2013-12-09 09:17:19.2
For the second year in a row the France 10 Hour race ended in disappointment for Eddie as he and his 3Cubed team-mates struggled all weekend and ended a disappointing 12th in the Premier result.
Saturday was held in sunny, albeit cloudy, conditions. The team again struggled during practice and had to get a replacement kart. Eddie was nominated to do the super-pole qualifying but failed to get up to speed and could only manage a lowly 21st on the grid.
The team were still not completely happy with the performance of their second kart and would later change it in the afternoon. Despite this, all four dove well and put in some quick laps. Unfortunately more mechanical gremlins left the team trailing at the tail end of the Premier standings.
Sunday dawned wet and miserable. The mechanics had managed to sort the kart out over night and the team were hoping for a better day, with the conditions playing into their hands. Unfortunately, qualifying was another disappointment. The format was a Formula 1 style “knock-out” system. Ian Wilson just managed to squeeze in to the second session after setting the 20th quickest time. Eddie was nominated for the second session in an effort to get the team into the all important top 10. Unfortunately, an uncharacteristic spin into the gravel early in the session lost him time and he was then held up on his flying lap by a slower driver, missing the top 10 by 3 hundredths of a second.
Eddie also started the race and made a storming start in the wet to go from 11th on the grid to 3rd. Slipping back down to 6th, Eddie fought with the leaders in the opening double-stint before again falling off into the gravel in the same place as before. Further spins from Ian Wilson and John Emerson again left the team trailing and their misery was compounded when Eddie was eliminated from the race with 5 minutes to go while fighting for 10th, sustaining minor whiplash and bruising in the process.
Eddie was understandably disappointed with the team’s performance after the race.
“Well the whole weekend was a bit of a disaster really. I lost count of the number of mechanical failures we had on Saturday and we messed our own race up on Sunday with some silly mistakes. I really feel like I let the team down this weekend as well, which makes me angry. I messed up qualifying on both days and made a really stupid mistake in the race when we were in with an easy top 6. I’m really sorry and feel bad for all the guys because we came all this way and I go and cock it up like that. I guess with Ian and John going off as well we would have been screwed anyway but it doesn’t really make me feel any better.”
Eddie also admitted that the team have a lot of work to do to avoid the mechanical problems that have blighted their season so far but admits that they are far from a solution.
“We have had this problem all year and I can’t help thinking that it has happened to often to just be bad luck. I know there have been a few recurring problems with the carbs (carburettors) this year but basically we just don’t seem to be strong enough in this area to either sort it or drive around the problem.”
