Noble storms to victory
Noble M400 proves itself class of the field
Lee Noble stormed to victory at last weekend’s Yokohama Mid-Engine Sports Cars series at Silverstone with a lead of more than seven seconds in his Noble M400, after a frustrating run of second places.
Lee gained pole by 1.5 seconds, with a fastest lap of 1:03.93 and lead the race from the start. Barrie Wight and Sam Blogg, both driving Lotus Motorsport Elises, held second and third places throughout the race, despite manic attempts to catch the Noble.
The Noble gained such a sizeable lead by the race’s mid-way point – almost 12 seconds – that Lee decided to ease off the power to preserve fuel and tyres. After this, the near-silence and composure of the gently-driven Noble seemed at odds with the raucous Lotus dog-fight happening just behind it. While rain made conditions slippery for the last few laps, Lee still managed to lap the last two cars in the field before taking the flag.
After 16 years out of motorsport, Lee’s win showed that he was back on the pace, while also demonstrating the prowess of his company’s latest road car, the Noble M400. With a 425bhp, twin-turbocharged engine, the race-M400 is virtually identical to the road going car, which was recently voted Best Driver’s Car of the Year by Autocar magazine.
The last race in the Yokohama series will take place at Donington Park on Sunday, October 10.
So has anybody got near 1:03 round Silverstone on a track day with a standard car?
lance robinson said:
A win is a win.... but on balance it is not especially impressive. Judging by the number of people in the photos from earlier race meetings it seems that the Noble has a fair bit of factory support too.
So has anybody got near 1:03 round Silverstone on a track day with a standard car?
1.03 and much faster
G MAN
Yeh I was at the race. Lee's car has more than 200 bhp advantage over the motorsport elises so its pretty meaningless as a victory really. In fact it shows just how well driven the elises were to be only 7 or so seconds behind frankly! Also the short national circuit at sivlerstone is pretty much three long straights, very much a power circuit.
that name rings a bell, but I can't think why. 
You can get the results off www.amoc.org with all the times in pdf. Look for St John Horsefall results.
Despite an hp advantage he has designed ,developed and buit a car which sells and wins on the track.
Although production is in Sud Afrique, these are British cars. Like lotus is UK but owned by malaysian, like TVR is but owned by NIK SMALL.
British in spirit!
Hoorah!
rev-erend said:
Sounds like his car has about 200bhp more that the Lotus cars..
And 50% more weight...
700kgs for a motorsport elise verses 1060kgs for the Noble. Makes a difference in the corners. The Noble that came last was a road car driven by it's owners for his first ever race and has only got 310bhp so can't be compared with the M400.
It was obviously capable of creaming the rest of the GT class at Thruxton. It was just minor niggles such as an overheating ECU (leading to misfires) and a disintegrating wheel that stopped it winning.
ribbo said:
i was stood on the same bank that photo was taken and you could tell that the only reason that noble wasnt streaking away was because it was visibly a lot more heavier than the elises and TVR's on the track, tell you what tho, watching it do standing starts up the paddock was a sight, what a lovely car
Which mid-engined TVR would that be then?
The car in the GT series does look very quick, as previously said, at Thruxton it had the beating of the field especially in the second race. Any chance of them heading to LM any time soon?
info can be found here (as for a second you had me thinking "im sure the tuscan isnt a midship car"
) www.motorsnippets.com/750mc/racing/results/Silverstone_28th_August_Roadsports.pdf
ribbo said:
i was under the impression that the yokohama midengine challenge was part of the 750MC Roadsports race which aside from a griffith, audi TT a shed load of ginnettas and one of the nicest porsches i've EVER seen (mal davidson's 993 car number 2) contained a Mr Doug Ellwood in his very nice Tuscan (car 25) who Lee was sparring with for some of the race.
info can be found here (as for a second you had me thinking "im sure the tuscan isnt a midship car"
www.motorsnippets.com/750mc/racing/results/Silverstone_28th_August_Roadsports.pdf
It would appear there's two championships here the AMOC Yokohama Mid Engined Sportcar Series and the 750MC Roadsports Championship and that cheeky Mr Noble is racing in both of them
He came third in the 750MC event at Silverstone on Bank Holiday weeknd and won the AMOC one at Silverstone two weeks later.
Now, form an orderly queue to flame me!
www.motorsnippets.com/750mc/
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