Topic: Been thinking...
About Lemons, of course.
Like, why we do it, and especially why we keep doing it. Our 2013 season is starting up, so it seemed like a good time to reflect.
I got involved in this after watching a couple races from the sidelines, then in a moment of weakness I bought a seat in the pyramid-powered Mazda 323. I had never raced. Lots of track days, sure, but no racing. Being able to drive for Dave was an experience, to say the least. He had a great car and team and had done well with that thing, which I swear the motor was barely any bigger than the battery, so it had to be pyramid-powered. But for me, the sensory overload was similar to my first track days. So much was new, different, challenging, mental processing of it all was maxed out, and I couldn't believe what I was doing with and to someone else's car. Even so, I still didn't quite get the racing part of the racing thing. It took a while to realize that I was basically just out there driving a track day in traffic. Sure, there was some dicing, but I was still holding back, being nice, patient, practicing good track day etiquette, point-bys and all. I even pitted after a spin in the last 20 minutes of the race without getting BFed, wasted a lot of time there, probably lost several positions for the team, but still managed a top 20. Positions mean nothing on track days, and at the time I didn't realize what a top 20 in Lemons actually meant.
The Tinyvette was born out of this one experience. We got a car and in 9 weeks made it safe and pretty and able to complete laps at a track day, and barely finish it's first Lemons race. When you run a team, build a team, build a car, and field that car, then clean up the mess afterwards, you are wearing so many hats that it sometimes is difficult to figure out what it is all about any more. The build, sure, but that's just a fraction of it. The race, including the logistics, management, execution, for the power hungry and despot-tending types, that might satisfy. The driving, awesome as it is, a reward for the 9 weeks of foreplay just mentioned, does not quite justify the effort.
I've decided that it is the theater, and given all that Phil and Jay to to make this not-just-racing, that should have been obvious, but I guess I am a little slow about some things. But yea, it is the theater. We practice and rehearse and prepare, then pack up and get to the show with plenty of time to settle in before the curtains open. The paddock is back stage, where all of the characters are arriving and getting into character. Each team is a character, as if Lemons were a Pixar movie. We're the Tinyvette character, earnest, mostly honest, still a little clueless and still holding on to the dream that if the car does well enough in Lemons that it will get invited to Le Mans and get to race with the big Corvette guys. The Lemons version of "The Little Engine that Could". Then, OMG, there is the 'bee character, the Bug, the Jeep, the Polar Bear, Eyesore, Mazadarachies, that pole dancer car, and so many more characters, and that's just for the west coast races!
So last night as I was pressure washing parts I had recently bead blasted, soaking wet and cold, hoping I could get all the glass out, hoping that my second attempt at an engine build would last more than an hour this time, stressing that our replacement for piston #4 still has not arrived, wondering if I anything I've read online about tuning Webers is true, still needing to inspect the rest of the car and repair any salt-related damage, thinking about the the money to get a 4-channel EGT gauge, plus a gasket set, and how I should really be spending more time making money so I can continue to pay rent, the idea of Lemons as theater and not just racing, and as art and not merely sport, that made it all feel better. Being part of this show, especially with the other great characters that we've become friends with, makes it all, well, mostly, worth it, most of the time.
24 Hours of Lemons on Vimeo, Team Tinyvette on Facebook, Team Tinyvette
