News & Welcome

14 July - Make Mine a Double. No, Make That a Treble...

Gavin's 2008 season continued to exceed his expectations with three wins this weekend at Rockingham. On Saturday he won the bonus race dubbed 'The Fans Race' and then on Sunday he came through from the back of the grid twice to win both races in the RS Capp 100. Gavin has, as a result, extended his lead in the championship. Report here.

08 June - Gav maintains 100% on Road Races...

Gav bagged the fastest lap in qualifying and also came through from the back of the field to win Saturday's race at Mondello Park. Mondello is one of the few circuits where Gavin had not win a race before so he was particularly pleased - also to have maintained his 100% record on road circuits. Sunday was another day however and he had the tough job of starting at the very back of the grid again but he was again up to the task - taking the lead from Paul Saunders on the penultimate lap! Gav's report here.

03 June - Be a Pickup Trophy Winner...

Our new fun page competition is now on line. All you have to do to enter is send us an email and tell us where you think Gav had his first ever Pickup Truck racing win. This month's prize is the Trophy that Gav won at Rockingham last time out!

26 May - Gav Wins at Rockingham

Gav still holds the championship lead after taking sixth place, a win and a fastest lap today (26th May) at Rockingham. Gav has now broken Lee Caroline's career win record - Lee had 33, Gav now has 34 under his belt. Report here.

19 May - Rockingham Timetable

The timetable for Rockingham on Bank Holiday Monday has now been made available and it reveals that the Pickups will now have both their races on Monday. Gavin and the team are very much looking forward to the weekend and would like to welcome back Kelly Jayne Wells and Paul Poulter to the track plus a warm welcome to Miguel Gomes who is the formula's first driver to come from Portugal.

27 April - April Fun Page

We're pleased to announce that the winner of the April competiion is: "I think my foot's stuck..." which was entered by Kalie Kaur. Congratulations to Kalie who wins a signed, framed print of Gav in action taken by George McNeill. The team would like to thank everyone who entered as we enjoyed reading all the entries. There will be another competition in the next few days!

20 April - Gav's Double Double

Gav made Pickup history today at Rockingham becoming the first ever driver to win back to back road circuit and oval doubles. Full report here.

16 April - This Weekend's Round

The Pickups return to Rockingham this weekend - the big oval races are always something of a premium event in the UK as it is now the only Super Speedway racing the country. This weekend's round will see the return to Pickups of Neil Tressler who missed Brands Hatch whilst other additions to the grid are former champion Paul Poulter (in Damian Carr's Truck) and ex ASCAR Champion John Mickel. Practice is on Saturday with the two races on Sunday. A superb supporting programme includes Legends, Caterhams, BMWs and Formula Renault.

As always we welcome any fans who wish to drop by and see us in the paddock.

Someone who won't be with us in the paddock this weekend is team owner Alan Seager who is having an operation - we all wish you well Alan and look forward to seeing you in the paddock at the next meeting.

11 April - April Fun Page

We're pleased to announce that entries are coming in for the April fun page competition. If you can come up with the wittiest caption to the photo on the fun page then you could win a one-off signed, framed print of Gav taken by ace lensman George McNeill during #54's double winning Brands Hatch round.

We looking forward to hearing from you.

10 April - Testing at Rockingham

The team were testing at Rockingham on Saturday. Crew Chief Craig (Poodles) Slater and Gavin devised a structured programme for the day during which they tried a number of variations on the set up with the aim of becoming the team to beat at the Rock this season season.

09 April - Congrats to Kev and Jo

The team would like to congratulate Kev King, our regular assistant mechanic, and his wife Jo who recently gave birth to Ruby. Both mother and Ruby are very well. Following his paternity leave at Brands Hatch Kev will be back on the team for Rockingham.

04 April - There's only one Gavin Seager...

...if only that were the case. Thanks to another Gavin Seager who googled himself and found the site and has been in touch. We hope that the other Gavin will become a fan of Pickup Truck Racing this season and we look forward to meeting him later in the season!

28 March - March Fun Page Competition Results

From Alan Seager... I and the team would like to thank all who entered the fun page competition for March, of all the answers some printable and some not (!) we have awarded this months prize to David Tasker (pictured, right) of Paddock Wood, Kent.

His answer: "Gavin was laughing at the new nitros pack fitted to the Nimbus truck" was deemed to have been the best received, after the weekends results I do not think he was far off!

