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  • Oct. 30, 2009 1:23 p.m. Nashco SuperDork

    For any of the folks in the pacific northwest that didn't get the memo, the very first Chump Car race is in Portland this weekend. This series is similar to 24 Hours of LeMons...except better! The racing will be put on hold from 6pm-8:30pm for a trick-or-treat session and admission to the track is even free (from 4-8pm or so), so it's a great time to bring the kids out for you family guys. This is also the FIRST EVER 24 hour race at PIR, so you could also be a part of history.

    In addition to the trick-or-treat shutdown, there's also a daylight savings time change in there, so this 24 hour race actually runs from Saturday noon - Sunday 1:30 pm.

    Here's some links for more info:

    http://chumpcar.com/
    http://www.examiner.com/x-10798-Portland-Auto-Examiner~y2009m10d28-Chump-Car-bring...

    We'll be bringing our seasoned '95 Impreza Wagon (L AWD) to the event. It's sporting the original 1.8 engine and 5 speed trans with 299,000 miles on the odo, it's been in two LeMons races (Thunderhill), and has served as our rallycross beater for many events...wish us luck!!! We're hoping for rain, as our underpowered AWD car might actually stand a chance in hell of a decent finish. The Subie (formerly Festivus themed) is sporting a new theme - World Rally Chumps. Our WRC theme is looking pretty good (from 50 feet)!

    Bryce

  • airwerks

    Oct. 30, 2009 1:28 p.m. airwerks New Reader

    Sounds good.... I will be going.

    First I have heard of it and PIR is only 30 miles from me! Wish they advertised more....

  • P71

    Oct. 30, 2009 2:40 p.m. P71 SuperDork

    Wish I could be there Bryce. Good luck!

  • rbankracing

    Oct. 30, 2009 5:11 p.m. rbankracing New Reader

    Good luck Bryce. I look forward to your race report and your experience with this sanction as opposed to the other...

  • Oct. 31, 2009 12:51 a.m. Nashco SuperDork

    Things are looking good so far. Our theme stuff (almost complete in these pics):



    Tech went smooth and we're pit with friends on both sides:


    ..and we got 10 bonus laps (before the race even started) because of our theme and generous donation spread:


    A moment to thank our sponsors, who helped out with all the donations to the organizer's charity choice:



    The weather is very sketchy for tomorrow...if it rains, we've got the clear advantage. If it doesn't rain, we don't have to race in the rain! The way I see it, it's a win-win as long as we can keep the car on the track.

    Bryce

  • P71

    Oct. 31, 2009 7:26 a.m. P71 SuperDork

    Looks great Bryce! Are those steelies painted gold?!?!? They look awesome!

  • oldeskewltoy

    Oct. 31, 2009 2:20 p.m. oldeskewltoy New Reader

    Heh... I know of an ex LeMons car do to compete.... also know of a few others....

    I was supposed to be car chief on a Toyota FX, but a knee issue has sidelined me...

    GOOD LUCK to ALL the competitors!!!

  • Teqnyck

    Oct. 31, 2009 5:38 p.m. Teqnyck New Reader

    If I wasn't hosting a Halloween party, I would be there already! Literally, when I first heard about Chumpcar and saw what day it was on, I was like "AWWW Dammit!!"

  • airwerks

    Oct. 31, 2009 10:33 p.m. airwerks New Reader

    I went today... Nascho you had one of my favorite cars there. That turbo'd silver miata was my number one.

    The passes are good for both days, and I'm not going tomorrow so if anybody wants free passes ($30) lemme know- you just gotta come to Woodburn to get em'.

    PS- what was up with the yellow Firebird that I lost track of how many times he bombed through the chicane? It was entertaining at least.

  • Nov. 2, 2009 1:25 p.m. Nashco SuperDork

    Thanks for the compliments guys, we thought the World Rally Chump theme came out great. The car was HORRIBLY slow, we were one of the slowest cars on the track. However, we still managed a 4th place finish out of 40 cars!!! It didn't come easy, as we had to do a trans swap during the 2 hour trick-or-treat shutdown, but we got the swap done without losing any laps by taking advantage of the timing of the shutdown (lucky break...literally?).

    This Subie continues to amaze me. 300k miles on the car, we started the race with the original powertrain...knowing that the trans synchros were hurtin'. The trans has now been swapped, the engine is getting pretty down on power and leaking a fair bit of oil when hot, and the suspension bushings are essentially non-existent, but the damn car just refuses to die. We ended up getting the "Timex" award because our car just kept on ticking...proving that the spirit of bringing a POS car with some drivers ranging from great to not-horrible, some decent fixin' skills, and a conservative slow-and-steady approach can still be a heck of a lot of fun and fairly successful.

    My favorite part of the weekend? Driving the car home after tossing our tires, etc. into the back...gotta love racin' a wagon! We never even pulled the license plates.

    Bryce

 

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