Oh what might have been!
The Six Hour Relay Race
Winton Motor Raceway
Sunday, August 30, 1998

Last year was the first staging of the event since 1994, so it was keenly awaited and contested by the 13 teams. After taking the chequered flag as provisional winners, the hard light of day dawned later and we managed to finish 3^rd outright and 7^th on handicap, winning the trophy (which I have yet to see!) for the best Post 70's team. Knowing that this year=s event had attracted almost double the entrants, we anticipated that the competition would be quicker and keener than ever. We weren't disappointed.

To give ourselves a better chance at the handicap trophy, which is the whole reason for the event, this year the club decided to run two teams: Team Maserati Red and Team Maserati Blue.

The Red team comprised Steve Chiodo, a veteran from last year in his 1997 Lotus Elise, Winston Kim in his 1960 Elva Courier, Steve Phillips (who was in the 1997 team, but was forced to withdraw with engine problems) in his 1995 Nissan 200SX and Chris Stephen in his Iso Rivolta 300GT. Greg Aimers was the manager of Team Red and was ably assisted in this role by Mary Blecher and Lee Kim (who kept lap times and operated the team pit board).

The Blue team comprised myself (Jim Reark) in the 1975 Ferrari Dino 308GT4, Tony Moodie in his 1985 BMW M635CSi, Andrew Gregory in his 1996 Maserati Ghibli Cup car and Andrew Ogg in his 1971 Ford Twin Cam Lotus Escort. Mike Mier was team manager and he in turn was ably assisted by Dee Stephen and Carol Williams who kept lap times and operated the Blue team pit board.

Assisting both teams were Travis Williams, John McNiece and Louis King. John Aust was the Club=s official nominated representative and he worked with the MSCA race officials for the event. To make sure we stood out from the other 24 teams, Carol Williams organised the production of special club hats and polo shirts, which we all made a point of wearing. These items are part of a limited merchandise range that Carol has put together for Club members. (See elsewhere in this newsletter).

The starting point for the event is the free-practice day on the Friday. Some of the team got started early in the day, whilst others (notably myself) arrived a little later in the day. The purpose of the day is to get some preliminary idea of likely times. Each driver has to nominate a lap time that he/she intends to drive to. Any laps quicker than the nominated time by 0.1 or more result in a penalty lap. So if you go even a fraction quicker than your nominated time, you lose a lap off the team total. Getting to know, what time you can drive to, but not go below, is a critical part of the event.

The weather for the Friday practice was clear blue skies and sunshine. It looked and felt more like the Gold Coast rather than Winton. By the time I got there however, there was only 30 minutes of practice left. Somewhat hurriedly I got the Dino off the trailer, jumped into my suit and got onto the track for 25 minutes or so.

It=s funny how you panic when you see fluid underneath your car prior to an event. Within half and hour of the close of the final free practice session, I was reviewing my times and walked back to the new garages in the new pit area at Winton. The Club was fortunate to get three of the new garages built for the Group A guys. So we had the best of facilities with concrete floors. That's how I noticed the puddle, which turned out to be oil directly under the rear of the car. After a few phone calls and a closer look at the oil, it started to make sense. Opening the boot it all became clear. I had forgotten to remove a plastic container of oil prior to practice. The end result was the lid came off the container whilst circulating around Winton and the outcome was on the floor. The next hour was spent cleaning up the mess. I must admit I was more than somewhat relieved.

Saturday morning dawned another bright, clear sunny day. It was time for scrutineering and then qualifying. Each member of the team has to qualify for the event. The only problem is only one member of any team can be on the track at the one time. With 26 teams entered, this makes a lot of sense, though I suspect in some cases where teams have six cars it involves a bit of waiting around. Both Red and Blue teams got through Qualifying by the end of the second session, so there was a little time left over to do a few more laps which most of us managed to do.

To wind up the Saturday, there was a trophy for the best lap. Starters were restricted to the top 10 qualifiers based on the Qualifying times. Mort Fitzgerald in a very special MG V8 put in a very quick time of 1:31 to take out the trophy. In the 1997 event the best time was somewhere around a 1:37. In this years event there would have been at least six cars quicker than that. As a gesture to team officials the organisers also conducted a short regularity run. The team official with the closest three laps won the trophy. I lent Greg Aimers the Dino and he put in some good and close times, but unfortunately was not in the hunt ... the winner put in three almost identical laps and that's calculating to four decimal places!

Saturday night is of course the big night. The team dinner was held at the Kim Wah restaurant, where with some helpful persuasion from Winston Kim (and his personal supply of fresh vegetables) a gourmet Chinese banquet was presented. Our special thanks to Winston for his efforts in once again organising a terrific meal. It was a pity in some respects that the Sunday was a race day. All the drivers, at least, behaved themselves.

Then it was Sunday. Race day. It was an overcast day, but quite warm. Whilst it was clouded there was no threat of rain. In fact it remained that way all day. The conditions were ideal.

