After a frantic 3 weeks involving an engine change and the valves hitting the pistons on the new engine, we managed to make it to Trois-Rivieres for the Touring and GTU races with zero testing on the car. Carl was running in the GT-class race with 40 other cars of up to 700 hp (Porsche 935). I got to see the street circuit at low speed the night before the event started, which made me less nervous about running a new track, especially one lined with armco.

Carl practiced first and all went well. He was around 25th out of 40 cars, despite having one of the lowest powered cars out there. Later in the day when I went out, the alternator light came on in the dash, first at high RPM, then all the time. The belt was toast yet again. It turns out the crank pulley and alternator pulley don't line up since we put in the new block. I managed to run within 2 seconds of Carl's time, which was about right given that he was on V710's and I was on K104 street tires. We had 2 extra batteries with us and Carl qualified on battery power only. He managed a 27th out of 38 cars still running, which was not bad at all. The next morning, I qualified 20th out of 27 cars, which is consistent with how I've been running all year. I was within 1.7 seconds of Carl's time, so I was happy with myself... it meant I was learning the track well.

We hoped Carl would last the 40 minutes of his race with no alternator and we had a spare battery in the pits just in case. He was having some good battles in the race when he pulled off the course after 27 minutes. We were wondering what happened because usually you have some warning before the battery dies. It turns out the motor let go. I guess than when the pistons hit the valves the week before, it weakened the wrist pins under the shock. We knew it was a risk going in, but after four trouble-free sessions (engine-wise), I was quite shocked and a little depressed. It cost 500$ to sign up for this event and I hadn't even turned one race lap.

When all seemed lost, my crew member and friend Roberto offered me the use of his car for the race the next day. He has a Touring car as well but tooke the weekend off to save some money. I had driven the car the week before at a lapping day and found that it had evil handling characteristics... but I accepted anyways, figuring I could take it easy, drive conservatively and have some fun. His car is similar to mine on paper: it's an Integra with a stock ITR engine and tranny, about the same weight and spring rates. He runs the fat Progress rear sway bar an I run none.

We wento to Montreal and got the car back to the track the same night. They had added a morning warmup session to the schedule (thank god). I had my buddies disconnece the rear sway bar and they noticed the front one was loose on one side. Carl adjusted the Konis to a setting he said I would like (if there's a guy who knows how to set up Konis on an Integra, it's Carl Wener) and I went out for 2 laps before a car caught fire and ended the session. Well, 2 laps is better than 0.

I was gridded last for the race, which was 24th. I had qualified 20th, so it wasn't a huge drop. By the 3rd lap or so, I had passed 5 cars and was getting into a battle with the Jetta that I've been fighting with all season. The guy who qualified 19th was in front of me, so I was where I was supposed to be all along. I could not keep up with that guy and exchanged position with the Jetta 5 or 6 times. The Jetta owner had seen his own problems, as he blew his tranny in qualifying and was running an open diff (with big VR6 power and torque) in his spare tranny for the race. We were both handicapped then, and still running together. I got caught up lapping a slower car and lost alot of track position to the Jetta in the final laps. We were getting lapped by another white Integra and the Jetta was blocking him, thinking it was me! The fast Integra lapped the Jetta and I was close behind on the start finish straight. I was only a couple of feet behind the Jetta, thinking I would try to outbrake hm for turn one... when the checker fell. I hadn't known it was the last lap (although had I known, I doubt I could have done anything different, as I had already made up a huge deficit in two laps). We ended up 13th and 14th, and I was quite happy with that, since I haven't finished better than 13th all year. I had gained 10 positions from my last place start with a borrowed car, so I can't complain. My lap times were less than a second off my qualifying time, which shows that I was probably not pushing as hard as I would have with my own car, since Rob and I are usually very even in the series. At least I had made the car handle safely (if not conservatively). I can't wait til they show the race on TV, as apparently our battle was featured heavily on the jumbo screens (assuming they use the same shots to produce the TV version). Usually, you never see me at all unless I'm getting lapped.

All in all, it turned out to be an excellent weekend thantks to Rob and the rest of the crew, as well as Trac Racing and TK Race Heads, who worked so hard so I could be there. Thanks guys!

Me in Rob's car (note the hand cut letters for my name on the side windows and the number 89 hastily converted to make a 00)



Modified by Civic44 at 5:40 PM 8/8/2005

 

nice!!!


chad....counting the days till....