Today Alex and I popped along to Castle Combe circuit to spectate at their Spring Performance Car Action Day, the highlight of which was to be two drifting sessions. I’ll start right now by saying that I wasn’t disappointed in any way – today was nothing short of awesome! There were a huge variety of cars present, and a full gallery of photos is available here. Also, for those with a shorter attention span, here’s a video clip to help convey the general atmosphere of action!

So, down to the usual blogging business. After an early start I found myself parked next to Alex’s van trackside at 9:30.

We spent the morning watching those brave enough to take to the track on get to grips with our little corner.

Of course plenty of people were doing very well, some were a bit slow, and some were a bit bland. But then the mistakes started to happen, and we were happy! :)

Just before the first drift session was a about to begin, I found myself exceptionally entertained by this gentleman doing apt justice to his Vauxhall Omega – it’s hard to get more sideways than this!

Here’s the above hero at work:

Soon the first drift session was underway:

It wasn’t long before we saw the first wheel loss of the day…

Here’s the video clip that leads to the above!

And some classic E30 action:

We then went for a wander along the pits where we saw lots of wonderful cars (and some, er, dubious ones…). Let’s start with this – if you know me, you’ll know how excited I was…

The afternoon sessions saw two more cars lose wheels (that we saw on our corner – who knows how many wheels were lost in total today!), and another epic drift session that went a bit like this:

I’ll spare a special note for this E39 M5 – it had lovely multi-pot AP brakes and the tyres looked well used, but I couldn’t help thinking that the poor chap looked a bit slow. It really made me want to take to the track to fly the M5 flag, but I didn’t because I know what I’m like and I had no spare wheels and tyres to get home on. As this conversation was taking place, said M5 came past us and simply popped a wheel off for me to inspect – almost as though it was offering to help!

Really, a BMW dropping a wheel off on the circuit? Outrageous! He clearly should have been going faster – those nuts rely on a good dose of V8 to self-tighten, don’t you know. ;)

Here are a few more of my favourite photos, starting with a Ford Capri:

This Lancia Delta Integrale was showing a level of decay typical for its age:

This reminded me a bit of Smith’s Chavbo:

And this definitely reminded me of our old 106 Rallye.

Carry on racing – there’s nothing to see here…

POWER, POWER, POWER…

What a glorious day to chuck a wheel…

Always good to see the show cars in top notch condition – in particular I liked the rear wheel arch.

Raah!

Best place for a Corsa, really.

The king of the forests needed a bit more grunt on hot sticky tarmac.

What a scene!

Anyway – there are loads more photos on the gallery page, and of course there are more videos on my Youtube channel. I’ll conclude by saying that it really was an excellent day, and by thanking Paul Stewart for letting me know about it. If you’re one of my friends who so often thinks “damn, I wish I’d gone along” then why don’t you actually do that next time? ;)