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Year Reports
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TARGA 2009
Or “How to make the Plays of the
Week”
Team
Abarth celebrates crossing the finish line in Wellington for the 15th
year in a row. After 6 days of competition and completing every stage, we
won the Historic Category for a record 4th consecutive time and
also won the coveted “Index of Performance” trophy.
Legend.
Pre-event After a
phenomenally successful Targa Rotorua where the car ran faultlessly and we
picked up a Category win and the Index of Performance, there was little to
do but undertake the usual full tear down and check. There were some
minor items on the ‘honeydew’ list that remained incomplete from 2008, so we
took the opportunity to get a few of these done.
Apart from the ones dedicated to the actual car, we decided that as
the 2009 event was the 15th Anniversary of Targa NZ (and we were
the only car to have started and finished all previous 14) that we must, at
all costs, finish this year. Subsequently we
decided to embark on a program of sourcing or building a selection of what
we called “Catastrophic Spares”:
these are spares that would only ever come into use if the car was
really badly damaged or if something broke and if we didn’t have the part,
we may not have been able to finish.
This then gave impetus for me to finish the spare engine completely.
Thanks to Paul van der Heyden in USA, I was able to find a new 8-port
cylinder head and rocker shaft and rockers which coupled with our existing
spare bottom end meant we were able to carry with us a complete spare brand
new Abarth engine! Egads! …. In parts of Europe we would be killed for this! We also had the
spare gearbox totally rebuilt (thanks to Mike Lea) and a pair of properly
modified rear swing arms (thanks to With this year’s
event having over 900km of Special Stages and 1500km of touring, fuel became
an issue. Here in NZ you are
only able to cart 250 litres of fuel legally in a private vehicle, so a few
weeks before the start Moni and I did a fuel-drop at the half-way point
(Wanganui) and our good friends the McCormick’s stored a couple of hundred
litres for us… thanks guys!
Next year we are supposed to run unleaded 98 pump gas, but as we found at
Targa Rotorua, it gives us heaps less power and we use 30% more fuel as
well! We will be using Avgas
until we get caught I think!!
J
The only
last minute surprise was I found that the trailer did not have a WoF, so a
quick phone call to my friendly garage at 5 minutes before knock-off on long
weekend and luckily managed to score one! Co-driver
Phil Sutton flew up from Wellington and with Dave Jowett meeting us at the
shed, we loaded up Big Bird and travelled to Gary Finemore’s place at
Tauranga for the night. Usually
we all go to the Speedway opening night to ‘get in the mood’ as it were, but
due to a rugby clash there was no speedway. Damn.
What to do?
Gary
sorted that by bringing out a PlayStation driving game, but in true Gary
fashion, mere hand-held controllers do not suffice here!
A race seat and bespoke frame coupled to a monster TV meant things
became a little more serious!
Hell, Gary even had to undertake a mid-race pit stop to fix the steering….
Is this
the precursor of what is to come?
It was
fair to say we all looked forward to probably our last decent night’s sleep
for a week…. an early start tomorrow to travel up to Auckland for Prologue. Day 0 –
Prologue
For the
15th Anniversary, the Targa organizers decided to mark the
occasion by adding an extra day of full competition:
6 days, 925km of Special Stages, 1540km of touring running from NZ’s
largest city Auckland to our capital Wellington.
Awesome!
As we had pre-scrutineered, all we had to do was document and get ready for our brief prologue. Prologue is, if you like, a practice stage which doesn’t count towards the results, but does set the start seeding. It also gives the officials, timing crews, etc a chance to check all their systems are working too...
Team
Abarth at ceremonial start of the 15th Dunlop Targa NZ.
(l to r:
Mike, Gary, Dave and Phil)
The
Abarth performed fine, with Phil’s changes to my helmet earphones meaning I
could hear his calls loud and clear. There were heaps of people out and
about on the stage, and with some excellent publicity for the event, we were
hoping to see plenty of support during the week.
