Dodge Vintage Festival,

Lime Rock Park, Connecticut, September 3-6, 1999

by Mike Piera AnalogMike@aol.com

The Dodge Vintage Festival is a very large Labor Day weekend of vintage cars. In addition to the races, there is a swap meet where you can find all sorts of rusty bits for mostly British cars, a Concours (car show) on Sunday, and other festivities.

The Details were these:

Fri, Sept 3rd : Practice sessions
Sat, Sept 4th: Practice and Qualifying sessions
Sun, Sept 5th: Concours, Car shows, vendors
Mon, Sept 6th : morning warmups, afternoon 2-6pm ten races.

Prominent drivers included Bob Akin (1959 Cooper Monaco), Joe Buzzeta
(Lola), Brian Redman (Chevron and Ford Capri). The event was taped by Speedvision for airing in November.

I arrived early Friday Morning for registration and technical inspection. Most entrants were already set up in the paddock. I found a spot in the center of the grassy paddock near the downhill turn among the swap meet vendors. A wandering tech inspector was found, so that I could get the car inspected before the time we are allowed to start our race engines. The town is very strict on noise. This was one of few events with no noise limits on the track so I removed my normal muffler and ran supertrapps with the disk packs removed. The vintage rules used in this event do not allow my normal hoosier radials which are considered slicks, so I bought a set of Kumho tires in 225/50/15 which I ran on 7" front and 8" rear tires. This would improve gearing at Lime Rock, with more acceleration coming out of the turns, but maybe a bit less traction in the rear in extreme conditions like entering Big Bend. Other changes from normal PCA club racing were replacement of the headlights with a sheet of aluminum (I broke 2 lenses already!) and removal of some ballast.

Also I made a RENNLIST.ORG logo and affixed it to my windshield, as we were trying the first race car sponsorship of the rennlist Porsche site on the internet. Rennlist is a free web site and collection of mailing lists, which are a huge resource to Porsche enthusiasts the world over. RENNLIST also offers membership by paying a small amount and getting a membership card. Membership gets discounts with the many vendors who support RENNLIST, and by checking a box when applying for membership, one can send $15 towards the RENNLIST racing sponsorship and receive a RENNLIST window decal.

My 1973 911 was classed in the "Trans-Am" group, along with many late 60s Camaros, some Jaguar XKEs, and some other 911s which were generally more modified and faster than mine. There were also many Corvettes, Shelby Mustangs, and some real Cobras in our race group, but in other classes. The only cars with less power than mine were the 2-liter Trans Am cars, which were mostly Datsun 510s. So I was again in a group of cars with MUCH more power (average of twice my 210HP). In practice my new tires felt pretty good but my timing was a bit off. The powerful V8s would pass easily on the straight but I would be right behind them the rest of the course. But there was no way for me to re-pass them usually, except maybe in the esses if they got wide. I managed to get some decent times in the 1:03 range in practice, about what I get with worn out, hard Hoosiers but about a second slower than new Hoosiers. The Kumhos were wearing great though, almost insignificant amounts of wear. And they were getting VERY sticky when warmed up. We had rain at the end of our last practice session, which allowed me to experience the Kumhos (which were shaved) in the wet. There was very little grip, maybe due to oil on the freshly wet track, and our group was called in early.

Saturday started out with a practice session. RENNLISTER Barry Lenoble helped me in pit lanes to get some pyrometer readings and we used his radio to get my lap times. Another RENNLISTER who came by was Jens VonBulow, who gave me a cool VONBULOW RACING T-shirt in Yellow to match my car! Later in the day was a short qualifying race, run just like a normal race with pace car, green flag, etc but only your fastest lap would determine your gridding position for the main race on Monday. Sunday there is no racing allowed at Lime Rock. In practice before the qualifying race, David Cleveland, who had beaten me at the Volvo Historic race at Lime Rock earlier in the year, had a serious incident. His highly modified 600+ HP Corvette engine expired on the back straight, locking his wheels and spewing oil on the course. This sent him towards the wall at the bottom of the uphill turn. Making matters worse, there was a valuable 1963 Split Window Corvette right behind him which also spun in his oil and backed into David at the bottom of the hill. David's front end was almost completely ripped off, leaving the frame and engine, and his rear was also out of whack. The '63 fared better, with just some fiberglass damage that was repaired with matching duct tape and allowed him to run in the race.

David was the fastest in the session before the qualifying race, which set the grid for the qualifying race. Second fastest was Bob Hebert in a VERY fast Jaguar XKE, then a Corvette, a Shelby GT-350, then... me!!! followed by 25 confused drivers.

Above is the Qualifying Race lineup.

