My Race Car History

[Tommy R]

My buddy, Stang Killa SS, just posted up that he attended his first autocross and how much fun he had. Rather than clutter his thread, I thought I'd share a little timeline of my race car history from my time autocrossing. I was first exposed to autocrossing in '95 right after I graduated from college. It was with Texas Spokes Sports Car Club (the oldest sports car club in the US). It appealed to me because I could compete in a true street car without risking crashing into stuff or other cars, such as in road racing. For what it's worth, I got my "high speed" fix doing track events and drag racing, but nothing held a candle to the competition I experienced in autocross.

And I realize autocross isn't for everyone. That's fine and this isn't intended to convince anyone or to start a debate about autocross versus any other form of motorsport, mkay? 8)

I did my first autocross in '95 with my '91 Maxima SE (V6, automatic). It was WAY outclassed and, as expected, it didn't do very well. I have pics of it on course somewhere, but can't locate them at the moment so use your imagination.

In October of '95 I ordered a '96 Cobra. In February it finally showed up. I immediately started racing it in F-Stock (FS). Sorry for the size of the pics. These were scanned from actual photographs (remember those?) many years ago. And yes, the Cobra was VERY undersprung. :shock:

I quickly migrated to E-Street Prepared (ESP). And in '97 I competed in my first Nationals in Kansas. I only finished in the top third of the class, but that's okay. Surprisingly, I ended up winning our club's Driver of the Year award that year. Meant a lot to me and it still does!

Like I said, I also did lots of track events with it. That Grand Sport and I had great battles the whole weekend!

I also drag raced it pretty frequently. On street tires it ran mid-low 13s at a best of 105 mph. Back then that wasn't too bad and was definitely respectable for a nearly stock Mustang. It only had a cat-back, pullies, and K&N.

However, I soon visited a friend who was building a C-Prepared (CP) Mustang. This is a class where you're allowed to gut the interior, run non-DOT tires (i.e. slicks), build crazy motors, etc. I decided I wanted to be in that class. In hindsight, this was a bad decision. I should've kept my Cobra and continued racing in ESP, but I didn't. I sold the Cobra and bought an '87 Mustang LX. Here it is racing at Nationals in '98 when I was still driving it on the street.....which is unheard of for cars running in CP!

I was going to need a tow rig so in '98 I bought a '95 GMC C1500....and proceeded to give it a 2" front/4" rear lowering job. Nope, it didn't compromise it's ability to tow. And it occasionally saw time on the autocross courses, too!

 

[Tommy R]

For about 2 years I developed this LX in CP. I tried all kinds of spring/shock/sway bar combos and it was a lot of fun....and occasionally got a bit tail happy.

This was at its last event in '99....and also my most impressive win in the car. It was right before Nationals and I ended up beating last year's Nationals winner (at a regional event) by a fairly substantial margin....and I only had about 250 rwhp (largely stock 5.0L) when most guys in the class were in the 450-500 rwhp realm. Of course, it was a 5 speed car. 8)

But I felt a 3rd Gen Camaro would be a better platform. So I sold the LX (probably shouldn't have done that, either) and bought a work-in-progress '85 Camaro just before Nationals in '99. I campaigned this car for the next couple years and had a fair bit of success with it. In '01 I won the CP Pro Solo National Championship and finished 4th in the Solo II National Championships. It had a mild 350 with a 4 speed Super T-10 trans. Only put out about 325 rwhp.

I'd also finished lowering my GMC (4"/6") and added airbags to the rear to help with towing. Although a bit underpowered, this truck towed very well all over the country.

 

[Tommy R]

In '02 I was getting tired of not having a fun street car. I didn't have the budget to keep the truck and Camaro AND buy a nice car for the street so I sold off the Camaro, the truck, and the trailer. I picked up a bone stock '92 Mustang LX (5.0L 5 speed). I raced it, but only at the local level. Why? Because the mods I wanted to do to it to make it more fun on the street bumped it into an autocross class where it wouldn't be competitive. Here it is in street trim. Basic mods included modern 5 lug discs all around, 3.73 gears, coilovers, and some simple motor mods. It ran about 102-103 mph in the 1/4. Not sure I've ever owned a car that got more "thumbs up" than this one. It was super clean.

Here it is in race trim with 16x10's all around.

This car was VERY outclassed for national events so I worked out a deal to co-drive with my good friend in his VW Scirocco. From '02-'04 we teamed up and were near the top of all the events we attended and were frequently #1 and #2 in the PAX results. "PAX" is a handicap measurement used to equate the relative speeds of cars among all the different classes.

In '02 I was 2nd overall at Nationals behind a highly modded Toyota AE86. The car was added to our class, but shouldn't have because it was too fast. In '03 the SCCA corrected their mistake. We also got protested that year. You see, we were running a lower revving head with hydraulic lifters (for more torque, but less hp). At the time, no one had the written proof that this head was legal for this car so we were DQ'd. A few months later, proof was found and the head has since been legal. What does this mean? Had the SCCA properly classed that Toyota and had we had the required documentation for the cylinder head, I'd have a Solo II National Championship. C'est la vis, right?

By the way, with these short tires and the gearing of this car, we FREQUENTLY would have to go to 4th gear! That's pretty unheard of for SCCA-sanctioned autocrosses.