Well done David.

David is a race day Track Marshall at Brands Hatch, we take this opportunity to thank him and his colleagues for the very important role they play as we know without them it would not be possible to go racing.

David will receive a Team Seager t-shirt and baseball cap for his effort.

April's fun page competition will be announced next weekend 4th April.

24 Mar 2008 - Gav Doubles Up

Two races, two wins - both from the back of the grid. That's the news from Brands Hatch. Full report and pictures here. Gav's own report now heads the round one page.

21 Mar 2008 - Easter Update

We are just about all loaded up ready to go and looking forward to an exiting weekend of action at a circuit that usually produces good results for us.

Poodles has been through the truck with a fine tooth comb since our last outing at Donington - he, more than anyone, is aware of the need to finish both races this weekend without mechanical probs or breakdowns. He assures us nothing has been left to chance.

We would like remind all race fans who would like to come along with their families and chat with Gavin or any other member of the team they will be most welcome to do so at any time during the weekend, we have a long break between races 1 and 2 which should provide good opportunity.

Finally Team Seager would like to wish all their their fellow competitors a successful and trouble free weekend and all our supporters and fans a great Easter... as usual a big thank you to our sponsors.

Don't forget to read Gavins weekend report on next Tuesday.

17 Mar 2008 - New Team Base

Team Seager are pleased to announce their recent move to new purpose built facilities adjacent the new Seager Home Solutions headquarters.

Team boss Alan Seager said: "We are very excited by this move. As well as improving the team's base it also affords us increased space which means we can fully and comfortably accomodate a two car race team. The new team has gelled well since being put together incredibly quickly last Spring. The combination of the team and the new facility now gives us the confidence to push on and manage another race car which we hope to have out on circuit by mid-season."

14 Mar 2008 - Brands Entry List

Pickup Truck Racing have confirmed that 21 Trucks are entered for the first round at Brands Hatch on Easter Sunday / Monday. You can access the timetable above. The entry list is as follows...

 

NO	NAME	HOME TOWN
2	DAVE BRIGGS	BOURNEMOUTH
3	JULIAN ARNOLD	LARKFIELD
4	PETER STEVENS	COVENTRY
7	TONY MUMFORD	HOLMES CHAPEL
8	ANDY PYKE	HORLEY
9	PETE WILKINSON	SALFORD
10	CHRIS DAWKINS	MAIDSTONE
14	DAMIEN CARR	SHEFFIELD
15	SIMON CARR	SHEFFIELD
16	STEVE DANCE	READING
21	KELLY JAYNE WELLS	TUNBRIDGE WELLS
22	NIC GRINDROD	BIRMINGHAM
24	RICHARD NOVELL	BEDFORD
26	PAUL SAUNDERS	SURREY
28	RICHARD GRINDROD	BIRMINGHAM
37	NEIL TRESSLER	BULKINGTON
54	GAVIN SEAGER	IPSWICH
63	PHIL WHITE	IVER HEATH
69	LEE ROGERS	EXETER
93	MICHAEL SMITH	HARTLEPOOL
98	ANTONY HAWKINS	SUTTON COLDFIELD

14 Mar 2008 - Welcome to Richard Herrick

We would like to welcome Richard Herrick as a new member to the team. Richard has a keen interest in all aspects of motorsport and we are sure he will be an asset. You can view all the team profiles (which are now complete) via Gav's Profile page.

13 Mar 2008 - Fun Page

We're pleased to announce the relaunch of the fun page and will be running various competitions during the season. Here's looking forward to hearing from you.

12 Mar 2008 - Donington Test

The team had the first run in our new livery today at Donington Park - it was an important test as the Pickups will race their for the first time in several seasons in July as part of the European Truck Racing Championship meeting. Here's the report from Gav's long suffering dad, Alan...

We must be crazy.....early doors again (04:00) for our second practice session of the year at Donington - open pit lane from 09.00 onwards. We had a steady drive up to the circuit with only the usual one scare which on this occasion was an almost seized drum on one of the trailer wheels. We had to stop briefly while "Poodles" took a big hammer to it - he clearly has lost none of his class over the winter!! We arrived unusually early - 08:15 and were able to unload at a fairly casual pace - in actual fact a first for Poodles... we were fuelled and ready to hit the pit lane with 20 minutes to go instead of the usual 20 seconds.

