The plan immediately after the last two rounds of the European championship was to put the Clio away for a couple of months and do my best to forget all about it. Not for any other reason than to have a break from the constant thought process it involves. So, as you can imagine, within a week of being back the plans to improve it for 2011 were being put into place.

As anyone who has read any of my articles about the Clio will know, getting hold of parts for it is anything other than straight forward. Nobody we could find makes vernier pulleys specifically for the 1600 Renault engine, so after sending some standard sample pulleys to Cat Cams in Belgium, they came up with the goods and supplied us with some pulleys to do the job.

Next was engine mounts. We were able to determine that Clio 172 Cup mounts were the same, and were duly offered some support in form of a discount from K-Tec Racing who supplied them. We have also swapped the mount that bolts onto the top of the gearbox to that used by a 2.0 Megane as it appears to be considerably stronger, but this in turn meant that the mount on the chassis leg of the car did not line up. Back to the drawing board and again Frankie Boak came up trumps with a very nice little steel bracket to hold the new rubber mount.

Not that the engine mounts are going to be used for a while, the engine and gearbox are now out, the gearbox back with Gripper to have the ratios changed and a full service.

I have also found some steel conrods for the engine, made by a small company in the South of France. As ever the language barrier hasn’t made things easy but I think we know what to order and the French engineers know what we want now, which is certainly progress.

There is always the constant strain of paying for all this racing lark, but I am more motivated than ever to progress and I genuinely believe that we can be making C finals on a regular basis in 2011. Leaving the workshop before midnight is now a luxury, be it working on parts or plans for the Clio, or working to try and get the cash together to fulfill this addiction. As I have come to realise over the last few years, if you don’t believe in yourself, you will never convince anyone else to support you and I really do believe we can prove ourselves.

I feel my driving has come on an incredible amount this year. The step up to D1-A has been a bit of a difference from a British Stock Hatch car. Driving has almost been a bit-part in the whole situation this year, but at the events I have tried to focus as hard as I can on that aspect and not worry too much about the car. This is becoming easier the more we work with the Clio, but I feel we definitely need to have a stronger team next season to allow me to concentrate more on the driving. Liam Doran giving me a sharp word about my lines – or lack of – in the last corner in Poland certainly made me realise quite how much time there is to be found.

The 2011 calendar certainly looks interesting, and I am personally pleased that it starts at Lydden Hill. This at least will give us a good measure of our improvements before trekking across Europe, although maybe the pairs could have been more thought out. Lydden is easy for us, but to go to Czech at the end of the year only a few weeks after driving all the way home from Poland seems a little crazy. I am pleased that Poland has made it into the date-list, although Dave (my mechanic) is already unconvinced by the amount of driving in the van this entails, I loved the track and the lack of grip it offered.

The name changes in the classes are a good thing I think, for me to promote a class to potential sponsors called Super1600 is easier than One-A. But coloured door squares that we will have to use behind the numbers… I will have to wait and see before I am convinced by that one.