Citroen C1 24 Hours of Silverstone 27th and 28th April

03

May

2019

The workshop team at Bassett’s Citroen Swansea built this Citroen C1 to compete in the Silverstone 24-Hour race exclusively for Citroen’s 800 kilogram, 67 bhp, 3-cylinder C1 super-mini and the event certainly contained all the challenges that this capricious form of racing produces.  The C1 Racing Club operates its innovative endurance race series under a robust set of technical regulations for competitors but the early spring race on Northamptonshire’s iconic Grand Prix circuit certainly threw-up many challenges to drivers including a long night’s racing, sometimes in heavy freezing rain.

Ninety-nine identical Citroen C1 race cars – the largest number of starters ever in a UK motor race – took to the Silverstone’s iconic 3·6 mile Grand Prix configuration for the gruelling 24-hour race, with teams of between 4 and 6 experienced and novice drivers. For such a large grid of racing saloons, organising club BARC had obtained special permission from British governing body Motorsport UK, which granted permission on the grounds that cars are identical. Teams from Europe and even one from the USA featured in the entry, illustrating that the Citroen C1 series is truly global.

Citroen C1 number 358 was crewed by motor sport journalist Ken Davies, father and son Stephen and Felix Archer – one a renown Aston Martin authority and the other an international Classic car Valuer. Also driving the Bassett's Swansea prepared C1 were Physicians and Historic racers Harry Naerger and Dave Leopold, together with well-known motor racing ‘snapper’ Jakob Ebrey, busy juggling driving duties with his day job as official photographer at the weekend’s exciting BTCC races 65 miles away in Donington!

At the end of 24 hard-fought hours on the track the Bassett’s C1 finished a credible 76^th position overall having completed 344 laps or 1,238 flat-out racing miles in all conditions. The only problem encountered was in the early hours of Sunday morning when the car lost 30 minutes or 10 laps, while a bent front wishbone was changed by DJ Notorsport – who looked after the car at Silverstone – after Felix Archer was forced over unforgiving sausage-kerbing by a novice driver. Having started the race pristine red, the 2011 C1 model now shows the signs of body contact after 24-hours racing and some of the driving-standards of inexperienced competitors were considered questionable at best!

During the race the C1 used 330 litres of fuel during 12 two-hour driving stints, as well 12 specially produced 14” diameter Nankang tyres, but no oil – Total 3-50 Synthetic – or attention to its efficient ABS braking system, critical when the circuit was wet. The crew’s fastest lap of 3:07.26 compared the cars first race experience favourably with the fastest lap of 3:00.21 set by the winning C1 of experienced C1 race-winning team McAttack.

Images: By kind permission of Retro-Speed historic web motorsport magazine