When we left off, I had bid adieu to my drunk Delaware friend and his musings on life. There were still 420 miles between me and home at 10pm with no plans to sleep is pretty daunting, but since I got a huge Coke at WaWa, I figured I could pull it off. Come 4AM I was done. I had to sleep so I didn’t kill myself on the Pennsylvania turnpike. I rolled into a service plaza, nestled between a couple big rigs in the truck parking, and set my alarm for 5AM. Let me tell you, laying the front seat of a 2016 Ram back and attempting to sleep sucks. I probably got 30 minutes of sleep but I did get an hour of rest with no driving. The balance of the trip was uneventful, and I pulled into the driveway at sunrise and went to bed.
I got up around 1pm and after eating went out to survey the magnitude of what I had gotten myself into. I had a car that I wanted for several years. Big W. It came with enough stuff I likely wouldn’t use to make the car and trip cost nothing. Massive W. My garage was filled to the brim as was the driveway in front of the garage, and there was no room in my parents’ barn. Big L. I had a car filled to the brim, a trailer equally filled, a truck bed and back seat also filled to the top with stuff that I had to put in somewhere. Massive anxiety inducing L. We made a Harbor Freight run for one of their portable garages, that kind with the metal tube frame and tan tarp to keep the weather “out” and because Carli is a saint with the patience of a poker player on the long bluff for my car shenanigans, she helped me assemble it.
Then it sat. I got distracted. I sold the EJ22 Subaru motor and Kennedy adapter parts to another GRM member to get 70% of my purchase price back, but I didn’t know what to do with the car. The only thing I knew is that I was not using a Subaru engine and VW tranaxle. I had picked up a retired circle track car with a Winters quick change rear end that I thought of using the tube chassis from, until I realized the fenders would be flared over a foot. I had even gone so far as to seriously consider doing just that, and making fender flares out of wood and going with a woody surf car theme. I went so far as to buy a Pinto based pony stock car for the 2.3 engine and manual transmission. Then I got distracted some more. I dragged a 1962 Corvair Monza and a flood totaled 2000 Corvette and combined them into Darth Nader, which was supposed to be my $2000 Challenge shot at the overall win. I spent many hours cutting, cutting more, scouring for parts, welding, and realizing it was absolutely not happening for the 2017 event.
All the while the Wartburg sat. I spent a little time getting our 2015/16 $2000 Challenge car ready to compete one more time, a Datsun Z car purchased from a tick infested field now with the Chevy 5.3 engine from a 428,000 mile taxi van. I had zero cares in the world at that point. I knew I had a good car and just wanted to go down to Florida, go fast, and have fun with my friends. I was as relaxed as I ever was at an event, kept my family and friends first over being competitive, and had the most fun I’d ever had at the track. As it turned out, we had finished in 7th place for the autocross, 4th for drag racing, and having a very good all around car had me sitting in 2nd place after adding the two event times together. The next day, we did well enough in the judging portion of the competition to maintain a podium spot and bring home the 3rd place overall trophy. Proving to everyone – and more importantly myself – that I could build a top flight car for next to nothing set off a chain of events that would begin the Wartburg build.
Until next time! -Patrick
