Have you heard of the Junior Saloon Car Championship? No. Same here, until Dad came across of the event organisers in the food area queue - Here's my time photographing the JSCC Championship at Oulton Park.
How did I get to photograph the JSCC Citroen Saxo's?
Whilst I was photographing some exciting performance cars in the car park. My Dad managed to speak to the Junior Saloon Car Championship (JSCC) event organisers whilst he ordered his food.
Dad noticed the event organiser had National Autism Society (NAS) on their apparel. Dad discussed autism and gave the event organiser my leaflet.
Sadly, the photographer couldn't make it to the event to take pictures of the cars. But, the event organisers looked at my leaflet and said: "can your son photograph our event, including the?"
Paddocks
Assembly Area
Cars on Track
Dad said, "sounds like a fantastic idea. I'll tell my son that". While I had lunch with Dad, he told me about an impromptu photoshoot. I felt excited!
Once we approached the paddock area, (closed to the public) we asked the marshalls "can we can take pictures of the Race Car Citroen Saxo's?"
The Marshalls said, "we weren't supposed to be here. However we can make an exception if you look don't appear conspicuous". We thanked the marshalls!
What did I get to photograph in the JSCC paddocks?
Once, we got instructions from the marshall to head to the black and green JSCC coach. We met the organisers and marketing leads. Thumbs up.
They asked us "if we can photograph the Citroen Saxo's with the team's drivers besides them in the paddock/assembly area and the cars driving on the track?" We said "sure."
After our briefing, we photographed the Race-ready Citroen Saxo's. The highlights were:
Oliver Cottom Motorsport #98 Red and Blue Saxo, for its clean and classy livery.
Alfie Jenkins #754 White, Pink, White and Blue Saxo. Due to the vibrant and unique livery on the car.
What challenges did I overcome?
The biggest challenge I overcame during the JSCC impromptu photoshoot was photographing the drivers next to the cars.
I had to adapt my knowledge from photographing dogs into doing portraits. My favourite portrait came from Alex Solley and his fluorescent yellow/silver #12 Saxo. Alex was very relaxed with the camera.
I also had to be very aware of the traffic not to get in the way of the drivers and teams doing work to the vehicle. But, also manage my stimuli, so it didn't become overwhelming.
How to improve neurodiversity in motorsport
It was incredible that the Junior Saloon Car Championship genuinely promoted neurodiversity. We also saw different people with a variety of additional needs (physical or mental).
It's a great idea to find people with different ways of thinking to encourage their friends/community to support a form of motorsport.
Whether it's via doing media for the event (photo/video or blog) to help them further their careers; showing the individual who would struggle with the stimuli of the paddock via first-person video perspective.
Even speaking to the event organisers and drivers how they progressed from go-karts to advancing to their dream motorsport championship. It would inspire the person to move forward with the goal, with the event organisers making a difference to their community. Bonus!
Conclusion
Thank you to the event organisers at JSCC for letting me photograph the teams Citroen Saxo's and the drivers. It was a pleasure to take pictures where fewer people are walking around your pictures.
I hope to see these drivers for next year's JSCC championship around the country to see how far the drivers progress.
If you come across someone with additional needs and is interested in helping your motorsport; give them the chance to contribute to your scene. It's a win-win situation.
What's the best opportunity you've had? Let me know in the comments below, and if you've found the article inspiring, please share my post on your social media channels.