Today was a good day.
The event was the Goulburn Toyota Affordable Endurance Classic, run by the Light Car Club of Canberra.
It runs to the same rules as the usual Cheap Car events, but is not part of the series.
We won it last year after the #17 blue Integra broke a couple of wheels while leading, leaving us as the only experienced team left.
This year, car 17 is a newly built VTiR Integra, and again they were faster and then had mechanical drama while leading - this time it was bolts falling out of an exhaust flange.
The S40 was magic. We moved to 205/50 Federal 595RSRR tyres, instead of the usual 195/50 595RSR (note the missing R). They are definitely better, although the larger size raises the gearing and dulls the brakes slightly.
So anyway, the race was all sort of a bit odd. We qualified second, inherited the temporary lead when the Honda pitted early, dropped back to a close second after our first driver swap.
Then the Honda had the exhaust problem and the race was just ours to lose. Definitely less fun than the usual games of cat and mouse, but much better for the ego! It was just a matter of keeping our poop together, and not making mistakes or getting penalties - we were super cautious with pit stop times and driver stint times.
We progressively pulled laps on all the other cars while the Honda very slowly unlapped itself.
Near the end, there was a discrepancy between time of day and race time that made it unclear whether we needed a final driver change. At that point, we were nine laps ahead of second place, so we chose the safe option and did a late driver change, which reduced the lead to six laps at the end. Good enough! :)
Car is ready to go again. I reckon the tyres have another four hours left in them, and the rest of it is as good as it was at the start.
Peter Ewingand Anna both drove very well (including Pete being faster than me for the third or fourth event in a row, and Anna finally realising she is more than competent at this).
The beer is tasting very good tonight!