There were of course a number of Club members at this meeting ... excluding those in the Club teams. David Floyd, well known to those who attend club track days, was the Event Director. Barry Jorgensen was one of the Stewards for the meeting. All of this was confidence building as we felt we had some friends in high places. In the ranks of other teams were Martin Cole (Lotus Club: Lotus Elise), Geoff Fickling (Targa Boys: Nissan Pulsar GtiR) and Stephen O'Neill (Historic Touring Cars: Ford Cortina GT). And, of course, a wide range of familiar faces from Maserati track days.

Making their presence felt on race day was a contingent from the Australian Ferrari Register lead by "Lightweight" Jack Klaver, who were checking the event out for a Ferrari 355 assault in 1999 (or some other year).

Anyway, back to the event. Starting time was 10.00 am. Steve Chiodo (Red Team) and myself (Blue Team) took to the starting grid. Following two warm up laps, the lights turned green and the field of 26 cars was away. The start was uneventful. All cars got round the first corner and the race was on in earnest.

Both the Red and Blue teams being composed of four cars were scheduled for changes at 45 minute intervals. Each car in each team has a short strip of Velcro attached to the top of the left front panel. The starting car carries another removable strip or 'sash' affixed to this strip. When it is time to change cars, the car exits the track and proceeds to an area adjacent to the dummy grid, where a team official, under the direction of race officials, removes the 'sash' and affixes it to the team car that is due on the track next. When the transfer is complete, race officials, signal the car to move onto the track. So it really is a relay race ... with a velcro sash as the batten.

As the pit garages are quite a distance from the dummy grid area it was necessary to hire two way radios for communication between the two areas so that there was good communications between the team manager and his support in the dummy grid and those doing the lap scoring and timing in the section of track in front of the new pit garages. From the driver's standpoint the challenge was to get close to, but not go under the nominated he had set. This is more difficult than it sounds.

Apart this event the last time I had driven at Winton was several months before and then only for a few laps. Practice and Qualifying had also been short stints. The problem is that when you get into race mode, you tend to get quicker. In fact the longer you are on the track the quicker you get.

The Red team handled this situation well, incurring only one penalty lap for a fractional oversight. But the team had other problems. Winston Kim encountered bearing problems with a front wheel on his Elva Courier, which meant he had to come in earlier than planned. That was OK, except the problem had to be fixed so that he could get out for his second session. That was when the drama started. After asking around and checking all suppliers within an hour or so of the track it became apparent there was no replacement ... that is until Travis Williams noticed that the bearings appeared to be the same size as those on the trailer. Following an hour or so of valiant work, Travis got the car ready, using the bearings from the trailer, just in time for it to get back on the track. Which it did. But only for a limited time. This time the front axle failed and that was it for Winston. The problem was we had to make up the time on the track.

Each driver is limited to the amount of time he can spend on the track (in the case of our teams it was 90 minutes " 10 minutes). Each of the other Red team drivers drove to their maximum time, and that left Steve Phillips according to our reckoning, who still had 10 minutes track time left to finish the race. The problem was we had 15 minutes to the end of the race. The end result was the Red team incurred a two lap penalty for Steve's extra track time. Red team completed 215 handicap laps. The three penalty laps incurred reduced this to 212 for their total for the event.

The Blue team had different problems. Unlike the Red team we had set our nominated times a bit closer to what we actually felt we could drive. All of us felt confident we would not go under them, exercising reasonable constraint. In any case, the times that were set were 1 second better than what we had achieved in Qualifying.

Well, you guessed it, we were wrong! In my first session, despite the frantic gestures from Dee Stephen and Carol Williams, I incurred four penalty laps. Tony Moodie who was next incurred none and so did Andrew Gregory who followed. By this time we were running third and doing well. Unfortunately from there on it went downhill. By the end of the event, we had completed 218 handicap laps ... which would have placed us in a winning position, but ... when the penalty laps were added up, Blue team had incurred a total of 16 penalty laps for travelling too quickly. With the exception of Tony Moodie, who obviously demonstrated great restraint, the rest of us contributed to the problem. Notwithstanding, the final outcome, it was a hell of a lot of fun!

Who won? In first place with 218 handicap laps was the Alfa Romeo Club (Team Quattroporte). Second with 217 laps was the Sportscar Owners Club of Victoria (Redback Racing) and third with 216 laps was the Mini Club (Link Automotive All Stars). None of these teams incurred any penalty laps. For the Maserati Club, Team Red finished equal seventh (212 laps) and Team Blue (202 laps) finished eleventh.

A special vote of thanks to all members of the club team. We may not have won the event, but we all had a good time!

As for the event itself. The highlight of the event was undoubtedly its professional administration both on and off the track. There was a wide mixture of experience and times represented by competitors on the circuit. Yet, despite this there were no incidents, other than self-imposed or mechanically imposed ones.

Congratulations to David Floyd for his splendid role in the organisation of the event. In appreciation of David's hard work, which he claimed had caused him to Apull my hair out@ at times, the organising committee for the event presented David with a free treatment at Advanced Hair of "yeah! yeah!" fame. Congratulations are also due to Alister Grigg who acted as Clerk of Course, Neil Thompson as Chief Flagmarshall and of course to the many other officials who made it such an entertaining and enjoyable event.

One thing is certain, there will be a limit of 34 teams next year. The Club plans to have three teams.