It took a long time to get to the first race this year (and this will be a longer than usual post), but racing June 18 & 19 in the Mid-Atlantic National Automotive Sports Association region at their biggest event of the year; Hyperfest was a blast. Scheduling conflicts with my Columbia Business School development job kept the Reparto Corse Protégé off the race track in April and May when my NASA Northeast region headed south to NJ Motorsports Park and north to the Glen, but that was a good thing. The spring weather was cold and rainy and the Protégé was undergoing serious work under the hood and on the surface too.

Many of the upgrades were accomplished with the help of the extended Reparto Corse team. The little-engine-that-could received upgrades in the shape of a custom AWR exhaust header scored at a great price (thank you Protégé forum!), a racing intake header and AEM cold air intake. The brakes were redone with new calipers and braided lines that massively improved brake performance and control. Thanks to the loan of an old angle grinder from friend (and team plumber, Alvar Lee) the doors were lightened with new cutouts. This dropped a couple of pounds and cleaned the interior up  – no more ugly interior door sheet metal panels! A new Recaro racing seat saved about 15 pounds too thanks to friend and Protégé-protégé, Mike Schultz, who traded a day of driving instruction for the new seat. (Thanks Mike!) A fresh set of Toyo RA1 Proxes from Phil’s Tire Service picked up at the track helped keep things on the blacktop at Summit. When I run out of mechanical ability/time/etc, Mario and Silvio at Post Rd Sunoco greet me with “Hey Speed Race-a! What’s going on?” They installed the headers, brake lines and new seat too.

On the outside the crinkly war wound in the right rear quarter panel received at NASA Nationals in 2007 was finally unwrinkled and made smoother than most of the rest of the panels by buddy John at Reimann Auto Body – all these guys enjoy sending me off to play. With the cleaned up body came a freshening of the Reparto Corse graphics. The Protégé acquired a new number changing from 9 to 4 at the Northeast region’s request so we don’t have conflicting number 9’s on the track and Jackman Max helped with the cosmetics – cleaning up the body and painting the interior panels. Racing a Protégé usually turns a couple of heads, and often includes a sort of why a Protégé look, if not spoken question. The answer, whether spoken out loud or not is really simple. When I decided to go racing I needed something that was inexpensive to buy and work on and would also have enough room to transport all of my junk since I would be driving it to the track. The Protégé was the least expensive thing available in the Sports Car Club of America entry level Showroom Stock categories. Being a sedan it has plenty of room to carry the spare tires and tools and it was very competitive in the hands of the top level amateurs when it was new. Basic maintenance and replacement parts are relatively inexpensive and it’s a tough no-nonsense design. There is a good Protégé community for support and it handles quite well too thanks to the package developed by Mazda’s racer support arm, Mazda Speed.

Being economical usually elicits one of two responses. The wondering negative one as in, ”What happens if you crash and can’t drive home?” and the sort of nostalgic positive one as in, “Cool! I remember back in the day when we all drove to the track. It was a lot simpler then…blah blah blah”, or “Man – driving to the track really forces you to think about how much crap you’re gonna actually need to pack! That goddam trailer of mine is full of junk we never use…” One thing that anyone who lives in one place for more than a year knows is that if there’s space, for sure it is going to get filled up.

What I learned at Hyperfest:

The Reparto Corse Protégé races under the NASA Performance Touring rules. These go from A for the fastest, most modified cars through F for the most lightly modified least fast (we, I, at least, don’t say slowest) cars. The Performance Touring rules allow racers to upgrade their car as much as they like. A point system for the modifications determines the class. The base class for the Protégé is F as in least fast! After all of my upgrades I registered for PTE for Hyperfest. What I learned at Hyperfest is now that the Protégé is at the limit for F class modifications; it with me hanging onto the steering wheel was 5 seconds quicker than the other PTF race cars entered to race. I also learned that with me sawing away at the wheel and pushing the pedals and levers around as best I could the Protégé was 5 seconds from the middle of the PTE race car field.

The down side to this at Hyperfest was that I made the guy who finished 8^th in PTE feel really good ‘cause I was 9^th. I did not get a trophy (like I would have if I raced in PTF). I was not cheered by the fans when the race winners walked onstage on Saturday night (like I would have if I raced in PTF). I did not share said stage with the Daisy Dukes look-a-like contestants (like I would have if I raced in PTF). The upside is that I think the Reparto Corse Protégé has a shot at doing very well at NASA Nationals in PTF and that is really cool. I also had a great trip with Jackman Max. We changed a lot of wheels from practice wheels to rain wheels to dry wheels and he learned some good preparation skills when I killed the battery and fried the transponder that sends the timing tower my lap times.  No harm done except to the transponder that needs replacing. It was just another lesson learned about moving quickly, but not hurrying. Being more than competitive for what would have been the correct class on a new track on the first day was great. 

The Northeast region’s Grand Slam weekend at Pocono Raceway is next on the calendar. Grand Slam is happening July 15-17 so come on out and enjoy.

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