Its been a last minute decision, but thanks to the generosity of people once again, we are going to the final round of the ERC in the Czech Republic this coming weekend.

As I write this the car isn’t yet ready to go, but then there’s nothing new there. There is just bodywork to finish repairing after Holland, and a few odds and sods to sort out. The only other thing is the suspension geometry, but I am still awaiting the return of the front damper that broke in Holland that has been away for repair, I have been promised it for Wednesday at the absolute latest, which is handy as we are leaving for Czech on Wednesday, so the damper may have to be swapped and the geometry done at the circuit on Thursday night. This isn’t a big problem, one of the nice things about the European events is that there is a lot of time, in the British championship instead of the event being spread over three days, a single day is all you get to do all the administration, practicing and racing, making things far less relaxed.

Czech will be only the second circuit we have visited twice with the Clio, the other of course being Lydden. Although we didn’t get huge amount of track time in our visit to Ceska Lipa in 2010, I at least did enough laps to start to find my way around, so hopefully we can build on that experience from the offset. Czech is one of the faster circuits on the European tour, and a commitment track at that. The entry in Super1600 for the weekend looks quite widespread, so we should have some good racing given our form from the previous few events. The entry overall is very impressive, especially in Supercars. I assumed, wrongly, that people might not be so keen on going as it is the last round of the season, a standalone event and all the titles are wrapped up, but the list is very impressive for any event.

Another reason to go to Czech is to research further for our plans for next season, and the changes we wish to make to the car over the winter months. There is no better experience than talking to people who have already made mistakes and changed ideas, and seeing different peoples interpretations of the best way of doing things. On top of this I also have to deliver some cylinder head parts that are heading to Sweden for development.

Over the last few months I have been trying to do more with the promotional side of my rallycross adventure. When I first started with the Clio project I was very good at finding the time to write and publish stuff about what I was doing, but then I had less to worry about, and ironically there was also less to write about and inform people of.  I have recently re-launched my website, and also had flyers made to give out on events. The website is just a guide about who I am and what we have done, and a way of giving something back to my sponsors, and keeping people up to date with news. The flyers are to give out on events, it again showcases sponsors and also gets more publicity, you never know who is going to read or see what you put on there, and it might always land you some sponsorship or support if people like what they see.

Of course, results always help your sponsorship hunting cause, and after this coming weekend we will hopefully have some more good news to send out to people who are on the cusp of giving us some backing for the 2012 season.