Another open road race under our belt; a lot more lessons learned. This was a tough race this year on a lot of folks, in more ways than one. This year there were 21 competitors that didn’t complete the race. Sickness, disqualification, mechanical failures and crashes combined to plague the field this year. Like I said, tough year. We were entering a big car in the race. We were entering an untested car. We were entering an antique car. We were entering a big, untested, antique car. Without the back story of how we found ourselves in this spot, which is not unfamiliar territory for us, suffice it to say we bought the car we raced less than six months before the April date of the Big Bend Open Road Race (BBORR). Having raced in this event and others, and having been in this position before, we already knew where to put our energy and money right away.

First let me explain what we are racing, and try to make sense of the ‘why’ behind our choice. We joke that we will race anything with wheels. I’ve raced motorcycles on dirt, drag strips and road courses. I’ve raced cars and trucks. I like to compete and love to go fast. After selling our first ORR car, a C6 Z06 Corvette (still miss that car), and then selling our “200mph” car, a first generation Camaro with a full certified cage and massive 572 cubic inch engine, we bought a 1969 Cadillac Coupe deVille. Yes, we actually got it in our head that we would race a 19-foot long, 2+ ton, 45 year old, 80K-mile survivor car. Call me crazy. Why this car? That’s the easiest question to answer. Because, in all likelihood, it will be the only one you’ll see on the race grid. Everyone has their own taste but I just like this particular 1969-1970 body style and accept that it will be an uphill climb to achieve, and surpass our previous speeds when we ran our other cars. Besides, look at all that real estate for sponsors!

Race Preparation

We dove right into evaluating the car when it arrived on a semi tractor-trailer transporter from Spokane, Washington. The assessment of the drivetrain, suspension, body and interior was good. We jumped on the to-do list:

• Refresh the brakes
• Replace the original wheels and tires
• Re-web the front seatbelts
• Replace hoses and fix leaky valve cover gaskets
• Service the chassis, replace shocks
• Service, but don’t beef up the transmission (to be explained later)
• Replace burned out exhaust manifold gaskets and re-weld parts of the exhaust and mounting brackets
• Replace alternator (unexpected failure)

Sounds easy, right? It was going fine, we thought, until we were on our third set of wheels trying to find a set that allowed us to upsize, fit a lower profile performance tire that exceeded the load and speed requirements, and keep the circumference as close to original as possible, all without contacting the body or chassis. While that battle dragged on, we were preparing to modify the transmission when it occurred to us that this was a 45 year old unit and that the clutch material "might" be questionable. If we made it shift hard and fast it might very well self-destruct. We opted to leave it alone, other than a new filter and fresh fill of Royal Purple MAX ATF. The engine got a new K&N filter treatment and a big gulp of Royal Purple, too. Taking her out on the highway proved to be enjoyable (we are blessed with 80mph limits on the stretch of interstate that runs near our area, and 75mph on the secondary highways). The car drove better than we imagined it would, for a battleship. It easily climbed to 80 (or so) with no problem and the 472 under the hood made a beautiful note from the new dual exhaust. We must be ready. We drove the big gal to west Texas, just over 4 hours, to sign in at registration in Sanderson and roll into tech inspection. We had one minor issue (if you’ve read past raceblogs, you’ll know tech inspection worries keep me awake at night) and corrected it in the tech line and received our sign-off. We were good to go, so we thought. Did I mention the heat? It was in the mid 90’s and our car now lovingly named “CadZilla”, thanks to some friends, didn’t seem to take to the heat very well. The starter was heat-soaked and we had to jump start the car, twice, to get out of Sanderson and back north to Fort Stockton. On the way, Cadzilla threw one of four belts. The next morning (Thursday) we got up with plans to practice, tweak our course notes and capture some stock video with fellow teammates. CadZilla had other ideas. First she chucked another belt. After replacing all four belts as a precaution, the battery then gave up and we replaced the battery. During one test run, there was a very noticeable stumble getting up to speed. “What now?”, I thought. Fuel? Ignition? With haste, we grabbed a fuel filter and ptfe tape and got ready to change the filter. In the end, it was a vapor-locking condition and we worked around it. On Friday, I didn’t even pick up the keys or look at CadZi

lla until the sun had set in the evening and we were topping off the fuel, mounting the GPS units and installing the cameras. I figured we needed to give each other some space. I’m pretty sure one of our Twitter posts contained an angry reference to the hood being up more than it was down since arriving in west Texas, but I told myself it would all be fine on race day.