I had run a high 1:02 which gave me this strong position. I knew I would have a hard time at the green flag as the powerful cars behind me would have a huge advantage, but the amount of advantage they had at the start was even greater than I imagined. When the flag fell, I floored the gas but not much happened, as some loud V8s thundered by near the end of the straight :

The first few turns were exciting, running side by side with the monsters. Below I passed the Corvette as he takes the agricultural route :

I never had a very good lap in the qualifying race, I got held up a few times by traffic and when I lifted I would lose my momentum, which allowed slower but more powerful cars to pass easily on the straights. I managed only a 1:03.4 in qualifying which was not great but might have been OK. Unfortunately there were about 10 cars that were in the same range, most of them just faster so I was gridded 14th for the main event. Bob Hebert's Jaguar was up front with pole sitter Brian Redman who was running in our group in his own class, in a very fast European Ford Capri with a 400+ HP 3000cc V6. Brian had run a 1:58 or so! Jim Scott was also ahead of me in his very fast 911 race car, slightly de-modified from his PCA GT4R setup. He was also running a 2.0 liter 911 and a 356 in two other races, a very busy man! There were also some Camaros ahead of me which were in my class, and one of the Datsun 510s had run a very fast 1:02.

On Sunday I went to the US Open tennis tournament in NY with my wife Ayako and daughter Laina. When we got there it was raining, a foreshadowing of the weather for the race on Monday... But we were able to see some tennis during breaks in the rain and had some nice $12 sandwiches and $5 bottles of water... we stopped in Korea town in Flushing on the way home and found a big supermarket with lots of interesting oriental products so the trip was not bad.

On Monday, race day, the weather did not look good at all. There were showers and thunderstorms all over the area. The first race was for very old, open cars; like Bugattis, pre war roadsters, and MGTs. They ran (at least the brave ones did!) in a fairly steady rain. A good number of races were dry, but a few were wet and some VERY wet! Our race was last and it rained hard 2 races before ours, so when it let up a bit I and my crewman/guitar pedal assistant John Manifold mounted my Toyo RA-01 rain tires. Here is the car in 3" of water :

Most others in my group were also mounting their rain tires, if they had any. Rain is the great equalizer in racing - the powerful V8s would not be able to apply their power and their wide tires would not help either. A 911 is an excellent rain car if driven carefully, mine even better than most as it is relatively softly sprung and does not have a lot of power. So the rain gave me some optimism that I could do well even with my lousy grid position. It stopped raining well before we were called to grid but I decided to leave the Toyos on, as they would be much better if it started raining or stayed wet, and would be safe in any condition. We lined up in the pre-grid area, and I noted that many people did not have rain tires, including Jim Scott's 911 and several Camaros and Shelbys. We lined up and followed the pace car on the pace lap, feeling out the conditions and trying to warm up the cars and tires. As we came down the hill towards the start/finish line, several cars ahead of me decided it was not safe and headed to the pits. So I moved up cautiously, until I saw the green flag - the race is on!!!!

There were two lanes of cars on the left side of the track, and they were not going very fast so I decided to make my own lane on the right and proceeded to pass some cars before the first turn. I slowed it down and hung tight to the turn, grip was pretty good. I continued to gain ground and through the esses I stayed wide in the outside line, which is grippy in the wet, and allowed me to pass a few more cars. I was right on the bumper of Jim's 911 by the start of no-name straight but could not quite get by him. He went inside for the uphill to pass a car, and I followed him. Jim got sideways in the uphill turn, causing him to back off going up the hill, allowing me to out accelerate him and pass at the top of the hill. I was now ahead of most of the field except for a 510 and Brian Redman and Hebert, who both escaped the heavy traffic and were able to pull away the first few laps. I soon was 3rd overall and could see the Jag and Capri ahead of me. I was steadily getting closer, as my car was working great, I was able to use almost full acceleration and 3rd gear around most of the course. I had enough stick on the wide lines to get some good cornering forces out of the Toyos, and never even got the car sideways a bit.

Soon we were lapping slower cars, some cars without rain tires who decided to stay out and just take it easy. Then we were lapping the V8s with rain tires. I was losing time on the leaders, as even with good handling I was not able to pass on the straights easily with my low HP engine. One of the 510s held me up from West Bend to the downhill, although he waved me by I was not comfortable passing off-line so decided to wait for the main straight. But he pulled even with me all down the straight, so I had to outbrake him at the end of the straight to get ahead, which I had done several times before. Then I caught Manfred Moehring's 911 and he decided to race me and cut me off in the esses... not very nice. I immediately passed him on the following straight, but lost a few seconds to the leaders. Brian and Bob were working through traffic a lot better than I was as everyone knows and respects Brian Redman. Conditions were improving towards the end of the race but I pushed less as I just wanted to finish the race and hoped I would get a good placing by staying where I was without incident.

I was not really sure that I was in 3rd place overall as I forgot to look up to the leader board during the race (I'm not used to running at the front of the field!). But at the end of the race I realized I had pulled it off and finished 3rd overall and 2nd in class behind the Jag! And in so doing we nearly lapped the entire field. I wish I had known I was so close, it could have been exciting if I could have caught up to the leaders. I doubt I would have been able to pass but it would have been interesting!! Thanks to the rain I was able to keep my season podium-finishing streak going. The car was working great and needed nothing after the race, so I left it on the trailer ready to go to the Watkins Glen Vintage Grand Prix the following weekend. Would I be able to keep my streak going at this event, which is one of the largest vintage races in the country??? Read the next report to find out!

Speedvision will be airing coverage of this racing weekend on November 26th, check local listings or their web site for details.

For a more complete writeup of the event, see http://www.historiconline.com/ and find the link for the Seventeenth Dodge Vintage Festival

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- Mike