After a massive winter re-fresh on ALL the Team Japspeed cars BDC Round 1 Donington was judgement day! With Baggsy’s Subaru now 1JZ-powered and Shane’s V8 twin-turbo S15 completely rebuilt with Quaife’s new 6-speed sequential box and last year’s reliability issues were hopefully (and finally) put to rest. The 1JZ of Paul Smith underwent a few suspension tweaks but otherwise remained in 2010 spec.
So how did we do? Well all three drivers qualified in the Top 16 and we’re mega pleased to say the Impreza performed absolutely faultless on the day! ‘To be honest, we would’ve been happy that the Impreza just drove off and on the trailer fault-free!’ explains Japspeed’s Paul McCallum. ‘The fact Baggsy took it into the top 16 was an awesome effort – so now we can focus on getting back to the top.’
Paul Smith’s S15 knocked out reigning BDC champ Phil Morrison to reach the final eight, while Shane’s V8 S15 performed spectacularly, first qualifying 8th and then knocking out Simon Perry in the Top 16! Shane looked like he could go all the way, and in the top 8 faced Mark Luney in the SATS/Cosworth Supra. After going ‘One More Time’ twice Luney narrowly went through after a tiny error on Shane’s behalf, but what a performance in the refreshed S15!
Overall an amazing day for the Japspeed crew – we may not have made it to the podium, but it’s only Round 1 and now we’ve got reliability on our side 😉
