THIS WEEK AT FRENSHAM

Castle Coombe Race Day – Written by a Greenpower Parent Frensham staff and parents gathered in the early morning at Castle Coombe, (on the outskirts of Bath), for this year's penultimate Greenpower electric car race. Whether we had arrived via tents, B&Bs, motels or long drives, we all felt slightly bedraggled. However, electric car races aren’t for the faint-hearted or slow risers; the trestle table, canopy and all important parents' lounge tents were set up before you could say, "two sausage rolls and a strong black coffee please’" (thankfully there was a cafe on site). The kids know the drill by now and got their electric car ready in super speedy time for scrutineering. It’s an event that requires communal effort, and all the kids take turns driving, pushing, stopping, holding out the pit lane sign and testing microphones. First up, Richie, Ava & Sully took the car out for its initial practice laps. An important stage that allows the team to learn the peculiarities of the course and also size up the competition. In previous races, we had eyes on our arch nemesis ‘Raptor’ from the Priory School. The tactics in these races is not to be the fastest, but to be the most efficient with the base level battery power they start with. Basically, the winning car is the one that gets the most distance completed in the given time, think tortoise, not hare. Success is down to the work the kids (& Giles) have put into designing the car (the gears, the alignment, the tyre size, the aerodynamics of the chassis) combined with on the day racing, comms and organisation skills. A valuable learning experience on lots and lots of levels! There were two races on the day, the first race was started by Maria who managed to secure a strong second place behind ‘Raptor’, no mean feat as it seemed they had gone for a gearing that gave them a much faster car than ours. As the pit lane jammed up, slowing many cars down, the team decided to stay out for longer, a tactic ensuring we could have a quicker driver swap. Next was the turn of Sully to take the wheel. After a number of laps he managed to overtake ‘Raptor’ and take a narrow lead for Frensham. A pit stop later and it was Aragon's turn to take the wheel and again take the lead and cruise the car into first place kit car with just over 20 laps. Back on the trestle table the team got the car ready for the second race. The overall result is based on your best result from either race, and Frensham had just set a leading target. However, they wanted to double down by having as good a second race. The team got the car ready in super speedy time, and our first racer David sat ready in the car for an hour in the pouring rain to ensure team Frensham were first on the grid. As the race started David was looking strong and the team were feeling confident. However, as we lost sight of the cars around the first corner, the pit team's earphones started to crackle, something had gone wrong, and David was informing the team that his car had been in a collision and he was taken out of the race! As the damaged car was towed back to the pits it became obvious that our race was over. Another car had spun out of control on the first corner, and despite David’s heroic efforts to avoid it, our car was clipped and the back axle buckled. No one was hurt but it was a tense wait to see if any of the remaining cars could beat Frensham’s result set in the first race. The second race seemed faster, but as the children consulted the race times live on their phones, it soon dawned on everyone that the cars in the second race had only managed to race 19 full laps and Frensham’s record stood strong… gold medal! We’re all now very excited about the final race of the season in Goodwood on the 8th October.