My season started with an email from Jakester in the middle of April, saying the first race was coming up the first weekend in May.<\/p>\n
I wasn\u2019t planning to go. In Middleofnowhere, Oregon, the car was in the trailer where she\u2019d been since I\u2019d drained water out of the block last fall. I had my racing license, but hadn\u2019t even paid my annual dues to the club. I thought I\u2019d be race-ready by June.<\/p>\n
Jakester was having absolutely none of that. At age 15, he\u2019s still crew chief and decided the season doesn’t begin when we are ready; we are ready when the season begins.<\/p>\n
“Time to suit up,” he says. That\u2019s not a direct quote, because Jakester is more discreet than that, but that\u2019s what he meant and I got the message. Three days later we were signed up, fueled up, tuned up and fired up.<\/p>\n
Good thing Jakester woke me up. Cowboy called about a day after everything was finished, asking if I was going to the Spring race, and I was able to say, \u201cYeah, I\u2019m ready. You?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNah, it\u2019s supposed to rain.\u201d<\/p>\n
Actually, I think Cowboy doesn\u2019t want anyone to see what he cooked up over the winter. He likes to surprise the rest of us. One thing is certain: It\u2019s going to be fierce. It may look like an older vintage race car, but that\u2019s because it was \u201cbuilt down\u201d from a much wilder machine.<\/p>\n
Or \u201crestored to original,\u201d which is how Cowboy describes it. Cowboy is the best there is at getting you to think what he wants you to think just by how he says things. \u201cRestored to original.\u201d No harm in that, right? I bet there are a few details swept under that rug.<\/p>\n
Cowboy doesn\u2019t like new rules letting much newer cars into our races, into our group.\u00a0 Cars that are 15 years newer than ours. Able to run super-light frames, with bigger motors and smooth tires that will allow them to stick to the track like they were glued.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll be middle of the pack. Might as well kiss this racing good-bye,\u201d he said, thinking our popular production Corvettes, Mustangs, Camaros would be replaced at the front by cars with less appeal. He makes a good argument, but others see it differently.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need more cars or it\u2019s all going away,\u201d says Ceegar. \u201cThe fact is, those of us who love these old cars are dying off. We need to have newer cars come out. Some guys we used to race with in the past, like Irish, might even return.\u201d<\/p>\n
I enjoyed racing with Irish back when he was still involved. He brought to the track\u00a0the finest automobiles ever made; a TransAm car, an original Cobra. And he\u2019s a lot of fun to be around, smart and enthusiastic.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s true. The grids are smaller, and we\u2019re getting older. A lot of guys aged out, or the money ran out, or they just moved on. There aren\u2019t as many of us as there used to be.<\/p>\n
Our cars are getting faster, too, and that concerns me a bit. Racing at 170 mph is not just 15 mph faster than 150 mph. It\u2019s a whole different level, with different aerodynamics, different braking forces, and far more demands on a driver to act and react faster than ever when he runs out of track or out of skill or something happens on the track just ahead that he didn\u2019t anticipate.<\/p>\n
We’re going as fast as pro drivers did just a few years back, but we’re in machinery that was designed 50 years ago.<\/p>\n
I hope we\u2019re all ready for that.<\/p>\n
Ceegar will be there this weekend. He\u2019s 100 percent ready, his chief mechanic, O\/C, has seen to that. We may not recognize Ceegar, nor O\/C. Ceegar\u2019s lost more than 30 pounds, O\/C has lost more than 40. They\u2019re on some diet that cuts portions and uses three drops of magic oil: my guess, something between snake oil and 90 weight gear lube, but you can\u2019t argue with those kinds of results. I wonder if I can sneak some into my crankcase.<\/p>\n
Excalibur will be there, too.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had teething problems last year. I was going nowhere. The first weekend, we ran a 1:31 and it got worse from there. There was one race I brought the car in and said to Stays-Late (his mechanic) that I wasn\u2019t sure if next time I would bring it in in one piece.\u00a0 After the front straight, I could stand on the brakes with both feet and not know if I was going to make it.\u201d<\/p>\n
