2005 - Round-5 Ice Racing Weekend
I had completly forgotten about stuffing the car into the bank on the last last lap of a race on the previous sunday. It was a hard stuff, Todd McCall approximates that we straigthlined turn one and hit the bank between 75 and 80km/h. (He brought his GPS toy with him in the car — apparently our max speed was just over the 90km/h mark.)
that incident set the stage for an absolutely emotionally draining round-5 weekend.
During Saturday’s Street Stud practice, the car suddenly started pulling to the right — it felt like a flat front right tire. We pulled into the infield — as soon as the car stopped I could smell it — the stink of welding. The outer right CV boot had split and the joint had all but seized. I wasn’t really suprised, as I noticed the boot had split while swapping the clutch the weekend before.
Luckily Nielsen Auto Parts (aka Brian, Eric and Frank) had a spare driveshaft. I missed stud practice, but didn’t much care — I was back in business in time for the Street Stud qualifier — Andy and I had a good battle, but i just couldn’t make it stick, finished on his bumper, again.
Chucked the illegal stud tires on for the stud qualifier. Starting from last place (due to tires), I hovered behind for a couple turns to let the field spread, then mashed the gas. What a blast, I picked off a few cars within a couple laps, and was chasing down Carol Raitte when the checkers were thrown.
During the cool down lap, again I noticed the car pulling to the right. initially thought it was a tire, but after some driving around in the pits, I heard the clunking from the right front. Another driveshaft killed. grr.
Jumped in the truck and went looking for Carquest. Couldn’t find them so I hit Highlands Supply on HWY 35. Lucky enough they had a new axle for me. Swapped the second axle out just in time for the first stud race.
The guys at the entrance to the mock grid had me starting in 5th! Cool. I told them about the tires and volunteered myself to start 11th. This time around I wasted no time carving through the field. Stephanie was my passenger and was having a blast. Coming onto the straight I was on the inside of the rabbit who was coming up inside Carol, who still had her mustang in full drift. Unfortunately for the rabbit, when the stang snapped straight, he got sandwiched HARD between us. He later told me that his steering was affected by the hit, and would be changing the rack in the week to come.
In the pits, Steph couldn’t get the door open and ended up climbing out my side. With some good kicks from the inside, we were able to get the door open. Frank Nielsen snapped into action and got the door latching again while I changed to my street stud tires. I think that Stephanie was a little spooked by the hit, and decided to watch from the banks..
Again Andy and I had some good battles. Again I finished right on his bumper.
Todd busted out his body jack, a hammer and went nuts on the damaged pillar and quarter panel. Aside from the 3/4″ thick chunks of bondo that fell off, by the time Todd was done, the car was as good as new.
Promising to be quiet during the race, he joined me for my last stud race of the afternoon — his first in years — we were both giddy after the fun. I like studs. 
My last race of the day was street studs. It was a good race, Andy and I were duking it out as usual when i started smelling burnt grease. F—! The new boot split wide open and pissed out all of the warm grease. Again, finished second. Richard Walker in the chevette was disappointed that I slid into him trying to get by. Smacked the front end and kicked his camber in quite a bit. What a way to end the day. grr.
The Cliffe was dead. Most of the folks had gone to the Kinsmen dinner — I’ll go next year.
Todd McCall offered one of his spare driveshafts from his garage.. That would have worked out great if I could have reached Mark. I called his mobile so many times that I killed the battery, preventing him from seeing the text message the next day.
Steph and I fired up the car during the drivers meeting, then hopped into the truck and booked it to Canadian tire in Lindsay. Grabbed a driveshaft, a coffee and hauled ass back to the track.
I threw the new driveshaft in the car, swapped tires and hit the grid. Made it to the mid-point of the race in third place, thenI lost all drive and parked it just before the kink. What a pisser. The only thing I could think that happened was that the diff broke — with a chewed axle I would have pulled to the right.
Richard pushed me into the pits. Jacked it up and saw the axle was half out of the gearbox. Also noticed the very bent suspension.