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Story by James Heine • Photography as Credited
Fifty years ago, small-bore sedan racing exploded upon the professional and amateur scenes. The competition was close, brash and full of brands loved by enthusiasts.
Guess what? All of …
have you seen this years Goodwood??? The small bore stuff(as well as big bore sedans) were going at it... GREAT RACING!!!
I came of age in the sixties (road racing that is). I liked the underdogs of the U2L Trans-Am class. That's why I liked the picture of the Racer Walsh Pinto. That was a classic low bucks under-funded Ford Pinto adversary to the big-bucks factory Datsun and Alfa teams of the era. I always cheered for Racer Walsh. That car is still racing in Northeast vintage racing, still looks fantastic, and I still want it to succeed.
The first race I went to was the '72 Trans Am at Lime Rock. My buddies and I were all into the small imported sedans that were gaining in popularity at that time We were there to see the BRE Datsuns vs the Alfa and everybody else. When the big bore race started, we watched a bit then hit the food stand and mens room. A couple of the pictures I took that day were used in the republication of the Stainless Steel Carrot a few years back.
And speaking of Pintos... Later that year we hung around with Carson Baird at the Bryar night race for IMSA small bore cars. Was that the BFG race back then? He was in the process of winning the championship that year, in a Pinto, beating up on the BMW's, etc. Great fun. I wonder what happened to that Pinto?
And, Damn! I've got to get off my ass and edit my pictures from the Lime Rock Vintage weekend.
Stu
Back in 2005, I got an ITB GTV just to go racing in this group. But just got it out to one event.
Thankfully- I sold it this year, and it will soon be racing with other small sedans. Great car. But it's another IT car that turned into a vintage race car- it's an amazingly easy thing to do. The chassis is almost exactly the same- weight is different, and it's the engine and trans that are open to most modifications.
This was the racing I was most interested in doing.
Due to the Keihin flat slide carbs on my Datsun I run in a catch all class but the my class is in with the B-sedan cars.
The group is really great to run with. I found Matt Rose and Steve Link to be very good guys. Part of that is Steve was hugely complimentary of my driving; how can you not like someone who tells you your driving the wheels of your car when your driving the wheels off your car. These guys all paddock together and have a lot of fun.
While obviously it cost money to run up front it doesn't take a lot of bucks to be fairly competitive. My motor is very moldy tuned and I manage slightly better than mid-pack, I'm spending around $2,000 building my own motors (they go 5 seasons or more) if I'd spend another $1000 on the cylinder head I could probably manage 5-7th over all rather than my 9-10th.
Using an old SCCA IT car is absolutely the way to go if your doing you own work. Install an upgraded camshaft, clean up the ports, install a set of sided raft carbs and call it a day. If you run Toyo tires like many of the competitors do, your tire bill won't be so bad. Keeping the compression in the 10.5-1 range will also cut the fuel bill.
Again for anyone wanting to go vintage racing this is a really good group. I've had some titanic battles for mid-pack glory. While my ego would love to leave the field behind its a lot more fun scrapping it out. Previously I ran in with the small bore sports car run group, while that was fun and I ran up front, I'd have a good dice on the opening lap or two and then I'd settle in between the top 3 or 4 (perennially 5th overall) and the 6th - 10th placed cars. The driver depth seems to be a little deeper in B-sedan.
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