Th Grinch Makes an Appearance

At long last we were ready to go out for testing. The car was looking good if not totally complete.

I wasn’t going to tell anyone but the car looked more complete than it actually was. On the other hand it was a long way from being the car that I had first unloaded in the front yard.

What I had thought was going to be a practice day turned out to be a driver’s school of some sort. That meant I would not be able to get on the track unless I paid the fee for the school, which I was not interested in doing.

Still, there are a lot of things you can test at a track, or at least a lot of open driving area, that you simply can not deal with in half a carport. A rolling car and a static car are different animals.

I knew we still did not have a complete handle on the ride height problem and the springing wasn’t just right, but not to what extent the problem would manifest itself. It turned out to be considerable.

It felt good to have the Grinch out in the open. No one but Hugh and I had seen the car and I think there were a few who were becoming skeptical of its existence. But it existed. And I could prove it.

As important, was to let other people see that there were more of our cars coming out. Hugh’s had been the one they had seen most and it was developing a lot of interest on it’s own. Mikes had been seen briefly and mine would be the third. When Barry's comes out for the next race it was going to be a surprise for lot of people. Even some of our group will be surprised because all of a sudden the will be five cars out at the same time rather than just one.

Rory White, from Homa, has purchased a car he found down near Sebastion Inlet in Florida (one of my old fishing haunts).

Up to now I have claimed the "best buy" of all of the cars in our group but Rory has beaten me hollow with this one. He found a current spec, race ready car, with a fresh Noble (the best of the best) engine an extra transaxle and some other spares for sixty percent of what I paid for mine. I told him if he didn’t take it I would. I knew there would be a market for it. Any way, he will have it in time for the January race and we can expect for him to be fast.

That will mean that suddenly there will be five cars running in our class and the hook should be well set to snag others.


Tom Walter, our neighbor, who is usually handling race control for the track, is a noted car builder. He most often works on big bore stuff but he does have a good working knowledge of things Volkswagen in general and race car suspensions in particular. When he stopped by we spent about an hour discussing possible remedies for some of the trouble spots. It’s good to have neighbors. Especially smart ones. At the end of the day we were pretty well whipped. It had been a productive day and we were headed home we a two page "to do" list. That includes putting the driver on a diet.

* * *
Sunday was race day.

I wasn’t near ready but Hugh was. He kept all his wheels on this time and finished second and scored the first podium spot for the Vees.