The exercise was arranged primarily as a shake down for the new engine, spare gearbox and recently rebuilt axle and if things went well we were to try one or two ideas with set up.

The first session was completed with only a minor oil leak on the axle which Poodles soon rectified. This enabled us to quickly progress various different setups from a starting point not too far away from the Brands arrangement, going softer then harder with a combination of the two tried on different camber/caster and shock settings.

As lunch approached and following a couple of near misses with two Formula One cars - one an ex Emerson Fittipaldi machine. Both these were some 22 seconds a lap quicker so Gav decided enough was enough and a halt was called to proceedings.

In conclusion, considering weather conditions, (very windy) and cold track we were quite pleased to be lapping lower than our previous best times at Donington and all on fairly worn tyres with only the odd clear lap.

We can now all look forward to Brands at Easter weekend for the season opener in the knowledge that whatever happens at least we will be much better prepared than at the start of last season when a week before we did not have a team let alone a properly tested car!!

Catch Gavin's full report of events after Easter.

11 Mar 2008 - Gav and Hollie Name the Day

All the team and #54 supporters would like to congratulate Hollie and Gav on their engagement. They will be married in July 2009. Sounds like the honeymoon could be at Rockingham or Thruxton...

08 Mar 2008 - Continued Support from Nimbus Motorsport

We would like to announce the re-confirmed support of Nimbus Motorsport for the 2008 season. The support is a continuation of the successful ongoing and consistent technical development between Seager Racing and Nimbus Motorsport.

05 Mar 2008 - Update from Gav

Thought I'd give you a quick update on the site before the next test which is at Donington next week. As you'll have read in my last scribbles we now have Nimbus Motorsport on board - I am very excited to be working with them this year. I know it's something that all race drivers say but please do support our sponsors - we could not do what we do without them.

Over the Winter I signed up on Facebook - one of the social networking sites - it would be great to welcome race fans along as friends on my page there.

You've probably seen the race dates for this season - in Pickups we are already pleased with the first draft fixture list but when we were also confirmed on the DTM bill at Brands, August Bank Holiday weekend that was the icing on the proverbial. All our dates are the motor racing equivalent of premier league football matches this season! More from me soon - all the best, Gav.

13 Feb 2008 - First Test @ Brands Hatch

The Seager team took its maiden voyage of 2008 in a Brands Hatch test today.

We hoped the good weather of late would continue allowing us to continue what we started at on the last meeting of 2007 where the 54 Truck was in a class of its own.

With the truck naked and not yet displaying the new sponsorship deal with Nimbus Motorsport we were ready to go. A full rebuild and chassis spray meant the build up was no easy task. The never ending wait for spare parts engines and gear boxes axles and panels was now over and play time was about to begin.

We arrived early and unloaded the car, Craig (Poodles) had almost done everything which was a big surprise, he worked all night to get us here on time but fog surrounding the Kent circuit delayed the start by half hour.

Eventually we got going, we were in the saloons category with Ginetttas and a selection of Legends and other racing formulae. The track was very green and wet was slippery and we used the first five laps to just run everything and check for leaks.

Session 2 got underway and with a few checks done we were ready for a proper run. The truck set up was that of last meeting so we knew it worked. The car felt really tight and the engine very strong. Traffic was a problem for us - there was nothing in our session within 4 seconds of us and this was dangerous. A few near misses and I'd had enough. I sent Dale (radio man) to see the Clerk of the Course to see if we could be upgraded to the next class, super saloons which consisted of Touring cars, a few Ferrari's and Clio Cup cars.

The Clerk said it was fine and with a new wristband and screen there were no excuses.

Session 3 We were lined up ready for it start. The sun blazing and track temperature rising. One out lap and then we were on it straight in with 52.8 - quicker than the current lap record we had set in 2007. The lads at this point were ripping Dale for having a itchy trigger finger, ha ha! Lap 3 saw a 52.6 and lap four a 52.4. Now half second faster than our record. We came in and a quick tyre temp and visual check was carried out. The afternoon session was run of the mill just changing the setup a lot and seeing how it goes. New design brake pads made by Nimbus were tried and tested and reports made for steve (Nimbus)

That's all for now. A full detailed analysis of our next test at Donington will be done when completed on the 11th march. Thanks everyone what a good day.

2007 News Archive here