IVECO NATIONAL FINALS
In preparation for the finals we lowered the car and fitted heavier springs, hopefully to get it to “chuck” into the corners harder without feeling like it wanted to tip over, this worked great.
We grooved a new set of rear tyres using 31 x 10.5 Maxxis Trepadors, two of us with the aid of a box of Heineken, took 4 hours to cut 2 tyres.
I bought a new crash helmet which allowed for better positioning of goggles to be able to see through roll-off strip.
The short course track being wet in the first race was surprisingly drivey, using plenty of wheelspin the new tyres were able to dig down into the dry layer underneath. Starting from row 3 on the grid, I had big visibility problems as the new peak on my helmet was too high, by lap 3 I was driving without goggles,as they got smashed in half, I finished 2nd behind Clive Thornton.
Race 2, a couple of tweaks to the springs and fitted the old helmets peak to new helmet. Starting from row 4 (last) on the grid, the mud was very thick and sapped horsepower, so it was good to have plenty of grunt, finished 2nd behind Daniel Powell.
Race 3, started 2nd row on grid, but got a bad start as I forgot to do a “burnout” to clear rear tyres prior to grid up. I lost 3-4 places off the start, but found the track to have huge amounts of grip available, to the point where the car pulled a wheelstand going down the hill onto the back straight, hit the bottom, wheelstood up the other side, went over the crest on the back wheels and nearly flipped over backwards. I had to hit brakes to get her back down again, however went on to take 1st place.
Feature race, started last, passed Daniel Powell for the lead about lap 9, lapping traffic I got to be the meat in a V8 sandwich between Gary Baker and Raana which allowed Powell back past, from there we hung on for 2nd place as the track was drivey by now and the rear tyres weren’t sliding sideways enough making corning difficult.
Qualifying, wet and sloppy but the Maxxis Heinekens did their job and we were fastest qualifier.
Top five shootout, actually slid off the top corner going onto back straight, ended up in the sloppy mud, but held it flat and was fastest again.
Enduro. Prior to the start I had visions of the last Whakatane round and had prepared for a long, slow, wet miserable race and had packed 8 pairs of goggles in the car. One set was gone just doing look lap.
I took advantage of pole position to start the race when I wanted to, and gassed it from the bottom of the hill knowing no-one could keep close going up it. After 3 wet slippery laps we were into traffic, with the constant rain the tighter corners were like driving on ice. The smaller lighter cars like Wayne Moriaty could stop, turn and accelerate quicker than me. Thankfully the weather began to clear up and the track got better and better to the point where I can’t remember driving on a better circuit, except for the short course portion of the Enduro track which remained slushy. At times I was throwing the car sideways way before a corner standing on the gas hard and hanging on, drift out into the mush over onto the grass, end up pointing more or less the right direction, still buzzing the tyres and off down the straight, sweet!
I caught up to Daniel Powell, who I knew was in 2nd place and took a lap off him. Next thing I know he wants to race, we passed each other 6 times over 6 laps, once with a bit of bent metal,not really what we should have been doing when he had an overall championship at stake,and I an overall round win,but bloody good fun! Then 1 cop and black flag and a 30 second time penalty for doing a bit of a skid on the dam. This suits me fine as it puts a gap between myself and Powell. I change my goggles, get comfortable and give the car a good old fashioned caning for 5 or so laps until taking the chequered flag for the win.
For me and my hardworking crew a fantastic weekend. For the organisers and sponsors a big success. I cant wait for the next one.
For our team next year, some more shock valving changes, hook up the VTEC so she revs to 10,000 rpm instead of the current 7,500, this will also use the race spec lobe of the camshafts. Wind up the boost down low for better bottom end response, and maybe a bit more horsepower up top (we taper the boost off) at higher revs.
After 2 ½ years battle with this car from new, changing and tweaking just about everything, including throwing out a $20,000 gearbox and replacing it with an Albins unit. It is very satisfying to get this type of result which is what the car is built for.
Congratulations to Daniel Powell NZ1 I hope to wipe the smile off your face come next finals,thats if you havn’t got lockjaw from grinning 12 months non stop.
Neville (MAX) Smith
.jpg){kind=small}