All American Corvette Club at the
Corvette Express Show & Go at Englishtown, NJ
August 6, 2005
You know it's gonna be "one of those days" when I play tailor at a car show...poor Tony, he lost his pants...
At the starting line: OK - Ready... Set...and...
GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
The object of the competition is to complete a course by yourself (hence why they call it "Solo" autocross) as fast as possible. You are grouped with cars similar to yours. For example, I was in "AS" class which represented Corvettes up to 1982, in stock condition. I was car # 10.
The course is outlined by a series of cones - the downed cones depict turns. If you hit or knock over a cone, you have 2 seconds added to you overall time. You are allowed several practice runs and on this day, 6 competitive runs.
No, I didn't knock over those cones - those are turn markers! Anyway, my best time was 39:18 seconds to complete the course. Let's put that in perspective, the faster cars did the lap in 29 seconds: a race-ready Calloway Corvette, a race ready 1964 (not a street car) and a few modified C5s. The slowest time I saw was 45 seconds. My time was very respectable considering I am running an old car and stock. In fact, I was faster than some old guys in C4s & C5s (those cars should have beaten me easily). This is a fun event due to the fact that the driver's ability allows one to surpass others in better cars! If you drive an old pumpkin like me, it's isn't often you beat C4s & C5s (really, you shouldn't be) so any victory over them is a great opportunity to bust some chops!
But in the end, it was all about hanging out with your buddies and driving your Vette in a way you SHOULDN'T on the street. Don't get me wrong though, it was cool to win 2nd place again this year in my class. I won 3rd place in 2003 and second in 2004 & 2005. Maybe with a little luck (and some tweaking on the new lift), I'll get to that 1st Place someday.
Above: Left - Right: RT, Jim, me (kneeling, since the old guys have trouble getting back up), Tony "I've got no pant legs", Mario & Scott. These guys won the "show" part of the event - having very nice cars competing for the best presentation and appearance. Since I was racing, I was required to remove my chrome trim rings & center caps (plus, I still didn't have my door panels on).
NOTE OF THANKS
If it wasn't for my buddies RT, Mario and Jon, aka TEAM ORANGE, I wouldn't have had my car back together in time. These guys gave up free time on weekends, answered my emails and phone calls which allowed me to put the interior back together just in time. Thanks guys!