[Motorsport] Knockhill BTCC 2012

Yesterday I took my annual trip down to Knockhill for the British Touring Car Championship. This is one of the few big, live motorsport events that I can easily get to these days, or that fits in with my busy schedule at least. I’m sure that there are lots of club meetings at Knockhill that I could get to during the summer, but that’s also my prime time of the year for gaming events, what with the Autumn, Winter and Summer being full of livesaving.

British Touring Car Championship race 1 gets underway at Knockhill. You've got

to love the variety of cars entered this year. (Credit: David Brown)

I had a great day out, and the weather just about stayed dry for the whole time I was there. The racing was good, from all of the races and classes this time (for a change), and there were some spectacular displays of overtaking and car control during the day. We were also treated to a parade of ‘Scottish Touring Car drivers’ over the lunch break, most of whom I’d never heard of or only vaguely remember, and many of whom were only in the BTCC for a season or two. With them came some display laps from 90s supertourers, which were great to watch even when clearly not being driven at full capacity.

Rather than give a blow by blow of the day, I wanted to ramble a bit.

The start of race 2 for the BTCC field. The BMWs were really dominant in the first

two races. (Credit: David Brown)

 I was in two minds about going to Knockhill. There was a Warmachine tournament happening in Perth yesterday as well, which would have been a new venue for me and possibly some new opponents as well, although a lot of the ‘usual’ crowd were attending. The BTCC also has a really good TV package, and I knew that I could at least get highlights very easily, if not the full races on Youtube. But I decided in the end that I’d been to a fair few tournaments over the summer already, and didn’t get much opportunity to see live motorsport. Le Mans earlier back in June was an unusual one; as mentioned above, Knockhill has been my only experience for the last couple of years. I’m glad I decided to go as well. Although I watch a lot of motorsport on television, there’s something about seeing it live that is so much better. Yes, it’s true that you can’t see as much of the track, and often miss things as they happen out of your sight. But a good commentator, or even any commentator, can mitigate that to a great extent, and on the plus side you get to see some of the action lower down the pecking order that the TV cameras often forgo in favour of the leading cars. TV also can’t replicate the sound properly, which sounds stupid but is really important, or the smells. Nor can it replicate the effect of the crowd which, I’m discovering from my forays into watching football live, are a big contributing factor to the experience of live sport.

After this BTCC round I’m hoping to get to more race days over the next year, although Lifesaving will be a big factor working against that. But next year I at least want to get to the British Superbikes at Knockhill if possible, particularly if I’m not going to be in Scotland by the time the BTCC comes back North of the border.