Westfield Cup Spa Francorchamps 28th-30th May
As many people in the racing community know, Rudy van Buren's father ,Gino van Buren, is the owner of the dutch company Westfield Netherlands and creator of the Westfield Cup which ,in it's third year of competition, has become one of the largest dutch racing series, fielding upwards of 40 cars per race.
Last year, Rudy drove four events and managed to win three, but being the "son of the boss"' has not allowed him to run as many events as desired. Although all cars are identical and have the same specs, the two's relationship can play a factor in the reputation of the series and thus, Rudy does not drive the series year round. In reference to the cars themselves, the only adjustable features on the car are the tire pressure, camber, toe, and shock bump and rebound.
"The thing you need is a heavy right foot." - Rudy van Buren
This year, Rudy and his father had disagreements concerning if and what races Rudy would be allowed to drive this year. In the end it was decided that if they participated, it should be at Spa Francorchamps. Luckily, a good friend of Gino's called to offer Rudy a seat in his car. Of course the offer was confirmed as it was seen to be a picture perfect chance to participate in a race this year.
The race weekend in Spa started on Friday with two practice sessions and qualifying. A race was held on both Saturday and Sunday, mounting a three day weekend. The weather forecast for the first two days turned out to be great however, Sunday's forecast was bleak and unfortunately didn't turn out as well.
Although the first session was on Friday, they arrived Thursday afternoon to prepare the driver's tent, make changes to the car and to make sure Rudy was fully rested since the race was at 8:00 AM.
They arrived Friday morning at the track at 6:45 AM... "It was early, but that gave us enough time to be relaxed, as well as give us time to check the damping, tire pressure, change clothes, get to the pit line with plenty of time, etc," Rudy said. It rained during the night so the track was damp but by then the sun had already broken threw. "It was the first session of the day so I went on track with a relaxed mentality, feeling if everything with the car was okay and just keeping it all together since the rest of the day would be dry." As soon as the light went green on the end of the pit lane, Rudy went out on the track to do his warm up lap. The next lap would contain Rudy's first truly "hot moment" of the weekend... "Going into Eau Rouge I hit the white line with one wheel and the car snapped at a point on the track you just don't want it to. I locked all 4 wheels as soon as I could, slid sideways over the track, and had a very lucky escape. After that I drove a bit more careful, but in the end the pace was there." Despite this, Rudy still took the top spot in the session by quite a large margin.
The second session of the day was a Westfield only free practice, as the other session in the morning was also open to different car classes . "The session went very well for me. After some mistakes in the first few laps, I had the pace and the car was pretty good on the dry track. I took the fastest time by 1.7 sec."
The last session of the day was the qualification. Although he was held up during his first 2 laps, Rudy was finally able to get a clear track and took the pole by nearly one second.
Saturday morning was much more relaxed than Friday, as they only needed to be on track by 11:25 AM. "We had a good night and arrived at the track at 9:00 AM. After we checked several things on the car, we went to the pre-grid stahe and I prepared myself for the first race of the weekend."
"A rolling start was used for race one... At the start, I thought the pole sitter was supposed to go after we reached the first hairpin. However, the driver starting in third took some risk and dove on the inside beforehand. Thus, I was forced to let him through. As soon as we got out of the hairpin I was able to grab his slipstream down the hill, up Eau Rouge, and on the back straight I was able to pass him. From then on I was able to drive away and take the win by 17 seconds after a 25 min race."
On Sunday it rained extremely hard all night as expected. They arrived at the track around 9:00 AM again, but the rain had yet to cease. "Because of the weather we updated the tire pressure and changed the damping a little. I was sure we could grab the double because the rain suits me even better than a dry track." The race began again with a rolling start but this time, Rudy was able to stay in front of the others into the hairpin. Rudy tried to create as big of a gap as possible early on. After a few hot moments, he managed to gap the field by two seconds by the end of the first lap. "From that point on I drove a steady pace and extended the gap every lap. In the end the only guy who stayed within a ten second gap spun off the track." This meant that Rudy was able to end the race with a 26 second gap between himself and second place.
"Overall the weekend couldn't have been better for me. We were the fastest in each session, sat on pole, and won both races. To top it all off we were awarded our trophies on the F1 podium!"
Quotes and original story by Rudy van Buren / Edited by Demetrius Adelin and Nolan Scott.
Here's a video of Rudy's track time with the Westfield:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJ45yTw6t2A