U guys in the VW's are nuts........fantastic to watch though!

Ring Ring........'CT, it's Jak, have u got your gearbox in yet?', ' No not yet, have u sorted your rear disk brakes yet'? Nah not yet, talk to u later'.

Ring Ring........."Jak, it's CT, I've got 4 bent pushrod tubes! what do I do'?, 'Don't know dude, I just drove my car around the block & still have no brakes, what do I do?' ...................This is just a very small extract from CT & my phone calls even days before we were to race with the Porsche club at Oran Park on the 10th of May. The fact that we were able to drive our cars to the track, let alone race is a small miracle on it's own.

Yes folks, it's that time of year again when CT & myself feel it our duty & dare I say our responsibility to uphold the Volkswagen Motorsport flag & take to the track with the NSW Porsche club to carve up the curves, catapult down the straights & generally hold on for dear life in our "souped up" lawnmowers, but race fans we take great comfort with safety in numbers, for CT & I have been joined by 'Big Rudy' in the Ex John Watts sports sedan L-bug, running a high compression, Avgas slurping 1916cc, with absolutely no ground clearance & race slicks, Rudy has already been doing some blistering times at the track this year, improving his times by as much as 2 seconds per track session.!

Paul Loiacono has also joined in his L-bug, sporting Falkan slicks, suspension & brake work from V-Force, 1916cc motor , soon to be replaced with a 76x94mm stroker from V-force. Pauls carting background has been evident as he has shown that he really knows how to steer around a track..

Deiter Holzl will also be making his track debut in the next round in a Superbug, he has been practising on playstation & will definantly be a contender amongst the Porsche boys.

Saturday morning greeted us with blue skys & sunny conditions as we signed up & got our cars scrutineered before the days racing. Already there were a few kombis & beeltes in the car park to see some VW's try their best to stay on the track & in one piece.

We started the days proceedings with a 20 minute session on the track, basically to get familiar if u haven't been there before & also to sort out any bugs before the timed sessions started in the afternoon. CT & I were both a little nervous as we had done so many modifications to the cars since last year & with very few miles on them to check them out, this was really our first test session.

Just as a quick run down on what improvements we have made since last year, we are now both running identical close ratio boxes (1300 box converted to IRS) from Richard Holzl, we are also running identical Falkan street tyres, although I don't think CT was too impressed with them & will be returning to his Yokohama race rubber for the next run. CT's 1916cc engine now has 044 heads with no port work (only chamber work to unshroud the valves) 40 x 35.5 valves and 1.1:1 rocker arms. The compression is around 10 to 1 (I think). He finds it quicker if not equal to his old heads which were street eliminators with 44 x 37.5 valves, 1.25:1 rockers and about 9.5:1 compression. Not only that the 044s run about 5-10 degrees cooler and the engine takes longer to heat up. CT can't wait to put the current combo on the SAS dyno to see if there's any horsepower difference. CT said the reason the street eliminators didn't perform to expectations is that the inlet valves were shrouded (they needed chamber work) and the valves were just too big and needed too much valve spring pressure. A K-8 cam may find it's way into the case later on in the year but for now it seems to be running hard & thats what counts.

I on the other hand had a little unexpected surprise on the way home from the Bulli show, when half way up the mountain, in thick fog & traffic all around, the end cap of Chevy rod No.1 decided that it had enough & wanted out, a huge bang was heard, the oil light came on & that was that! Fast forward to present day, the little 1880cc (90.5x73mm) has now transformed into a 2027cc (94x73mm) , the crank was salvaged but nothing else up to the heads & rockers! Richard Holzl came to my rescue with a case already machined for 94mm barrels & pistons & CNC machined for a 86mm crank. A quick call to CB Performance in the States landed me some 5.7 inch Chromoly H-beam race rods, cam duties are now handled by a steel billet K-8, Berg chromoly pushrods, pushing Berg 1.4 rockers, Berg dual springs, my old 040 heads with 40x35 valves were still perfect & were bolted back on. It's very tourqey & will be interesting to get it back on the dyno. I also now have rear disks with Ford callipers & DBA rotors which have been cross drilled as have the front disks. It now goes like stink & stops on a dime. Back to the racing.

CT was all wired up for his first run with a camera in the car, which will be fantastic to watch as he had a big oversteer moment coming onto the main straight, corrected it & powered out of the corner, it will make for compelling viewing. I also had a couple of moments of my own, coming down the main straight, locked the inside rear wheel , got it sideways, got back on the power & stayed sideways through turn No.1! It was a big shock to the system but from all reports it looked as though I meant it, hope the Porsche boys watching thought that!, then on another of my early timed runs I left it in third over the dog leg , roughly doing about 145kph, got the car crossed up but somehow managed to keep it together , I'm now taking spare underwear to the track!

Highlights of the day was seeing Rudy in his L-bug keeping up with a supercharged 911!! I think that Rudy ended up with a 52.9 second lap time at the end of the day, certainly made the Porsche guys take note! Another was Paul , CT & I getting the whole track to our selves with only a 924 Turbo. By the end of the 4 laps we had all caught & passed him! We got a big applause from all the VW fans on the hill watching as we pulled back into the pits. He didn't know what hit him!.

Whilst standing in the pits we were approached by another driver who said "U guys in the VWs are nuts!......fantastic to watch though!" a few minutes later the same guy drove past in a clubman race car which runs faster than the Porsche GT3's! & he thinks we are nuts!

The final lap times of the day were 58.2 seconds for Paul, 57.4 seconds for CT & 55.9 seconds for myself. 

We can only go forward from here! Before we left the Vice President of the Porsche club asked us if we had enjoyed ourselves & said that they will probably end up giving us our own class.

I must give a big thanks to Steve Carter & John Ladomatos for the endless phone calls regarding VW stuff, CT for coming up one weekend to get the car back on the road, Richard Holzl for the gearbox, motor & brakes, plus the endless phone calls & workshop visits & my father Joe for the endless requests for things to be machined at work at short notice.

Stay Cool
Jak Rizzo