SPDA goes to the 24 Hours of Lemons

[Navigator]

Wanted to let everyone know that a Team of SPDA members is headed to The Lamest Day, 24 Hours of LeMons race this coming weeking.

We are Team Fahrfrumwinning. The team is led by Captain, SCCA Pro racer Andrew Cordeiro, From TDI Cup. The most experienced ;-) driver on the Team, Rob Stone from Rescon Racing, who has been providing training for many years. The alignment specialist Scott Murfin from Can-Alignment and rookie Ivano Di Pietro from Grindstone Motorsports.

The car, a 1992 Nissan 240sx, it is being prepared at Can-Alignment with help from the team members and crew. Our crew members are Maurizio D, Nuwan D, Ford W and Leighanne P. This will be our first attempt at a race of this type, but we think we are ready to meet the challange. Our team members come from different Motorsports backgrounds and our crew has proven that working through the night will be easy for them.

For those that don’t know the history of these type of events each LeMons race is for cars purchased, fixed up, and track-prepped for a total of 500 dollars or less. Twelve hours into the race, the car voted People’s Choice is called in and awarded a cash prize; simultaneously, the car voted People’s Curse is called in and summarily destroyed. The rest of the cars finish the 24 Hours and the winner gets their grand prize of $1500 in bags of nickels.

Our Sponsors include, Greenview Irrigation, Can-Alignment.com, Rescon Racing, Grindstone Motorsports, Ponderosa Nature Resort, Partimer Signs and Insidetrack Communications

[Cavemanrjc]

Good Luck
That sound like a blast Kinda like a 24hr enduro

[miatagirl77]

Good Luck guys!!

[Navigator]

Rob, it is a 24 hour enduro, only reason to stop is for fuel or brakes and if you get crushed. We expect to complete 850+ laps in the 24 hours.

[AndrewR]

Sounds like a blast - Lots of pics please :-)

[dubya_rx]

Good luck guys! Looks like fun.

[alf]

Cool!!! Good luck!!!!

[mikewolf]

I assume you've done your research and are bringing lots of canadain beer to bribe the judges and other competitors with so you don't get the people's curse award. Have fun and take lots of pictures!

[oldguy]

The 'luck' will be making sure that I'm in the car just
BEFORE Ivano - he can ventilate a room in a hurry.

Good thing that we don't have a crapper in the thing :-)

[BryceD]

Every year I am jealous of this event. Looks like a ton of fun, and good luck!

[DouglasM]

Good luck, guys!

Where is the event being held?

[Nuwan]

oldguy wrote:
The 'luck' will be making sure that I'm in the car just
BEFORE Ivano - he can ventilate a room in a hurry.

Good thing that we don't have a crapper in the thing :-)

Lol, just be glad I'm not driving or else you'd have to ask for a different car :hammer:

The track is Nelson Ledges in Ohio I believe.

[nissannx]

Wow! You guys are going to have fun!

We want a full report on the race. Then we want a report of the car build - which I'm guessing is still in process! Awesome work!

[racecartech]

The Beasty.


WE ARE READY

[dubya_rx]

That looks WAY too good for $500.

[mikewolf]

Yeah it looks great, You are going to need to ugly it up a bunch or you'll get crushed for sure.

[Navigator]

The rotting underbody and rotted hole in the rocker on the otherside, the rust covered by vinyl :-P are what you have to look at, then there is the tired engine, mmm stock 17 year old suspension need I go on. lol :-)

The value of the car is before any safety devices, tires, brakes and lighting. If you wanted to put a value on all of that stuff the car is worth more then $500.

[racecartech]

the decals make the car look good, thankfully they are free!!

It passed the 30 foot test now,
good from far--far from good

[racecartech]

http://insidetracknews.blogspot.com/2009/09/team-fahrfrumwinning-will-be-one-of.html

Here is Insidetrack support.

Thanks Mike & Greg

[andrew1984]

Big shout out to Scott Murfin a.k.a Can Alignment & TrackMart.com who have made this event possible for me!


Remember guys... the cold beer is waiting at the finish line!

Cheers

[tashko]

That's awesome guys, I'm jealous!

Might have to look into two teams for next year!!!

[Cavemanrjc]

Ill go as crew

[04turbowagon]

I'll drive!

[Navigator]

We arrived at the track before 7 this morning, the bad is that we got over and inch and a half of rain the good news is it cleared up by around 4:30. We got our lights mounted onto the hood and went and did out evening lapping/ light setup.

There are 125 cars entered into the event this year, we will have pictures after the event. To many cool and fun cars, a 57 pink caddy, an 70's 1 ton Chevy van with the back cut off.

On the bullshit factor we got a 10 lap penalty and it had nothing to do with the car. The guy looking over the car, recognized Andrew from last weekend at Road Atlanta in the rain (where he finished second) and basically decided no matter how stock the car we deserved the penality. The judges do take bribes, we have to remember Canadian beer for next year ;-). There is a 97 M3 that had been assesed a 150 laps penalty and got it down to 20 laps with a case of beer and $100 cash. I can see it getting crushed, lol. The event is about seat time and good hard fun.

