Vanessa was finally assembled at 4am on the Friday morning. Poor weather had hindered the cosmetic repairs to the other cars we're looking after, and Vanessa lost out as a result, leaving the senior Harrison toiling long into the night whilst Bears slept in readiness for the journey.

A shift change saw one Kutukan hunker down in the lorry to sleep as the other awoke to drive it. That’s efficiency for you.

The trip in the lorry, 3 cars-up, across the Pennine pass is one best slept through anyway, if you can watch Bear drive it you have enough nerve to be a test pilot for rocket-powered ski boots.

Arriving at Oulton with time to spare, Vanessa rather stole the show, her new livery rather dramatic. A slow start to the day had her equipped with T1R rubber as she wore at Brands, and the laptimes reflected it. A feeling of instability from the rear prompted a significant reset of the front dampers, the remaining unpredictability being the use of a heavy throttle foot in conjunction with tyres lacking any attention to pressure settings, she was rather wild at the rear. We reserve judgement as to whether her namesake is similarly equipped.

Laptimes, however, were good enough to outpace the Bearded Webster on his 235 R1Rs, which was most encouraging. I know we’re lighter, but even so we’d expect the Green Hornet to be on the pace, so if we can get away from him that’s not half bad, if we strap on the R1R race rubber we'll clear off.

Lunchtime, and other than a minor oil leak and a pressure gauge going barmy, she’s going well. A change to R1Rs, decent fronts borrowed from Bear’s car, rears so bald that they’d gone blue, and off to try again. The increase in grip produced instant results as the times dropped to a 2.05.5 lap. For reference purposes that’s the time Coppock set last year on the way to the race win.

Bear is starting to look a little nervous. His best here is actually the XJS lap record, a 2.04 flat. It was set in a far more potent machine. To be that close with a stock engine, to what we considered at the time to be a blistering lap, only serves to reinforce his view that I am not altogether sane, but he doesn’t want to be beaten. Spurred on by this, I’m only going to try harder.

I have finally knocked some of the rust off my brain, throttle applications are getting smoother as I learn to tame the rear end, which is still a little floaty, and my lines are adapting to the untrustworthy rear end, apexes are getting earlier, the car becoming a bit more V12-ish to drive. Discussions about re-visiting the rear springs are in-depth, and far beyond my ken. Or Barbie.

The total lack of door mirrors has so far seen me nearly collect a very big and expensive Ferrari, a very expensive Porsche, and a small blue thing, each of which appeared out of nowhere from one of Oulton’s many dips and corners at a speed that left a boggle of the mind, slicing past me in a storm of noise that was pretty much my only indication they were there.

For the last session of the day a real treat. Rear tyres with tread on them. Not much, but some. The plan, given it may rain tomorrow, is three laps to bed them to the car’s camber settings, three hot ones to set pressures, then done. Can't run longer, we can't afford the wear.

The three laps to bed them in dropped the laptime to a 2.04.7, faster than anyone last year except the Bear. The rear instability has near-vanished, and I’m getting set to really lay into this place when I make a rather foolish error. Going for a later entry to Druids that ignores the first apex, the correct way to go about it, I go for a line that only Helen would enjoy, far too late on the brakes and turn in, and it’s all going wrong in a hurry. I see the grass through the passenger window, then the windscreen, and then gravel appears as I spear backwards into the grit. Stops you very well though, good stuff. A trip back to base, day over, chasing the rabbits down the grass to shake the gravel out of the car off the racing line.

News of the time allows a smirk, I hadn’t set what I think is a proper lap. Trouble with doing this at the end of a day though is now I get no real practice on the rubber I’m using, and my confidence into Druids has taken a knock. My belief in the car is worth seconds per lap, I have to trust it.

Good news is I’ve saved a lot of rubber, fuel and brakes, I can now afford to be here!

A trip to the bar to dodge the incoming rain reveals the world's most amusingly sarcastic, psychotic barmaid. If she'd only been about a decade older... Next time you're in the area, rent a Bentley and stop by. Trust me.

Race day dawned wet. An overnight downpour had saturated the track, and as first group out, indeed first car out, I had the joy of finding the grip. First three laps I thought I had it sorted, I was escaping the lot of them, but just as it did in 2008 when I won that first race here, it started to dry, and I was set for the wet.

