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There
I was at Turn 3
By
John Kendrew
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There I was at turn 3 – Part
1 7
Well,
it’s been a while hasn’t it? I’m sorry for the delay in continuing
the series (you may not be) but the computer I had access to just
wasn’t up to doing what I wanted. The printer used
little chisels to etch prose on to thin slabs of stone and it is really
a pain trying to find those slabs
anywhere. Now I have a real computer!
This time I’m
going to rabbit on about stern chases, also known as coming from the
back of the pack. Some of the most entertaining races happen when some
poor soul in a really fast car has to start at the back for some reason
and must work his way to the front. The stock car boys at
local races have even made this standard practice just to add to the
excitement, and it does. We have all seen Michael Shumacher and Kimi
whatshisname blast up through the pack in F1 but it’s more
exciting when there are a lot more cars on the track.
I’ve seen a few of
these edifying (look it up) sessions and even participated in a few. The
one I saw at Seattle in the late 70s was an extreme example. It was the
big bore sedan and sports car race. There were all the usual suspects,
Cameros, Mustangs, Corvettes, and sundry other fast cars (by our
standards that was!) There was also one lone Chevy Monza which bore
about much resemblance to a real Monza as a NASCAR car does to it’s
namesake. This car belonged to a team that had bought it from an IMSA
team which had run it the GTO class the previous year. There had even
been an article in Road&Track about this evil device.
The only stock component was the
roof! It was a tube frame replica with a monster motor and steamroller
tires. It shook the ground while it idled and looked to be a brutal
handful on the track. It also had more bugs in than a slum tenement, the
team spent all their sessions trying to get the thing to run right. It
appeared to be blindingly fast down the straight but they failed to get
any qualifying time because of the problems. This meant that they would
have to start from the back of the pack - which should make it
really interesting!
Usually I don’t bother to watch
the other races because I’m too busy working on my own car but I
decided to make an exception in this case. I watched the cars rumble
away from the grid and the Monza was stuck way back in about 30th place
behind a lot of really fast cars. The pack set off on the pace lap and
the tension and anticipation rose as we all speculated as to just how
long it would take the Monza to work its way to the front. The green was
out and the race began.
The Monza blasted up the pit
side of the straight like a runaway missile, storming by about 20 cars
before it disappeared into turn 1. Wow! That was impressive! We
awaited the arrival of the pack with great anticipation. The Monza
burst onto the front straight all by itself and blew by us at well over
160 mph. It disappeared over the crest into turn 1 before the others had
even entered the straight! Now that was fast - but it was all in vain.
The sound meter said tilt! and the black flag ended the run on the
second lap. Apparently he had passed the race leader going through turn
4 on the first lap. Said leader drove a very fast late sixties style
Trans-Am Camero which was bloody quick. Ten years or so in race cars is
like 10 years in computers. The new ones are always fastest. Yet this
was last years car!
I actually did one better than that
during a race at SIR in the summer of 1977. The powers that be decided
that F sports racing would run with the small bore production cars
since we were too “slow” to run with the other sports racers. I was
running the 970 S Mini in FSR that year so this meant I had to race with
the production cars. Just to compound the situation some bright spark
decide to grid my class at the back. Bill Stevens and I were the only
FSR’s so we formed the back row. This was going to be interesting!
I spent the pace lap figuring
out where I would go on the start. As I was on the right side and the
field usually went down the left side of the wide front straight I
figured I had a good chance of getting well up by turn 1. The field
slowed right down as we came up on the green flag. I downshifted into
first and held her at 7000 rpm. The green waved and I nailed throttle,
10500 in first. shift, 10500 in second, shift, 10000 in third as I
stormed past the field and slotted into 4th place as we filtered through
1. It had been like Douglas St at rush hour with my throttle
jammed wide open. I was 2nd by the time we exited Big Indy and I grabbed
the lead going into 3a only to lose that lead to Bill as we exited 3b.
Bill and I scrapped for a while but he finally prevailed in the end.
This was the last time they made us start at the back!
Later in the day one of the
production drivers came up and asked me how I made such great
starts. My answer was simple “arrange to more horsepower than anyone
else”.
I did have one occasion at Portland
in 77 to make a voyage of recovery that went on for the whole race. It
was a typical Portland weekend with a huge entry so the organizers were
forced to juggle the grids around so as to accommodate all the
cars entered. There were not a lot of E&F sports racers there that
weekend so we ended up in the small bore production race again. Because
a series of minor mechanical problems. I arrived at the grid just
as the front group was pulling onto the track so I was forced to tag
onto the back, 43rd out of 43 cars! I knew I had a huge task ahead of me
if I wanted to get up to the front. I couldn’t even see the pace-car I
was so far back.
The green came out even before I had
exited the last turn so I didn’t get my usual Banzai start
which meant I was forced to pick them off one after another. The traffic
was horrendous and none of them wanted to give way. I went left and
right, passed on the inside, passed on the outside, under braking and
while cornering, any way at all. It was like a video game with no reset
button! I figured out later that I must have passed over a hundred cars
since I lapped many at least once and quite a few twice or even 3 times.
Near the end of the race I was catching a very nice prodifeid Ford
Pinto. I was halfway down the straight to start/finish when I noticed
they were giving him the last lap board. Well, maybe I can get by him
and move up another place because I was sure I had not seen him before.