Speaking of support, each year we are asked if we have any merchandise for sale. For the 15th Anniversary we decided to get a run of Team Abarth Supporters Shirts made, with all proceeds from the sale going to the Targa chosen charity, Cure Kids. We advertised the shirts and sold a bunch prior to the event, with sales to Australia, USA and UK. For Prologue, I enlisted the help of my daughter Melissa and her friend Katrina to try to sell the balance of our stock to fellow competitors and spectators.
It’s amazing how
successful having two attractive outgoing 21 year old girls selling things
works at a motorsport event… huh…who would have figured eh?
We sold out!! We raised
almost $1000 for Cure Kids, so thanks to all! With only one other
Fiat running this year (the 124 BC Coupe of Philip Pearse and Steve Rogers)
we decided to enter a Fiat-linked team consisting of ourselves, Phil/Steve,
Grant Shirley (Grunta) who whilst still a Fiat-guy, has defected to the
moderns and runs a Honda Integra, and Greg Paul who is co-driving for the
newly crowned NZ Rally Champion Hayden Padden in the Group N Evo9.
Hayden also won the Pirelli Star contest so is competing in rounds of
the WRC next year, 3 of which are tarmac.
As he had never rallied on tarmac before, the chance of having 6 days
seat time with vastly experienced Greg at his side made sense.
So the “Fiat-eers” Team was born. Parc Ferme was
inside the Manukau Events Centre, and where we were parked up was adjacent
to a large electrical conduit.
Dave decided to tell everyone that we were running a KERS system and needed
to charge it up overnight!
We ended the day at
a great steakhouse down the road, and back to the room where we watched the
MotoGP live from Malaysia where everyone’s hero Valentino Rossi was riding.
My god…. what a machine.
We watched in awe as he late braked into corners, the back wheel dancing
from side to side….. hmmmm….. interesting. (Heehee….. more of this later).
After that we hit the sack for some sleep before our Day One start
tomorrow….. Day 1 -
Auckland to Taupo
With
312km of touring stages and 115km of closed Special Stages, including 4 on
race tracks (a first for Targa) it was going to be an interesting day.
After one
‘normal’ stage, we hit the first of the racetrack stages at Pukekohe.
Tracks are great in race cars. They are crap in rally cars, and
really crap in low powered old rally cars like ours.
Unless you have 400bhp, these long circuits are rather dull and also
serve to chop out our soft compound treaded tarmac tyres at a frightening
rate.
The third
stage of the day was another racetrack, this time the brand new Hampton
Downs. The track complex is
incomplete, but the black stuff was laid and so we were the first cars to
hit the tarmac. Hmmm….. new blacktop.
I now know what the term ‘no grip’ means!
It’s a fabulous circuit and one that I will enjoy racing on one day,
but again you need 400bhp. It
was cool being the first bunch of cars on the track, but we were losing out
big time to our larger competition on these tracks. We may only be 0.5
seconds/km behind on fast road stages, but on a track this ended up more
like 5 seconds/km…. not good.
And we had two more track sessions to go today!
Between
the tracks though there were a couple of ripper stages, and with good
weather blessing us, we were able to drive the car fast.
Under really hard braking the car would in fact do a little “Rossi”,
with the back wheels lightening up and giving a little squirm.
The cry (in Valentino’s voice of course) of “... welllll….. you-a
knowwww……” at every time this happened did rather raise a chuckle.
At service at Te Awamutu lunch stop the guys checked the front end as it didn’t feel totally right, and it turned out we had a stuffed hub nut. Luckily I had Dave bring some down with him (thanks Mal! www.fiatparts.co.nz). Apart from that, all was good.
Day One…
lunch stop and wheels off…. Hmmmm.
Long
touring stages can be rather dull though, so you do at times day dream.
But apparently when I told Phil to ‘look over there…. see the cow
humping the culvert?”... well…..
Phil’s reply: “Umm…. yes there is a cow. No there is no culvert.” And
what was I thinking? Hell… it’s only Day One!