As the dry line appeared, incredibly fast, so the track changed lap by lap. I was getting faster, but it was also getting looser, and I could see Gail and Rich closing back in on me. Not good. Last lap and my tyres were not working at all, far over-pressure and slippery everywhere despite the grip clearly now available, and a long slide at Druids did little to encourage me there.

A cool-down lap and the rubber is still overpressure in the paddock, 42lb all round after three minutes of slowdown lap and a chat with a marshall suggests very high pressure out there. Little wonder that she’d felt a bit loose.

Timesheets, however, give me pole position for the XJS, a fraction clear of Stewert. Nice. What a debut for Vanessa! Pole again in a stock-power car, Oulton appears to be my speciality. And I thought that was Cadwell!

As predicted though, two saloons ahead of us. Not a problem, unlike some at Donington I know I’m not racing them. So long as the XJSs I’m after are behind them, I’m ok to stay back here. What does strike me is that I'm suddenly right in the thick of it, there are people out here out for points and championships, and I've out-qualified myself, in the midst of all this and not giving a toss about any of it, I'm a cameo in this season.

The worry is that there are V12s everywhere. I’m in what has become the normal situation, in front of a pile of cars with well over an extra 100bhp and enough torque that they stand still but rotate the planet beneath them. Damn.

Dry weather cooked the track into a racetrack again, and out we go to do battle.

I've been practicing race starts for a week at the traffic lights in Barnsley, there's a real skill to launching on the absence of a light, the disappearance of the colour red is something to consider next time you're at the roundabout.

Lights out and Vanessa’s light rear end tramps the drive wheels, Gail is slow away and I slot past her easily as Stewert launches into 2^nd. But as I go for third I find fifth gear, and she bogs down as I stir the box to find 4^th, which will do, as Bye comes past like a rocket, and Coppocks pulls alongside. I’m nice to him at Old Hall, could have run him onto the exit, but it’s not my style, he's every right to be there, no sense being silly about this.

Down to 5^th by turn 2 then, which was not the plan. Coppock does his usual late move wide and early braking, so Vanessa goes tight and looks to his inside, but he’s slow enough to have grip to shut the door. I had banked on him being committed to his line at full speed, the ability to change direction in the corner says to me that he’s not driving fast enough. Whichever way you look at it, the gap vanishes and I get out of it.

Haplessly watching the V12 romp away out of the corner a mirror check shows Comer behind me. 6^th place by turn 2? How does he do those starts, how?

The problem now is that without power I'm stuck. Vanessa's speed is in cornering, and if you're close behind a car and cannot corner at your pace, you have no speed, the other car simply points and squirts on the throttle, leaving you adrift.

A nice leap through turn 3 and I go for the inside outbrake, but Lawrence sees it coming and moves over, nearly a disaster but I get it stopped and go wide and high for the cutback, but find 5^th gear again, lousing up the attack on the exit.

A lap to settle down then, suss out the V12 weakness, which seems to be under braking. And corners. And putting the power down. Pretty much everything except that Star Wars acceleration. Last corner and he’s all sideways on the exit, but still with enough grunt that I can’t attack. Difficult now, he’s holding me up but I can’t close on him, I’m slow into corners for fear of getting the timing wrong and ramming him on the exit. My fear of lift-off oversteer has been pronounced since 2009, when Helen’s debut ended on lap 2 at Coram!

Gail is now in the mirrors, but there is little to be done with a car ahead. Logic says let her by, she will be far more aggressive with Lawrence, and I’d rather they collide than damage young Vanessa. On the other hand, if I want to win this I need past Coppock and Bye to hunt Stew. Gail decides this for me into Knickerbook, I check the mirror and see her coming in on the brakes very late and very hot. No way she’s going to make it, she’s about to crash straight into my driver's door if I turn in, so I leave the door wide open and stand Vanessa on her nose, only to watch Gail, with the extra room now available, make the corner and take the position.

Mutterings in my helmet. She did have the remarkably good grace to thank me after the race for opening the door, acceptance that my evasive action dodged a collision enough to sate my anxiety that I’d made the correct call. Never quite been a fan of diving on someone under braking, a do or die move usually ends in death, and I do my own bodywork, I know how long it takes.

