Race Report: 2013 Monticello There Goes the Neighborhood

Race Report: 24 Hours of LeMons 2013 There Goes the Neighborhood at Monticello Motor Club in Monticello, NY, April 6 & 7, 2013

Drivers: Brandon, Ruffy, Steve, Scot, Carl
Guardian Angel and Good Luck Charm: Zouneda


A 24 Hours of Lemons race at Monticello Motor Club is a rare event; in fact this will probably be the single time it will occur in the history of the Earth so it was imperative that we race there... even if it is to be very very very cold and tractionless.

A Beautiful Course, primped and proper, not at all what endurance racers are acclimated to:



Monticello Motor Club North Course



A bit more to scale I'd say



Tech and Safety Inspection: we mostly passed, with only two warnings... I lost a quart of sweat while the officials negotiated Warning (go race) vs Fail (go home).

 

1) The Kirkely Race Seat we have is a tall back, and the seat harness comes through about a foot from the top of the seat (making a weak point) - we need to add a support bar or brace behind the top part of the seat to keep it from folding back via helmet strike. Note the support does not have to attach to seat, only stop it from folding back.

 

2) One of the roll cage 'star' connection points is weak since someone cut out a section of tube years ago; never mind that the car has been in five prior LeMons races and passed tech - I see their point!

 

Thankfully, they let us race with these two points of 'oppertunities for improvement' with a deposit of promise to fix them before the next race.

MGB GT 50 - Gormless Racing, pic courtesy of official LeMons photo gallery

 

 Last minute check of the car yielded a loose bolt - THE loose bolt - that holds the brake and clutch pedal assembly on. This is the bolt that came off during the 2012 Captiol Offense race while Scot was driving. No coincidence that it is Scot's hand in the photo tightening the bolt!



More tea, Vicar?

In the first 15 minutes of the race, our driver pulled in complaining of loud clacking in the engine. We pulled off the valve cover and sure enough valves 7 and 8 were a bit off (0.016 instead of 0.013 warm), so we adjusted them and sent him back out.
Later, one of our newer drivers got into a bit of a tangle with one of Those Annoying Volvos and smashed in the front fender - luckily the tire was there to stop the steel from bending all the way in.... er....


Ruffy the MGB GT Front Fender Bender Mender - adding airspace between razor sharp jagged steel fender and soft supple race compound tire

We had to visit The Judge twice before we had bent the fender back enough to be deemed safe to rejoin the race:







 

At the end of Day 1 after 7 hours we were in 9th place in C Class and 80th place overall out of 121 entries.

 



MGB GT 50- Gormless Racing in action, pic courtesy of official LeMons photo gallery

The remainder of the race was spent adding oil, or trying to find out where the oil was spraying from, or swabbing the oil out of the engine bay, or borrowing oil from other teams, or cleaning up oil from the paddock.


Scot checking... something, while two supervisors keep him in check.

Cardboard & Kitty Litter - yep, it's British Leyland!

MGB Head Gasket bubbling like overcooked eel pie

MGB Engine Bay - now with built in rubber glove dispenser for oil cleanup!!

We ended Sunday after 14.5 hours in 66th place overall (out of 121) and 6th in C Class (out of 16) - not too dang bad for having 3 brand new drivers and taking our sweet slow time in the pits.