Leader Grieve keeps his cool

May 23 2007 By Richard Neale, The Journal

Legends racer Chris Grieve is well on the way to defending his UK championship crown after a superb weekend at Croft left him leading the 2007 event by 205 points from Peter Morton.

The Hexham driver is only 23 but already has the highest average points-per-race of anybody who has ever competed in the national championship and is looking forward to even more success.

Introduced to racing by his car-mad family - both his dad Willie and grandfather raced and are now team manager and director respectively - Grieve first got behind the wheel of a cart when he was five years old. As he grew older he moved up the levels and took the 2002 karting Open Championship before moving into Legends racing.

After feeling the pressure toward the end of last season - which finally saw him take the championship by 165 points - the driver is in a much calmer frame of mind this year.

"I'm a pretty laid-back person really and I don't let things get to me," said the young racer. "I try not to think about the race too much until the Friday before I travel. It's been a fantastic start to the season and I'm delighted with it, but I'm having to think about backing off a bit in races and not getting too excited. It's easier to make a mistake and lose a race than it is to drive well and win the race.

"And I suppose if you make a mistake it can lead to a loss of confidence, meaning you make more mistakes and lose races, so I'm hoping to go the season without making a major mistake."

One thing which has helped Grieve is the reliability of his car, something which has mainly come about being as he and his father are both mechanics.

"Being a mechanic really helps because we took the car apart and rebuilt it when we first got it two years ago, meaning if something goes wrong I know what it is when I'm racing. I think that gives me a bit of an edge over some drivers.

"We have completely changed the engine because the 1250cc model we were using was a closed engine, meaning if something went wrong with it you had to send it off to one of only three places in Britain where it could be mended.

"We can repair the 1200cc model we're now using, so everything is done in-house, meaning if something goes wrong it's our fault - but we can put it right."