This leaves me 6^th, which is no good at all. It’s about where I should be, in fact I predicted 7^th on Facebook, but I am faster than this today, so game face on.

It’s about this moment that I woke up, it’s amazing how rusty you get from not being in combat so long, but some of it had been knocked off, just a shame it took 2 laps out of 8 to do so. It literally took me this long to realise we were racing, to shake the sense of unreality.

Closed back in on the Coppock/Hill scrap, and swarmed the mirrors. Always better in attack than defence, pick their weak spots and try to exploit. The car feels good, more confident in it, and I’ve got a few corners that I can mount an attack. Gail is an on-the-brakes assassin, which I’m not. I’m a corner exit overtaker, a remnant of my class D education, carry more corner speed and get them on the exit, which is how you get them with no power. I've always raced with a power deficit, the problem leading the roadgoing class is you're always racing a superior car being driven badly. 

Problem is you need a LOT more corner speed against superior power. Gail’s car is heavier, but pulling much more power, it simply runs away down the straights, and despite my attacks I can only get alongside, never ahead. With a great corner exit and the slipstream I can hold her, which is brilliant, but the car is screaming to do it.

She dives inside Lawrence and runs wide, allowing me to pass her down the pit straight, got her cold. You fly past with ten mph in hand, but she pulls level by the end of the straight, huge power in that thing, and the exhausts so loud it's loud inside my car. This leaves me off line into Old Hall and early on the brakes, she drives clean around me on the outside as I again have to be a good boy on the exit and she storms away as we get to a straight bit.

It’s about this moment that I spot the dashboard. Zero oil pressure. Water temp above maximum. Lots of peering at the dash and trying to work out what to do, no flags for me, nothing smoking, no trail on the track, when the impossible rev counter draws my attention. With a shift light glowing red and the car screaming for a gearchange, we’re not doing 3000rpm. The dash has died. Great. Of all the moments to choose that trick.

Half a lap wasted, eyes back outside, catch them up again. Lawrence makes it easy by falling off. Gail's car is a bonnet ornament, I'm clearly faster, and caught in a dilemma. We're two seperate races, XJS and saloons. We're not one race at all, and the car I'm racing is my team-mate Stewert, who is now sitting in the lead of this race fast asleep, so much quicker than the saloons that he's wishing he had a radio. We are 1st and 2nd in our race, I don't need to mess with these XJ6s.

I have a few speculative looks at Gail, why not? We're here, it's fun, think of it as a one-race stand, I'll stick it in if there's a chance.

Dorlin makes it simple by breaking the gearbox, Gail appears to pass him under yellow flags, and I do wonder if that gives me third place and the podium, do I need to start my interview rehearsal? Not my call to make, yellows can oft be a judgement call. Rich has broken it properly though, I fly past too, and we close on Bye to create a white chocolate Magnum, white yellow white. It dawns on me that if I can pop the pair of them I can have a 1-2 with Stewert. But we’ve already got that, we’re not racing the saloons. It does strike me that we’ve done the job already. Curiously, that frees my mind a little, and though I have a few exhuberant looks at Gail again, I don’t mind as we flash across the line as a 60-foot 3-driver Jaguar, it was that close at the end.

From Gail furiously fisting the dash I’m guessing she’s had as much fun as I did. Either that or she's cross. Opening the door to wave I toured the 2.75 miles of OultonPark becoming aware of how much air pressure is exerted on a door at speed, as it slowly crushed the blood flow to my arm.

Three things to work on then. Mirrors would be handy. A new dash. And some ventilation. Got a bit toasty in here.

The results sheet said I set 2^nd fastest lap, beaten only by Stew. We took 1^st and 2^nd XJS, two complete sets of perfect points, and the next class E car was 50 seconds adrift. We’re prepared to call that a good day for Vanessa. It’s a race debut we can be proud of. No damage, a hard, clean race, a good result. 230bhp, it's the future.

Celebratory Pimms required.

Vanessa’s out again in 2 weeks with a guest pilot. You might even recognise him. Small chap,  weighs the same as my socks, fights He-Man.