What an eventful Easter it turned out to be at Hyden. After completing a conservative prologue we started out for the return trip to Hyden in high hopes of a good run. How wrong we were. At about the 5km mark we came across Adam Flanagan's escort on its side blocking the track. After several minutes Trevor Spencer came a long and cleared a path through the scrub with his Scout which allowed us to continue. After about another 5km's we were forced to stop again when we had a flat tyre that needed changing. The low point of the section was still to come though when we manged to rip the back left wheel off the car as we attempted to pass a slower car and were confronted with a large washout as we came out of his dust. We also damaged the front left brake caliper and rim. This damage put us out of the section and meant we had a long nights work ahead of us. With the help of the Renton's (very handy having a truck with a crane on it when you only have three wheels on the car) we got the car back to the pits and commenced work. Chris Hill who was out with gearbox trouble lent us a stub axle from his car, along with his expertise and labour and we managed to have the car running again by about 11.30pm. Sunday morning saw us set off on section two hoping to pick up some points. All was well until we approached the start/finish line as we were completing the first 50km lap where we noticed there was a lack of steering. We had lost the bolt off the left tie-rod end. Luckily we were near the pits and were able to grab a spare and continue racing. We then had an uneventful further two laps to finish off the morning section. With Mal having driven the first two sections, Dave hoped into the car with Mitchell navigating for the final two laps on Sunday afternoon. Once again drama occured early on when we snapped the accelarator cable about 500 metres from the start. After a repair job we got up and running and completed the two 50km laps with 3 minutes of running time to spare.
A special thanks to Alf at Rockingham Fleet Services with the motor running sweetly all weekend, along with the Rentons and Chris Hill from Idlewild. With no cars in our class completing all three sections we actually compiled the second most amount of points for our class in the national round and manged to pick up a few state points as well. Click on the link to the left for results and photos of the event
RESULTS
PHOTOS
The next event to be run is the Hyden 400 held over the Easter weekend. We have added a second Bilstein shockie to each side on the front of the vehicle which shoud help with the handling of the car. Otherwise the car is ready for scutineering this Sunday and will then go off to Rockingham Fleet Services for a final tune up. If you wish to keep track of the event visit www.offroadracing.com.au
Last weekend saw the first round of the WA Off Road Championships being run at Yealering. The new Super 1650 Buggy ran well during prologue and after a conservative run we qualified 15th out of a thirty car field, sitting 3rd out of the five cars in our class. Saturday afternoon saw us complete lap 1 with the only problem being held up by slower cars in the dust. Lap 2 however saw a terminal work its way loose from the battery. After fixing that things got worse on lap three when the gearbox failed putting us out of the race. We already have the gearbox out, with a 2 litre worked Kombi box ready to be put into the vehicle. Hopefully that will be completed this weekend.
In addition we would also like to welcome aboard Rockingham Fleet Services as a major sponser for the 2007 season. If you need any work done on your vehicle give Alf a call. In addition Southside Smash Repairs are once again providing us with assistance along with Ian Diffen Tyres Rockingham and Lost Racing Products Bibra Lake. Once the sponsers page is updated you can check them out.
Full results and some photos afor Yealering are available by clicking on the button to the left.
RESULTS
Well we are back from Harvey and the new Super 1650 Buggy ran extremely well. We finished 9th outright out of 19 cars. A big step up from the Baja days. There was only one other car in our class so we finished second in Class but it was great to run quicker times than a lot of cars that have been in front of us for the last two seasons. The new buggy runs nearly a minute quicker over the three laps of each heat (around 10km) than the Baja does, so the extra horsepower and better suspension certainly make a difference.
Another plus is that we didn't do any major damage. We smashed a driving light and a mirror when closely following other cars and need to replace the bushes for the front arms but otherwise all looks good for Yearlering in early March and Round 1 of the WA Championship.
You can check out the results and some photo's by clicking on the button to the left.
RESULTS
PHOTOS
The buggy is ready for the Harvey Short Course this weekend. We have installed new belts along with some re-wiring and a new intercom which should help a lot. It will surely beat hand signals and yelling. A special thanks to Darren Russel who is transporting the vehicle to Harvey for us on his truck. Check back to see how we go early next week.
The new buggy has arrived with a small amount of work needed to get it ready for Harvey in early Feb. Dave will be racing the Class 2 buggy there with Mal returning from overseas to be ready for the first long course of the year at Yearlering in early March.