Race report

Saturday morning the alarm clock went off at 4:30am. I was already awake, contemplating all of the ‘what-ifs’ and mitigating them in my mind. My lovely wife is also my navigator so a carefully woke her up and whispered those three special words, “let’s go racing”. We were up and ready soon, and on schedule. We had to be at pre-grid at 5:30am. We were suited up, grabbed our helmets, grabbed the keys and walked out to wish Cadzilla a good morning. It wasn’t long before she was sounding her own throaty growl, telling all the other racers to get moving. We rolled slowly through Fort Stockton, enjoying the cool morning air while making our way to Rooney Park to take our pre-grid position. While the annual “blender party” (formally known as the “Rookie welcome and racer reunion”) is always a good time, the pre-grid and grid is where you experience the real brotherhood of grassroots racing. Pretty soon the sun was emerging over the horizon, all engines fired and we were filing out of the park and onto TX-285 to make our way to the start line grid. Since we had moved down in speed class to “SR2” (Street Rod division), we were way back in the starting grid. Our job, before taking to the course, was supporting our teammates and other racers. After the race director delivered yet another speech mixing rules, good advice and humor, the chase planes and medical evacuation helicopter soon appeared overhead. We got busy helping our team’s Unlimited driver/navigator pair get suited up and settled in. This was going to be their first time racing in Unlimited at the BBORR and we were excited for and proud of them.

Kyle Eggspuehler (driver) and Jeff Carson (navigator) – Unlimited class.

Before long, the exhilaration of hearing the Unlimited cars launching and flying down the course was overtaking everyone at the starting line. To hear such powerful cars running wide-open down the course is just a magical sound, probably second only to being in the car. Just moments after the start came word that one car was “off”. The red flag was waving. I hate that term, “off”. Do they mean “off”, pulled off, or “off” left the road surface at speed? Fragments of information crackled in over the radios. “Driver is out of the car and ok.”…ok good, and?? Soon we learned that a cooling system problem had sidelined a beautiful and fast Ford GT40. Delay over, we got the signal to re-fire the cars. Pretty soon the call came of another car “off”. The good news was that it was not a crash, but another mechanical problem. This repeated many times but eventually it was our turn to roll up to the line.

We’d already talked with the cars starting in front of, and behind us. We discussed communicating in the event a pass was necessary and make sure we were on different radio frequencies, so we didn’t talk over or interfere with each other. We pulled up to the line, car engine still at a reasonable temperature and we reset all of our GPS units and timers. Watching the starting light, I actually felt my heart beating. It almost distracted me but then I turned my focus back to the tree. I watched the LEDs ‘tick’ around the top and then creep ever closer to the countdown. There it was, the first yellow light came on; Five seconds to go. The green flicked on and the timers were started. “Go, go, go” from the navigator. We eased off the line and gradually took it through the gears, leaning into the throttle more and more as the speed increased. Soon enough we were barreling down highway 285 at over 100mph. Everything felt good, so we eased her up to 110mph, then 115mph…this was feeling good! We took the smoothest line we could through every bend and turn, to keep from upsetting the car. To my surprise, it actually was more comfortable running in the 100’s than it was driving at ‘city’ speeds. Land yacht, yes, but this was pure joy. Soon we caught and passed the car that started ahead of us. The sadness of seeing racecars along the road was offset by the pleasure of wrestling this big old American sled down the curvy, hilly road toward Sanderson. As we cleared the 28-mile mark, still running strong between 110 and 120mph, my lovely navigator informed me that I was “playing too much” and “we are way fast” [on the stopwatches and average mph]. Oops. Knowing we’d be rolling out of the gas in the tighter sections, I was sure we’d scrub off enough speed to make everything ok. I was wrong. Here’s the thing to remember – the navigator is always right. We arrived at the Sanderson finish line [for leg 1 of the race] approximately 80 seconds too fast. I mention the first ‘leg’ of the race because this is operated like a rally. All classes, except Unlimited, are aiming to hit a target speed. The simplest explanation is that if you were going to drive 100 miles and needed to average 100mph, then doing it perfectly, you’d need exactly 60.0 minutes to complete the trip. Since there is a standing start for both legs, and a lot of sharp turns, you need to manage your speed to achieve average mph and precise time if you want to take home a trophy. Many times you’ll hear about the separation (time error) between first, second and third place being hundredths or thousandths of a second separating them. Mind boggling to pull that off over 118 miles. But, on with the second leg that makes this a 118-mile race.

