Day 0: The day before Prologue

Well we made it to Manukau safely and with no real problems with the car.
We stayed with the Kibble family last night at their Taupo home. Huge thank you to Harvey and Sherry Kibble for their hospitality.

We arrived here at the Silver Oaks, Quality Inn Manukau mid afternoon and set about doing final preparation. We set up the HD video system (Huge thanks to Dave Davenport for lending us his system) fitted the Dunlop race tyres, radio system and tried to setup some type of speed control system. The computer that's fitted to the car can control so many functions it's scary. But it seemed to stump us when it came to limiting speed. We just couldn't find the right settings.

The Evo will accelerate to 200kph in a very short time and if we go over this speed we will be penalised severely. The car is fitted with a GPS system by Targa control and they can monitor our speed and position at all times. It's vital that we do not exceed the imposed limit, but at the same time we need to get as close to it as possible.

The final seeding list has been set, We are 18th car on the road in the Modern class. This will change each day depending on our results.

Check out http://www.targa.co.nz/ for details of positions etc during the event. http://targa.co.nz/Results_937.aspx should give you live results.

Meanwhile I've published some pics of the team on day zero on facebook. Follow this link to view them.

Tomorrow we have documentation and Prologue. Prologue is a single stage of approx 10km's. It doesn't count towards the final results, but it helps with seeding. Monday is the first day of proper competition.

Hopefully I'll be able to upload some video of our prologue stage tomorrow.

Till then... Ron

What a stunning day of weather. We drove up on Friday night to Taupo and this morning we were greeted by a chilly sunbathed morning. The ride up to Auckland was straightforward and the Labour weekend traffic didn’t hold us up.

I’m looking forward to getting into the first special stage. Still yet to have a full speed ride in Ron’s Evo but from what I’ve seen of his driving, I have no doubt I’ll be in for an exciting ride.
We’re just settling down for the evening now with a bit of beer induced relaxation. Well, the others are anyway. The car and service vehicles are just sitting outside all locked up and I’m happy we’re heading into the Targa without any stressful issues.

Victor

Just 4 short days till Targa

So much to do so little time!!
Well actually that should have been my post title last weekend, things are a lot less hectic now.
I'm really sorry for not doing more blog updates but as you can imagine the team and I have been working flat stick on getting the car and all the necessary service equipment ready to race.

We had a devastating test day at Manfield last Sunday. After loosing an engine last month, which set us back by three weeks, the gearbox decided to retire in sympathy after just three gentle warm-up laps of the track.
A tooth had broken off a gear and exited the gearbox casing leaving a hole and a cracked housing.
We loaded up the truck again and returned home to replace the gearbox with the one from Murray O'Neil's rally car. Ray Yee from STM is rebuilding my gearbox to be used as a spare in case we suffer a similar problem again on Targa.

So we lost any opportunity to test the car, bed in brakes and get used to the new setup of the suspension. I guess we will just have to get the feel for things on the first couple of stages of competition.

The steroids have done their job and my energy levels are very good. A huge improvement over two weeks ago when I could hardly function at all. I've certainly been under a huge amount of stress this last week and seem to be getting through OK. I'd have liked a few days to really relax before we go, but we have decided to take two days to transport the car and gear to Auckland and that will allow some cooling off period where I can clear my head and re-focus.

There is still a huge amount of goodwill and support pouring in. It really is appreciated. Today for instance Joe McAndrew visited the workshop and shared his experience as a Targa winning driver over a bite to eat. Others have phoned or emailed in their good luck wishes. Thanks guys it really does inspire us to do well.

The car is now totally sign-written thanks to the team at Martin Signs/PT RaceGear. The car looks totally different now, gone is the old FlexTech livery. Replaced with Fujitsu Heat Pumps, Gaskin Ford & Mazda and numerous other sponsors.

Healthwise.. well who knows? I always end up feeling like there's nothing wrong with me at all once the prednisone starts to work. The lymph nodes in my neck are now almost undetectable, the fever has gone but I still have a persistent cough. I'm scheduled for another CT scan on November 11th, so I'll have to stop the steroids as soon as I return from Targa otherwise there will be nothing to see on the scan, which will only delay any treatment plans should they be required (note the steroid inspired optimism).

Then I have a week of jury duty at the end of that month. I could get out of it by playing the sick card... but hey it might be an interesting case and a learning experience.. who knows?

OK, must go. Have to rise early tomorrow to repair the car trailer we have borrowed to transport the race car.