By '05 I'd decided I wanted to race my own car again. By then I'd sold the Mustang and picked up a '92 BMW 325is (5 speed, of course). It was outfitted with all the goodies to make it competitive in the newly formed STX class. In '05 I competed at Nationals again and finished a very respectable 3rd in the most underpowered car there (it also had 199k miles on it!). One of the cars I lost to was a WRX and one of our race days was in the rain. :roll:

Right after Nationals in '05 I decided to strip the '92 of all the go-fast goodies and I picked up a '93 BMW 325is to swap everything to. Why? Because in '93 BMW had introduced VANOS, which is their version of Honda's VTEC technology (i.e. variable cam timing). So while the peak hp of the '92 and '93 were the same, the "power under the curve" was better for the '93. Here's that car...

But before the '06 season got into full swing I did some soul searching and decided to quit racing altogether. I'd become obsessed with it (if that's not obvious by the number of cars I went through over this time!) and it just wasn't healthy. I decided to get into offroading because it was more low key and there's no real competition to stress about. So far, I miss going fast, but don't regret my decision at all.

Anyway, if you've read through all this, thanks for indulging me.
Tommy

 

[EeePee]

Good stuff! "thumbsup"

 

[STANG KILLA SS]

nice shorts bro :mrgreen:

 

[Tommy R]

Good stuff! "thumbsup"

Thanks, man. I miss racing and I suspect I'll get back into it one of these days.

nice shorts bro :mrgreen:

I'm sexy and I know it! Well, I was in '98 anyway.

 

[EeePee]

Share your thoughts about going from Mustangs to a VW to a BMW?

 

[Tommy R]

Share your thoughts about going from Mustangs to a VW to a BMW?

Oh man, I think it might be easier to explain to the world which religion is best! LOL... Well, Mustangs (at least the '79-'04 model years) handle like crap. Not to say I don't love them, but they're not for turning corners. They push like a beyotch, but when you get on the throttle, they either push more or the rear end will start coming around.

Moving to the SUPER lightweight (~1600 lbs, IIRC) Scirocco was like learning a new language. It was all about momentum....and maintaining it. The Mustang could always rely on its torque to pull out of any corner. With the VW, it was all about giving up as little on corner entry to maximize the exit speed....which is the goal in any car, but was way more critical in the underpowered VW. Interestingly enough, the powerband of the Scirocco and the 5.0L were pretty similar. No, not in power level, of course, but they were both very strong in the mid-range, but petered out well before redline. This was because we ran the hydraulic lifter head which had less power/more torque than the solid lifter head. We were the only one running that head at the time, but after we did so well with it in '02 several others followed suit.

The VW only had a 4 speed, really short tires, a low revving "torquey" motor, and the 4 speed trans has the shortest gearset available legally for that car. As a result, 1st gear was never used other than to get the car rolling. Literally. I never, ever had to downshift to 1st gear on course, regardless how tight the hairpin was. That being said, I had to up/downshift frequently. This took some getting used to since I rarely had to shift out of 2nd gear with the Mustangs. Routinely, we'd have to use 3rd gear at least once or twice each pass. It was even pretty common to use 4th gear every now and then!

But the VW gave me a new appreciation for front wheel drive cars. Don't get me wrong, I'm still a rear wheel drive guy 100%, but I was truly amazed how fun I found this ~80 hp, FWD econobox. ;-) And man, was it fast. No, it didn't accelerate well, but it hardly EVER had to slow down! The speeds that lightweight car could transition was mind blowing. Really. We were always at the top of the PAX results and were disturbingly high on the raw times, too.

I gotta say, it was really cool to go that fast in a little car like that which NO one expects to run those kinds of times.

Moving to the BMW was just as eye opening. With the Mustang, it was all about minimizing the crappy aspects of the car. The chassis is too weak. The brakes suck. The front end doesn't grip. The rear suspension is just hopeless. The first time I raced my BMW I was floored. Other than a Miata, it may have been the first RWD car I raced with IRS. I was hooked! I couldn't believe how I could apply the throttle and it wouldn't upset the balance of the car. It would just maintain its line and continue accelerating. The Mustang, by contrast, would force you to expect under or oversteer the moment you got back onto the skinny pedal.

The E36 platform is flat out amazing, IMO. I truly think it's one of the best chassis for someone who needs any kind of day to day practicality in the form of a coupe/sedan with 4 seats, but wants to be competitive on the track. The M3 even moreso since it has better (not great) power. And the stock E36 brakes never left me wanting more.....not even on a track day. In fact, I knew some M3 autocross guys who downgraded to 325 brakes for the reduced weight!

To this day, the E36 remains one my favorite platforms. It just does everything so well. The only issue is the lack of straight line acceleration, but my friends at Vorshlag Motorsports have addressed that with their LS conversion kits. To me, an E36 M3 with an LS motor is my ultimate street/track car. It'd do everything great!

 

[gearhead79]

"thumbsup"You built some purty race cars!!!!!! I'm mostly into drag racing but I appriciate every style of a well built car

 

[Tommy R]

"thumbsup"You built some purty race cars!!!!!! I'm mostly into drag racing but I appriciate every style of a well built car

Thanks, man! I'm actually going to be getting more into drag racing (again) when the Model A is up and running. But yeah, I like most everything associated with motorsports. Drag racing, road racing, autocross, drifting, whatever.... It's all good in my book. "thumbsup"

 

[gearhead79]

I couldn't agree more with ya,all motorsports are cool in my book"thumbsup"

 

[War Pig]

Cool thread Tommy, thanks for sharing it with us! I knew you were always into cars but didn't realize you autocrossed so much back in the day. I did a little bit with my Miata in the early to mid '90's but never got into it that much. My friend Steven is deep into it right now with his Mazdaspeed turbo car.