Our season kicks on in June on the 16^th and 17^th of June with the 1^st round of the Thailand Touring Car Championship at Bira Circuit. Preparations are well underway, and as part of the preparation we have been testing at Bira, and to get some race experience as part of our testing for Alan Lewis who is one of our new drivers in the team in 2012, we joined the 3K-NITTO Thailand Championship event on the 5^th and 6^th of May which was also the first round of the season.

Dean Callister who have been with us for a few years now, will be participating in the 3K-NITTO Championship all year, in the F1N class and the F1SS class.

Dean kicked off his season with a double victory in the F1N Class, and took 25 Points for the first weekend of the season, which is the maximum possible points available, so Dean leads the 2012 Championship in the F1N class. Round 2 of the season will be on the 2^nd and 3^rd of June at Bira Circuit.

Alan who has been racing go-karts before, was for the first time ever entered into a car race event, and was looking forward to the weekend. Friday was a good start to the weekend with testing going well, and Alan doing a number of good laps in his Subaru Impreza STI. Saturday saw Alan qualify 3^rd fastest in the 4WD Open class, which was a big boost for his confidence, but as the race came around it had started to rain, and this was the first race he joined and then it had to be in the rain……

Alan drove safely during the race, but felt uncomfortable in the car at the start as the track was very slippery, but during the race, he started passing the other cars and ended up 3^rd in his class. Sunday saw Alan starting from 3^rd place, and as the track was wet he was looking forward to the race. Pushing hard with 3 drivers right behind him, he lost the back end of the car in S2, and spun unto the grass almost doing a 720 degree spin, but got going again, and by the end of the race, he was back into 3^rd in his class and finished his first ever car race weekend with a double podium taking two 3^rd places, so he was quite happy.

Thomas also joined in during the weekend, and had some fun. Thomas drove the little Honda City production car with 1500 cc and entered the Super 2000 class called Champ Car. As it was wet during qualifying the lack of CC and HP did not affect him too much, as he was able to make up for the lack of speed in wet weather driving so he qualified the car 2^nd on the grid.

On Saturday Thomas also drove in the Open Unlimited class, where he borrowed the Subaru Impreza STI from Alan, and entered the event. During qualifying the track had drived up, so Thomas only managed a 5^th place on the starting grid for race 1, but as race 1 was about to get underway, the rain started to come down, again, and with 4WD he was off to a good start and ended up as the winner of the Open Unlimited Turbo class.

On Sunday, Thomas was again in action, but on a dry track, he struggled to keep up with the Super 2000 cars in his little Super 1500 Production car, but still managed to finish 3^rd and get on the podium. In the Open Unlimited class on a dry track in a standard road car the odds were too, as the car was 300 Kgs heavier than the other EVO’s and Subarus plus they had slicks on and was sporting over 500 HP, against 280 of the standard Subaru Impreza STI. So at the start, Thomas dropped all the way to the back on the field, but then in the race, moved up to 5^th and just got onto the last step of the podium. In 6 races, he still ended up with 6 podium finishes.

All in all the team finished 12 times on the podium over the weekend, but since only Sunday's results gives you the trophies, the team was 6 times up to collect their trophies, but scored well, and all 3 drivers are currently in top 3 of the championship, with Dean leading his class with maximum points.

Photos by Edd Ellison/Interfuture-media