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Heavey & Elliott Race at Spa
Leastone team Boss Paul Heavey and Ken Elliott realised a dream the Friday following the Anglesey championship races when they rolled out of the Spa Francorchamps pitlane in Leastone Formula 5’s and headed up the infamous Eau Rouge corner. The pair were taking part in the British Monoposto championship, and despite the championship being populated by superior machinery, this was an opportunity not to be missed.
Heavey and Elliott ran in two half hour sessions, a limited time in which to learn the daunting circuit and the task was made all the more difficult when the notorious Spa weather took a turn for the worse before the opening session. Both drivers threaded the conditions cautiously as the explored the conditions, keen not to do any damage at this early stage of the weekend, and Elliott seized the early advantage and ended up 17th of 25 runners. Heavey was over cautious and ended the first session 20th overall.
The roles were reversed in the second session when the rain had stopped and the 7.003km track began to dry. Heavey recorded a time good enough to take 17th overall while Elliott’s attempts by an electrical problem that prevented him from setting a competitive time.
Both drivers were new to the rolling start procedure used for the Monoposto championship and Heavey made use of his experience attained during his karting days, even though those days were some time ago. He made a handful of places into La Source but faced a tough time defending from the more powerful machines down the long back straight into Les Combes. Elliott was left ruing his poor start as he became stuck behind more powerful machinery which hindered him greatly through the tighter parts of the circuit where his DH01’s nimbleness came to the fore.
Up ahead, Heavey was revelling in the dry conditions, battling hard to hold onto his early track position before having to surrender to the vastly superior machinery. Even still, the experience of driving Spa was more than enough to keep him entertained. “Even in the torrential rain, I was in awe of this track! In dry conditions it is just mind blowing. I had to get Eau Rouge flat. It’s tricky because the car gets unbelievably light at the top but I didn’t care if I had to bring the car home in a bin, I was not coming back from here saying: maybe I could have pushed harder!”
Without the comfort of the fact that he builds the cars, Elliott was understandably more conservative: “Having missed the dry qualifying, I was still learning the track during the race. I got stuck behind some slower runners, well, they were slower in the corners anyway, and that is how I lost touch with Paul but even still, it’s been an amazing experience. This track is spectacular. You really have to see Eau Rouge to believe it, I was hard pushed to cycle a bike up it!”
Chain failures prevented both cars from reaching the finish, failures which were attributed to a new batch of chain lubricant which was not as effective as the regular lube used by the team but even this could not detract from Heavey and Elliott’s weekend. Next years date is already pencilled in their diaries….
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