This winter, Stays-Late told him, \u201cyou will have brakes.\u201d That means Excaliber will drive again\u00a0with the confidence that made him one of the top three on most weekends, but this season in a fresh and much faster car. Whew.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t need to win. All I know is that I want to do the best I can do,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
Yeah. Okay. When Excaliber starts a sentence with \u201cAll I know is\u2026\u201d you can bet that he knows a lot more than he wants you to know that he knows.<\/p>\n
As to speeds as high as 170 mph, he\u2019s cautious but confident.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe that\u2019s where we\u2019re all going. That\u2019s something we all have to consider, and hopefully we all have what we need to do the job\u2026 Hopefully, it\u2019s not 1,000 percent harder to go five percent faster. But there\u2019s a world of difference between 80 and 140, or between 100 and 160.\u201d Yeah, things that used to go by fast are now just a blur.<\/p>\n
Most everybody thinks the rules on car preparation will be more rigidly enforced, and everybody knows that some will take advantage.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy guess is, that at least at the July 4 race, you will find some interesting interpretations of the rules,\u201d said Excaliber.\u00a0 \u201cBut if you are a superior driver, that can make up for a lack of horsepower. I always thought the driver was an unheralded part of the equation.\u201d<\/p>\n
We do talk a lot more about cars than skills, more about horsepower than technique, more about setup than braking points.<\/p>\n
The clearly superior driver of our group, by far, won\u2019t be there next weekend at the Spring race. Canuck\u2019s car isn\u2019t quite ready, he says. Lots of little things remain to be done. His mechanic, Swede, is working on it, he says, but Swede has other clients too.<\/p>\n
One of them is Falcon, and changes have been made to Falcon\u2019s red car that he likes a lot. \u2018Stang will be there in the blue Mustang that just keeps getting better and better and faster and faster. It\u2019s not like either of them has been sitting on their hands all winter.<\/p>\n
There are supposed to be some great drivers up from California this year, who can give any of us a run for our money. Canuck thinks they might push us a bit in Portland, but that Seattle takes longer to learn.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s said that Kiwi won\u2019t just wrench and manage cars for clients, at least at the big race in July. Kiwi may drive a big-engine Corvette, and Kiwi used to be a professional racer.\u00a0He intends not just to race, according to someone who overheard, but plans to qualify first with a better time than any of the rest of us.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are seven or eight guys who might disagree with that, who are planning the same thing,\u201d Excaliber says. And he’s one of them. Canuck certainly is. Cowboy, always. Captain America will have a shot. Ceegar wins races, and has gotten 105 percent out of that Mustang each year for so long, he’s got to be close to 175 percent of what that car is capable of by now. I’d like to be in the hunt, too.<\/p>\n
Seven or eight drivers in the running for first place, and any one of them could take it. A lot will depend on who did what over the winter; what new cars were built, what big changes were made to old cars, or what small tweaks were found that add up to give one of us the edge.<\/p>\n
We’re all looking for that edge. We all live a bit on that edge, in a way. It’s not just what we do, it’s\u00a0who we are. So we’ll keep doing it until we can’t, and keep looking for more.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s never enough.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My season started with an email from Jakester in the middle of April, saying the first race was coming up the first weekend in May.<\/p>\n
I wasn\u2019t planning to go. In Middleofnowhere, Oregon, the car was in the trailer where she\u2019d been since I\u2019d drained water out of the block last fall. I had my racing license, but hadn\u2019t even paid my annual dues to the club. I thought I\u2019d be race-ready by June.<\/p>\n
Jakester was having absolutely none of that. At age 15, he\u2019s still crew chief and decided the season doesn’t begin when we are ready; we are \u2026 Read more\u2026