Paddy Comyntook to the racetrack in Venice in a team determined, above all else, to come out in one piece
I’VE A CONFESSION to make and it is one that might sound quite odd for a motoring journalist: I’m not a big fan of driving on racetracks.
I’m not really sure why. Give me a car on a twisty road – or even in the snow and ice – and I’m as happy as could be.
I do, of course, understand the principal of how to do it and, if you catch me in the right mood, it’s entirely possible that I may be reasonably quick, but most of the time I find track tomfoolery a bit unnecessary.
So, I probably wasn’t the best person to be selected as part of a team of motoring journalists from Ireland who would compete in the very “fun” Mazda Open Race, conceived to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the iconic Mazda MX-5 open-top sports car.
Now in its third generation, the MX-5 retains the principals of the very first car. It’s lightweight, very easy to drive and enormous fun. And what better way to celebrate a global phenomenon than to invite Europe’s journalists to the Adria circuit outside Venice to be thrown into the deep end of motor racing?
But, much like the Eurovision Song Contest, some countries were taking it more seriously than others. We, perhaps, weren’t one of them. The team was made up of Michael Sheridan, Conor Twomey, Neil Briscoe and myself, as well as track novice, journalist Aoibhinn Twomey.
Adria Circuit is an FIA-approved racetrack about an hour’s drive away from Venice and this was where we gathered last Tuesday to get our introduction both to the circuit and to our car. A little jaded from the usual gritty-eyed early start that day, the difficulty of our task was just beginning to dawn on us.
You see, there are some countries that would take a three-legged race seriously – and probably ask one of their Olympic sprinters to saw off their own leg for the cause – and we quickly realised that the motoring journalists of our European neighbours may very well file copy from the pitlane, instead of the newsroom pit.
There were Formula 3000 drivers, drivers with German touring car experience and various other racing pedigree. And then there was us.
We were briefed about what lay ahead for the next few days. We got a garage, racing overalls, racing boots, a helmet and our own engineer, Fritz, who, when not helping us to figure out which damper settings to use, is to be found working on Audi DTM cars.
So, in garage 15, we were introduced to our very own MX-5 for the next three days. Number 15 was decked out in the tricolour, stripped of all unnecessary extras – like the passenger seat, roof and radio – and a few racing extras were added – like a competition clutch, new exhaust, new suspension and racing seat. We were ready for track.
Day two began with rain. Lots of rain. It was time for free practice and, for some, a chance to go after the course record; while for others, their first, nervous chance to progress around the track and hopefully not do anything silly.
The Belgians, Dutch and Portuguese set the pace with blistering laps. Both morning sessions lasted 90 minutes, with all drivers required to perform at least five timed laps each, with the quickest driver selected to set a time for the starting grid position. With a lap time just seconds away from the front runners, Conor Twomey took the reins and qualified us in a very respectable 13th on the grid.
Race day began with, as expected, more rain, and yet more practice.
Our novice driver – or rather, the most novice amongst us – Aoibhinn Twomey, had managed to improve her lap time by 29 seconds in 24 hours. She was designated to take the second leg of the race itself, once Conor had set the pace.
The race itself was a four-hour slog, with the winner decided by the team that completed the most laps in those four hours, with four mandatory fuel stops required by all teams.
Winning, we knew, was never on our radar, but a safe finish and some fun was our goal. After a rolling start behind a safety car in torrential rain we had worked our way up to 10th place by the end of the first hour, before the mandatory pit stop.
By the time we get behind the wheel after another driver change, we’re nicely tucked into the middle ranking.
Your first experience on a track where people are trying to pass one another out is terrifying, yet thoroughly exhilarating – like a rollercoaster, without the tracks.
You experience sensory overload, your breathing goes crazy, your vision narrows and you frantically attempt to turn something that you do automatically every day into something more deliberate, more focused.
Trying to remember entry points of corners while judging several other threats at once marks the difference between the true professionals and the rest of us mere mortals. But after almost an hour behind the wheel, the pieces begin, like a particularly dangerous jigsaw, to make sense and soon your eyes, hands, legs and arms are working together without calling too many emergency meetings.
And yes, I will admit, for the first time in my life, I was starting to really enjoy it. The last two legs were taken by Michael Sheridan and Neil Briscoe, Neil eventually posting the fastest Irish lap.
Apart from the driver having to refuel the car with a siphon and handpump, the changeovers quite often ended up as unchoreographed chaos. Getting into the seat and doing up the harness was often as much of a challenge as overtaking on a wet track. For those of us on the team that are more akin to six-foot prop forwards than ballet dancers, the MX-5 with a racing seat was snug to say the least.
By 5pm the light faded and Briscoe took Team Ireland home in one piece. We were 25th out of 30. Not exactly a stellar performance – more akin to an Irish winter Olympic effort than an Eddie Irvine challenge – but at least we were not last, and not ashamed either.
What had initially been considered a bit of a lark quickly turned into a dedicated effort. Bus journeys to and from the track turned into briefings on the right line to take and whether or not we should soften our dampers.
Any novice’s fear of track competition was gone and Mazda, too, had most likely achieved its goal. We know that at least one of the five team drivers will have an MX-5 – albeit a used one – in their driveway by the summer, if the trawling of classified ads was anything to go by. Whatever about our performance, it was the car that starred. The nimble little roadster took a pounding from us all but never let us down.
Its go-kart handling keeps you fully informed on every inch of road, reacting to every wrist-move. After 20 years, when technology seems to be taking over the essence of motoring, the MX-5 shows that its fundamentals back then were – and are – spot on. A roadster that’s true to its DNA can still be a star in an age of high-tech, modern cars. If only the same could be said of its drivers.
