One side affect of the demise of the Triumph is there's a total lack of drama when I head to the track.

Friday was a Honda day with Aaron Slight. It was also stinking hot and the last time I was at Hampton Downs was for AMCC Round 3, which had also been stinking hot. However, on that particular day not only had I learnt a lesson about how track temperature affects the tyres but the track had started falling apart. This time, however, the track had been repaired by a different contractor using a different recipe so I had high hopes that the problems at Round 3 wouldn't be repeated; I wasn't disappointed.

Although the repairs have left the surface quite rough there's tons of grip and it's held together extremely well. Even the edges of the repairs, which have a similar appearance to tar snakes, give you lots of confidence. The only problem I had with it was straight lining the exit of turn 5 - it seemed to be a bit slippery due to rubber build up from cars lifting their inside wheel and spinning. If you took a slightly more rounded line there wasn't ....

Click for more ...