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Well quite a lot has happened since our last report. On the USA front we have had another outing, this time at Phoenix for the Snowbird meeting. David Ferguson drove the Van Diemen, and despite several problems and lack of track time, he managed a second place finish. David is enthusiastic about the car to the extent that we now have a new car being built with an export tag attached! Eric Purcell is still looking for other drivers to hire the car for the new season so if you are interested then let Eric or myself know and we will talk figures. Eric also has the car available to do the Runoffs and you may see a surprise driver doing those if things fall into place.

The Autosport show, in Birmingham, was attended for the full four days and we had both a Pinto and a Duratec car on show. Van Diemen were hosts for the Duratec and the SRCC displayed the Pinto car that won last years Championship. Lots of interest was shown and I am delighted to say we have now taken deposits on a further car. Dave Mountain of Mountune fame; has been running in the Global Lights series for several years, and he now wishes to move up to the Duratec powered Van Diemen. Graham Hathaway will continue to run David and we hope he will also run a second car for another new driver. This new driver will be confirmed after he has tested the car, he has put a deposit on the ex works car for now and when he has driven the Duratec powered car he will hopefully confirm the sale and commit to the season. I am very hopeful he will be a quick driver; he has past experience in Formula Ford and drove alongside Senna, Palmer and other famous drivers in FF at that time.

We have received our first Duratec engine back from Dave Isles of Griffin motorsport. The Griffin Duratec has some changes from last years Scholar Duratec engine and we hope they will make the engine bombproof and quick. We will probably fit this one to the Ex-works car and take out the Scholar from Nik’s car so that Mountune can do their magic to it. Dave Mountain has offered this service to Nik, as he was successful with the car last year.

At least two other drivers are interested in the Duratec series and we may get another car built as soon as the factory can find a slot for it. Van Diemen are very busy at the moment with five different models being built and a waiting list that runs into several months.