sadly on the first Mikes Walton Motorsport S13 began missfiring causing an almost complete loss of power, Mike called in the 5 minute rule and the now combined effort of Team Walton/Team 1340 rushed to the Nissan to try and rectify the problem with a change of coilpacks, unfortunately this was not the problem which put Mike out and Zanna into the top 8 battles, where she again would come out ontop and go on to place 4th overall after a third place battle with top qualifier Mark Webb.

All in all we had a great weekend, after the disappointment of the poor practice runs, followed by the highs of 2nd place qualifier and Mikes favourite ever battle against Mike Jackson, followed by the low of the mechanical failure. Bring on Rd3 at Three Sisters Wigan on 2nd July!