7 - Nick Simpson

Class: A

Team: Nick Simpson Racing

Aged 25 he is a Oil & Gas Subsea Design Engineer from Surrey that started racing in 2009

Nick has been a fan of TVRs for many years, purchasing his 450 Chimera at 21 which he then tuned and tweeked and started tracking it. He helped out in the series in 2007 with mechanics, data logging, and compiling the points. Having had enough of watching everyone else having all the fun and after driving the legendary Pink Taz he decided to get his own car!

He has some racing experience with karting for fun for years and a couple of races in the Pink Taz. He rates Cadwell Park for the contrast between the tight twists and the long fast back straights and what he describes as Britain’s Eau Rouge – Coppice.

His racing is supported by ACT (Friend) Austec Racing (Engine and complicated mechanicals) Powers Bodyshop (Paint) and Syvecs (ECU). The car has a huge history and has recently returned from Sweden and for 2011 will be sporting a new engine, new gearbox, wiring loom, gearbox, ECU, dash, extinguisher, digital dash, logger, screens, steering wheel, steering column, seat, extensive chassis mods & strengthening, rad, front clam, flat floor, intakes, pedal box, repaint

The heavily modified, fuel injected 4.7 litre AJP V8 is mated to a Tremec T5 Challenge Spec gearbox. He expects around 500 bhp and the car to weigh around 900 kg.

The History

• 1989 built originally for Andrew Usher
• 1993 sold to Team Central, converted to AJP
• 1995 (9 wins), 1996 more wins while raced by Ian Flux in red/yellow livery under number 22
• 1996 Raced by Bobby Verdon Roe to more victories (until the last race where Flux and VR swapped cars for a bet) under number 23, Flux won championship this year.
• 1997 raced by Matt Doman
• 1998 sold to Amanda Whitaker and used as a training car
• 1998 sold to Ulf Eriksson in Sweden where the car was campaigned very successfully in the Nordic Supercar series for around 8/9 years under Backa Event Motorsport. During this time, the car gained a custom one off widened rear clam, GT spec hard top, roll cage mods by Ohlin, chassis strengthening, flat floor, aero, sequential box, gearbox/diff pumps & coolers, new interior, airjacks, wider wheels etc.
• 2007 the car was disassembled for a full rebuild and left after team plans changed.
• 2009 I bought the car and brought it back in pieces from Sweden – full rebuild.