News: Open Road Racing

[Tuna]

Well, I'm down in Ft. Stockton, TX for the Big Bend Open Road Race this weekend. There are ~160 vehicles registered with probably 50% of those being Corvettes (sadly, I'm not one of them as I just had to bring the CTS-V down this year). We're 'practicing' on US 90 today over an 8 mile stretch of road with about 8 turns. Saturday is race day and we'll use US 285 to Sanderson, TX. The start/finish are 59 miles apart with 60 turns and it's a 2-way run. My wife drives southbound and I drive northbound.

There is a Corvair, a Ford GT 40 and a Corvette in the Unlimited class. That ought to be fun. Okay, the Corvair isn't anywhere near stock (and neither are the GT 40 or the Corvette) but open road racing is "run what you brung" just so long as it meets the safety requirements for the class.

Open road racing isn't really racing as it is more of a "time/speed/distance" rally. You pick a speed class and try to average that exact speed over the total distance and you start from a stand still - unless you're in the Unlimited class then is usually WFO most of the way.

My wife and I drive the 110 MPH class as that's the fastest class for stock seat belt cars. We time ourselves with stop watches and sometimes that seems to be just a guess, so, we will not have a clue whether we take home a trophy or not until the awards presentation Saturday night. Either way, it's a kick because where else can you drive triple digits for over about an hour, wave at police radar units and not get hauled to jail.

Yea Ha!!!

 

[jrose7004]

Sounds like fun Tuna!

 

[Rex S]

We're down here too!! "458" 125 class.

 

[Tuna]

We're down here too!! "458" 125 class.

Did you get to drive both ways?

We were "red flagged" around the 45 mile point going north for cows on the road ahead of us. Too bad as I was having a good time and our timing was very good also. Only our south bound run counted for the race and we managed to get 3rd place in class with that run with my wife driving.

Overall, it was a good time.

 

[Rex S]

We went through just after the Vette went off roading backwards as the dust was still setteling so I finished the north bound leg but my time was thrown out as not all the 125 class made it up to Stockton.

 

[Tuna]

I guess you missed the 'debris' that was left by the go-fast truck that the red Vette hit.
They red flagged the route after the truck/Vette incidents to clean up the road then tried to get the rest of us going only to have the cows come out. That's just the way it goes and another reason to make the southbound run as close as possible to your target time as you can never be sure that you'll get a north bound run.

 

[Rex S]

There was junk all over the road when we went through but managed to miss it, hit a small bird instead. The white Dodge truck that caused it hasn't made it both ways yet.

 

[Tuna]

Sorry for the small bird!

Other than bugs, we didn't hit anything. Now I got to go clean those bugs and take the stickers off the Caddy.

Later.