I closed relentlessly pulling back several car lengths on every corner.
I was on his tail as we exited the last corner and headed for the
checker. I popped out of the draft and tried to slingshot past. I was
level with his rear wheels at the line and actually completed the pass
just past the flag. Expressions of discontent!
When I returned to my paddock
spot I was greeted by a swarm of excited Mini lovers. That when I found
out that my attempted pass was for the lead. The Pinto had lead from the
start and I nearly ruined his perfect race. So, I had finished 2nd -
just think- if I had of taken my grid spot I would have won the race
going away.
However, one of the Mini
people had a tale to tell me. The group was sitting in the stands
watching my progress through the field when they became aware of a fan
sitting in front of them who was yelling “go Honda go” every time I
appeared. Then he said “that’s the fastest Honda 600 I’ve ever
seen! Comes the dawn! My friends realized he had confused my car
with the similar appearing, but far slower, Honda. One of them leaned
forward and gently told him that that car was a Mini not a Honda. He sat
there in silence for a few laps and then started yelling “go, Mini ,
go”. It had been an exciting race even from the outside and it was my
personal high-water mark for number of cars passed. In these days
of fixed run groups and timed qualifying and smaller grids of more
matched cars it is unlikely I will ever do that again. In some ways the
old days were better!
There I was at turn 3 – Part 16
Thiwat3 p15 prodded some of my scattered
memories of the Seventies to congeal together and produce the
following un-edifying (but mildly amusing – at least I think so
and I'm the one writing this – and you are the one reading it
?!?) tale.
It was 77 and I was racing my Mini at Western
speedway in the 1st VMSC race of the season. I had made some
changes to the Mini over the winter. I had installed some new and
better (supposedly) valve springs and fitted one of the latest
Longman-3 branch headers. All in the search for more revs and more
power. The only result so far had been that engine stopped revving
at 9500 but it seemed to have a broader torque curve. This meant
it had enough torque to peel the skin off a banana at 5000 instead
of 6000 as before. The power band was 5000 to 9500 instead of 6000
to 10500. No increase but a decrease in revs is always nice.
1977 was not a vintage year in "D Improved
Sedan". My cars utter domination of the class had led most
competitors to give up so attendance was minimal. I could only be
beaten if I beat myself by mistakes or breakage. Everyone else was
just a spear-carrier at best. Still, others did show up – only
to be annihilated. I could lap most of my competitors 2 or 3 times
in a 30 minute race at most tracks so they did the reasonable
thing and gave up and bought something faster in another class.
However some still turned up and took their drubbing, always
hoping I would break.
This was the situation at the VMSC race that
year. I only had one competitor in "D" and he was
driving a Fiat 850 coupe that was underpowered and ill-handling at
best. I out-qualified him by several seconds (at Western if you
were a second faster it was like being 5 seconds quicker at a
"real" track). The race promised to be eminently
forgettable. And it was - except for an incident part way through
the snore-fest. I had just lapped the Fiat, which was exciting
because I caught him exiting the oval and I was on him so fast we
nearly collided as he wandered aimlessly into my path. I managed
to out-fumble him and was off into the middle distance when a
problem reared it's ugly head.
Once again there was horrid outburst of noise
from under the car but this time there came an ugly clatter and
rattle as well. The exhaust had come loose and dropped on the
pavement. I backed off and crippled around to the hot pits. I shut
the engine off and a crowd of people descended on the car, someone
grabbed a jack and lifted the right side of the car into the air.
An intrepid soul – Paul Bonner I believe- dove underneath and
ripped the offending system out. I could see it was not just the
exhaust pipe but also the whole collector, exhaust pipe and
muffler system that had come free. Yipes! The drooped the car back
on the ground and said "Go!"
By then the Fiat had gone by twice to unlap
himself and now he was leading "D". I fired the car up
and, miracle of miracles, it lit (970's did not like to hot start)
As I scuttled back onto the track I learned why collectors were
necessary for headers. There was no power below 7500 rpm and the
motor went flat at 8500. Plus the noise was dreadful – almost as
ugly sounding as miss-firing rotor motor.
I had to change my driving style completely.
Instead of running flat out in 3rd from the hairpin to the hairpin
I had to row the car around trying to keep in my narrow power
band. I was shifting 9 times a lap instead of 2! And the car
sounded bloody awful as well! At least this time I wasn't being
gassed as well – I had no door windows!
My head ringing, I rowed on at a good rate of
knots and closed rapidly on the Fiat and soon was past him again.
But, I still had to get by him one more time to ensure a class
victory and I only had a few minutes to do it. I slashed my way
though traffic, running as hard as I ever did at Western in my
need to catch him. That pesky 1000 RPM power band did not make it
easy! I had to take desperate chances to avoid losing any momentum
– fall off the power-band and I was in trouble. I caught him
with just a lap or two to go and muscled by him going into the
hairpin. Victory – I had beaten
my exhaust jinx.
So what did I do about the exhaust system you
ask? Well, I decided to put the old design long center branch
manifold back on because the engine had proved to be so sensitive
to exhaust tuning. As soon as I did that the engine reverted to
it's previous rev happy ways and all was peaceful (well sort of)
in my little toy. Faithful followers (both of you) will remember I
mentioned in one of my previous maunderings that this was one of
the advantages my car had over John Erith's. So we come full
circle.
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