This year's Christmas Fair was held on 05/12/09.

Sadly, we were cursed with some inclement weather, and everyone had to retreat indoors. Despite the rain, the event was well attended, raising a very respectable amount of money which is being used to help some very worthy causes.

Special Slot Car Report

The following was originally published on the Slot Car Time Attack website.

On Saturday December 5th 2009 we attended the Heritage School Christmas Fair, where we held our 2nd Annual Slot Car Time Attack competition to help raise funds to support FOTH’s projects this year of new shade for the senior school and new books for the library.

By the end of the afternoon, we had raised €164, so a huge thank you to all of the drivers for taking part and helping us to raise such a fantastic sum.

The competition was fierce throughout the day, with a steady stream of competitors starting on the dot of noon. It was obvious from the start that this track was more challenging than last year, with many competitors struggling to keep their cars on track for a full lap.

With many drivers learning quickly, we saw lots of them returning to try again, and as they gradually improved, and started to keep the cars on track through the tricky corners, the lap times began to tumble. Our eventual winner, Hjalmar Larsen, set his winning time within the first half hour, and left everybody else chasing him for the rest of the afternoon. Hjalmar’s eventual margin of victory was a razor thin 0.006s, so the battle was very closely contested.

Hjalmar Larsen after receiving his prize.

The first corner proved to be the undoing of many drivers, with the tight right hander coming up fast at the end of one of the longest straights on the circuit. Those that made it through there then had to contend with the immediate left/right of the chicane which unsettled many of the cars and pitched them off sideways. This corner was the scene of many multi-car pile-ups throughout the day, and was by far the busiest corner for the track marshals.

The first turn was the scene of a great deal of carnage.

The next straight allowed drivers to build up some speed before the open entry to the 180º right hander, but the decreasing radius at the exit tripped many of them up when they accelerated out of the corner a little too soon. We also saw some spectacular slides around that corner. However, these slides usually resulted in a tank slapper when the car reached the tight left handed entry to the infield section. As entertaining as these slides were to watch, they proved to be the downfall of any driver audacious enough to try and pull it off.

We saw some spectacular slides around this turn.

The extremely tight left hand hairpin of the infield section proved to be another tricky part of the circuit for many. Drivers flushed with the success of making it through the previous curves often misjudged their entry speeds, sending their cars off backwards into the fence. Many times this corner was the scene of total carnage when other drivers happened to get between a wildly spinning de-slotted car and the barriers.

This hairpin is a lot tighter than it looks.

Few drivers struggled with the infield exit section, and the right hander leading onto the back straight. Many were able to carry a good amount of speed onto this, the longest straight of the circuit. However, the speeds achievable down this straight caught a lot of drivers off guard, with many spinning off into the fences around the open right hand bend leading onto the start/finish straight, making this the second busiest corner for our track marshals.

This easy right came at the end of the fastest straight on the circuit.

We were pleasantly surprised to see just how well some of the younger children were able to keep it together and put in some good, solid lap times. Many of the older kids showed a lot of grit and determination, but we think most were trying too hard to beat the other cars on track instead of focusing on their own car and working to bring their lap times down.

Slot car racing is a fun activity that the whole family can enjoy, so it was fantastic to see a number of mums and dads joining in with the kids and having a go themselves.

A little video we made to remember the event by.

Many thanks to:

• David, Steve and Phillip, whose skills as track marshals kept the event running smoothly all afternoon. I hope your backs feel better soon.
• Psidaris Limited for their kind donation of the Grand Prize.
• Mrs Tracy for the loan of her classroom. I hope the nursery children who joined in on Saturday weren’t too disappointed to see the track gone on Monday morning. More than one of them thought they would be keeping it.
• Trish and Katharine for getting some great pictures for us to remember the event by.

To see all of the pictures from this event, please visit our Flickr photo gallery.