It was a weekend of ups and downs for Rob Guiver and the Ace Cafe T3 Racing team at Snetterton. A good qualifying time, some great weather and, most importantly, a happy rider meant expectations were high. Overall, the team achieved what they set out to with a strong finish of 16th in Race 2 and a win in the Cup class but it seemed luck was not on their side.
The team suffered some disappointment in Race 1 of the Motorpoint British Supersport at Snetterton. After strides were made in testing the week before the team were looking for improvements in Guiver’s finishing position. Unfortunately it was a penalty which would determine Guiver’s position rather than his racing skill on this occasion.
Guiver received a 20 second penalty for leaving his tyre warmers on too long. This meant that his finishing position of 17th was altered to 21st. Luckily he was still able to finish second in the Cup class and score a vital 20 points.
In Free Practice 1 Guiver had been running 17th in the pack which seemed a positive start. Qualifying had also been a good result for the team, he would start 18th on the grid, still not where they wanted to be but closer to their goal.
Team manager Ricky Chadwick spoke to us about the problems they had:
“We are going okay but we are not where we want to be. Rob has just lost a little bit of confidence in the bike and we are just trying to make him feel comfortable on it. It’s difficult to just find a setting that’s working for him. Compounded with a 20 second penalty for leaving the tyre warmers on too long on the grid. Unfortunate but they have their rules and that’s what they decided, we have a different view point on it but that’s racing!”
Tony Scott, team principal and owner of T3 Racing, feels that progress is being made though:
“We came here a couple of weeks back for the official BSB test day. We brought Rob along and we made more progress, good progress. We talked about some of the things that we might need to do with the bike which we have done this particular weekend so we were looking forward to a better positioning than we currently are.
“The end result for us from Race 1 whilst we qualified 18th we actually finished up further down the grid than that after we received a 20 second time penalty for allegedly not getting our tyre warmers off in time after the siren had gone. That is always a problem, we just missed that and we suffered the consequences so whilst we still picked up a second place on the podium the reality was that we finished 21st which is where we were and didn’t want to be on this occasion and with qualifying in 18th we thought we were going to see a better weekend.”
Before Race 2, Scott had commented: “I would like to see rob finishing in 17th 18th anywhere up to 15th for the next race so that would be a real indication that the work we have done has met our expectations and met Rob’s expectations, so hey anything above 21st is going to be good news.”
Guiver was able to meet Scott’s aims by improving from his qualifying position of 21st on the grid to 16th as well as first in the Cup class! It was great for the team to see him improve so much over the weekend and meet their targets. Guiver spoke to us about the weekend:
“I was pleased with some aspects but not others. It was fantastic to win the Cup class for the first time but I felt I could have done a but better in the main race. We made the wrong tyre choice and by half distance my tyres were finished!”
The times were improving for Guiver over the weekend and he is now feeling more positive about the next rounds: “We know we can do better so it’s onwards and upwards at Brands!”
Chadwick spoke to us about their plans for further improvement before the next meeting at Brands Hatch (19-21 July 2013):
“Rob’s confidence is really low at the moment so we need to do our best to get his head in the right place and make him feel confident on the bike because he’s more than capable. We’re going testing next week so we can get the bike setup the way he likes it.
“Everybody is an individual and bike setup is such a personal thing. Once we find that thing which Rob’s looking for he will start to pick up the pace. In fairness, we’re not that far away it’s just such a competitive grid.
“Power-wise we know we’re not that far away, we know we’ve got a good bike, we’ve just got to make it Rob’s bike. When Rob’s confident he’s virtually unbeatable but when things are right he beats himself up. As an ex-rider I can see this, once he’s comfortable we know we’ll be closer to that top ten.”
The Ace Cafe T3 Racing team will be at Brands Hatch for Round 6 in two weeks time.