The field was all lined up on the southern grid in Sanderson. TX-285 was awash in hot rods and full-on racecars. It was hot now, too. This wouldn’t work in anyone’s favor. I’m not sure how many DNFs and disqualifications there were at the half-way point but it was going to get worse. Soon though, cars were leaving the starting line and soon, too soon, word came of a car “off”. This time it was real, it was the bad “off” and the radio operator described “a lot of debris”. We all hate to hear this and immediately thoughts went to the driver. A Corvette in the Grand Sport (150mph average) class, driven by Eden Gonzales, had been involved in a serious accident. The car had come to rest well off the roadway, inverted, and everyone waited; hoping to hear that Eden was ok. When you hear the ambulance is rolling, you of course fear the worst.

Thankfully word quickly spread that Eden was ok. His safety equipment and the BBORR rules did their job. He walked away from a horrific looking crash. Everyone was relieved. After this long delay, we could again hear cars leaving the starting line hard…working through the gears and flying up the highway and out of earshot. A while later in came another call, a car “off”. This time it was a Thunderbird in the Grand Touring (120mph) class that had crashed. Again our thoughts went to the occupants and eventually the news spread that the driver and navigator were ok. This was welcome news. As the afternoon wore on, and got hotter, we realized we were going to be up against the clock just to get the race in for the tail-end of the field. Well, the race gods seemed to smile on us and the starting line officials were soon clicking off cars one after another. Our turn arrived and we again, this time in a hot and temperamental CadZilla, pulled away from the start line. As I pressed the gas pedal down harder, she stumbled. I eased up and she recovered, I hammered the gas and the accelerator pump gave her a necessary little kick in the butt, but then she stumbled. “Oh no”, among other words, crossed my mind. I pedaled the car for about an eighth of a mile and she soon came to life. We were really underway now. I dove into the first two sweeping curves a little over 100mph and decided to just take it easy through the entire southern “difficult section” of the course. If we needed to adjust our speed/time, we’d handle our business on the big straightaways. As with past races, the second leg was almost too comfortable; I wanted it to just go on and on. It again pained us to pass some teammates along the road but we carried on, hoping in some small way we were racing for them, too. Seeing the fist-pumps from course workers as we passed by was pretty cool and told me that CadZilla’s roaring exhaust, 19-foot physique and unique look was being accepted. We kept the hammer down most of the time. We had our worst finish (time error) ever but had arguably as much fun as we ever had. It was pointed out to me by a friend “…of course. You were making that car do things it wasn’t intended to do.”, which made sense. In our speed class, we finished fourth…out of four. We were 21 seconds too fast (.407 mph).

The future

So what’s next for our old gal? Here’s a few not-so-subtle hints at our current plans. Chassis and cage, forged wheels, LS engine…we’re on our way back up the speed ladder and will be campaigning “CadZilla” not only in the BBORR, but plan to return to Nevada for more open road racing and make a return to land speed racing, too.