Time for bed, maybe an update tomorrow night with how we are doing. Race starts at 12 pm tomorrow. Woot!!!

[Nuwan]

Maurizio and I showed up friday afternoon. The boys hit the track for some practice in the evening sessions (7:30pm to 10pm). About 1-1/2" of rain fell before I arrived, the ground is soaked and there's puddles everywhere. The track was slick during practice, Ivano put it into the weeds briefly, Scott tried flat footing it through turn 1 in 4th which resulted in an on track 360, and Andrew kept it all tidy. Meanwhile Rob happily slumbers at the hotel.

125 car field, which means the track will be packed at least for the first few hours, the boys were passing most of the field during practice so we should put some good laps in tomorrow.

We received a 10 lap penalty due to the applied "bullshit" factor as our car is worth about $600 according to the scrutineers, although it is actually because they recognized Andrew from the VW cup races and that he won the last race in the rain.

Hopefully things will dry up tomorrow on the track, there's a ton of interesting vehicles entered although many don't sound healthy. Can't seem to upload photos from this comp, so bare with me.

[nissannx]

LOL - I thought you might need to disguise the car a bit (that is, a little less shiny paint) but I never thought you'd need to disguise the drivers! That is so much fun already. It sure is better than a 150 lap penalty.

Keep the posts coming. I was afraid that once you got to the track we'd never hear anything. Remind Scott that he's going to need to brake once in a while, tell Ivano to not brake quite so much, get Rob to drive that car like it's a Nissan, and make sure Andrew keeps his balaclava on so he's not recognized again!

[Daniel_Buehler]

Where are the online results???


I thought there were live updates... :(

[JayC]

I have not spoken with ayone yet but this is what I read on facebook.

"Andrew Cordeiro We had an awesome time at LeMons! Unfortunately we had to withdrawl from the race as one of our drivers had a health issue and was rushed to the hospital. He is doing fine now and we are grateful for everyones help. See you next year! Team Fahrfrumwinning heading out!"


Atleast whoever it was that was ill is better now.

[STeveD]

I guess that Scott couldn't handle the sushi... ;-)

[nissannx]

I'm glad that everyone is okay. I guess we'll have to wait for the stories. I'm sure that there will be lots of them.

JayC - thanks for the facebook update.

[Navigator]

Thanks to everyone at the track and here for their concerns. At around 10 pm Rob lost consciousness while sitting in the motorhome with Scott and I and had to be taken to the hospital. We didn’t know how long or what the outcome would be so we withdrew from the event. Good news is 2 hours later they released Rob and he was his same “oldguy” self.

Now for the war stories.

The event has a unique way of gridding cars, they tell everyone to get on track as though it’s a lapping day. A 2 mile track with 125 cars meant that you had about 4 car lengths total to yourself. Then at 12 pm they randomly decided to throw a green flag at a car and that would be the beginning of the race. Scott was driving our car and we ended up starting in about 104th spot. Cars everywhere, tons of passing but a very good group of drivers as there was very little if any rubbing of fenders. Scott was tracking and passing a lot of cars, moving his way up the field. About an hour into the race Scott was in 3rd place, yes he passed 100 cars and half of those probably 3 times.

……
To be continued…….

[oldguy]

Thanks Momma-Mia.

Next time (and there WILL be a next time) I won't
show up at the track running a three-week sleep
deficit.

~~~

The event was great. The track was fun, the car
was SPECTACULAR (thanks to the Murfin-man) and
the 500+ other drivers (more than half of whom had
never ever been wheel-to-wheel before) were more
disciplined and trustworthy than we thought they
would be.

The penalties and the sand-bagging weren't unexpected,
but they were for the birds. All in good fun, though ;-)

~~~

Next year ? Two cars, more drivers !!!

[AndrewR]

WooHoo!! Glad to hear you are ok.

I'm in :-)

[dubya_rx]

Yes, glad you are ok Rob!

----------

Any in-car video coming?

[Navigator]

No video :-(

We had a go pro camera in the car but the rules were no work on the car on pit lane of any kind. We were only allowed to take fuel or change drivers.

I still cant get over how well our car was setup using the stock suspension and Falken 615's. They had been scrubbed at Dunville a while back, Andrew and I drove them for about 30 laps at TMP, we ran them in warm up for anther 30, then we did 10 hours of racing and would have probably gone the whole event.

Rob said it best " this thing drives like a Subaru, get it set in the corner and give it gas"

All that I missed was the spool and whoosh sounds, so I would play that part in my head ;-)

[warwagon]

[Nuwan]

[nissannx]

[BryceD]

That looks like awesome fun! Glad to hear that you're ok as well Rob.

[GTibyJB]

That looks like so much fun! Count me in for next year!