Taupo has
a chequered history for us. The very first Targa stopped in Taupo back in
1995. We had fond (??) memories
of doing a gearbox swap out in the open in the rain and cold only to find
that the spare needed some mods…. so out it came again. Then there was the
year we found missing teeth on the bespoke diff. And then there were the De
Brett’s experiences…. My…
haven’t things improved since then!
All the
Fiat-eers were home for the night, but Hayden and Greg had gone through 2
sets of front brake rotors and worn a set of tyres badly….. tarmac isn’t
gravel… mind you the handbrake turns around the Taupo track corners were
impressive!
The weather turned a little with some light rain falling. As servicing and Parc Ferme were in the street in town, we fitted our newest acquisition to our car: a pair of polka-dotted shower caps! These fit perfectly over the carbs and prevent water getting in overnight…. and they did look fa-bu-lous sweetie…
Yes… the green and
pink polka-dots look lovely, Gary….
After
that, nothing left to do but polish the car… it felt good, and we were
looking forward to Day Two and some great stages.
Day
Two…Taupo to New Plymouth
After
lunch stop in Te Kuiti, the afternoon gave us some fabulous stages …and a
real challenge. We had two
coastal stages back to back totalling some 80km plus about the same in
touring. With only a 30litre
fuel tank, we would not make it through so we had to do a splash-n-dash up a
farmer’s drive before we entered the road closure.
These
stages are absolute rippers. Beautiful countryside and awesome roads.
The famous Kawhia Harbour stage was extended this year by 10km to a
41km beaut! Last year a car jack-knifed on the long single lane bridge and
closed the stage. This year the bridge had some tar seal on it, so no
worries.
The final
stage of the day continued down the coast through unpopulated native bush.
The notes on this stage stated “Go off the road here and it could be
hours before you are rescued.” What a fabulous stage….
We enjoyed a traditional Whitebait Fritter at the service stop at Mokau and then had the long tour into service and Parc Ferme in New Plymouth. As in previous years, Targa takes over the multi-story car park in town so we can service under cover and the cars stay dry and secure over night. Two days of hard driving did mean that we had a major ‘all wheels off’ service that night, one of the things you have to do when running an old car.
Dave and
Gary in usual end-of-day positions!
This is
what the guys running modern cars don’t quite get: this is part of Targa!
We beat the hell out of our old cars, and then fix them ready to do
it again the next day. And we
enjoy it.
Dinner
tonight at the Irish Pub and off to bed, for tomorrow is “our” day:
Whangamomona here we come…
Day Three
…New Plymouth to Wanganui
A
relatively short day today, only 242km of touring and 6 stages totalling
156km... But two of these are the best stage of the event: Whangamomona.
Before we
get there however we have to survive the jumps and yumps of the Taranaki
roads. We did the big jumps
once a few years ago… never again. So yes we woosed out on those, but still
had a ball.
I did
manage to give Phil a sphincter-clincher on one stage though: coming uphill
towards a right hand corner the road fell away a tad, so we did have the car
all locked up going sideways towards a rather large drop when she gripped
and away we went…. no worries.
Phil was a little quiet at this point so when I asked if he was ok, I got
the reply “Give me a minute: I sucked the seat up my bum and I’m still
trying to get it out...”
Charming. It felt ok to
me ….
J
Coming to
the start of the first Whangamomona stage (we go in, have lunch, and then
come out on the same road) I decided to really go for it. The car felt good,
the tyres were fine, the weather warm and this amazing stage that runs over
three saddles and two valley floors is every bit Abarth territory… all 40km
of it.
I
honestly don’t think we could have driven the car any harder.
We beat our time from last year by 4 seconds, with plenty of “Rossi”
moments to keep us on our toes.
We had our Targa buddies Gerry and Pete in the BMW 635 start 30s behind us
and after about 30km saw they were closing. Then we came to the final saddle
and we left them behind. At
lunch Gerry loudly asked “Hey why didn’t you guys slow down for us” to which
I answered “We did”…. badaboom, badabing!
J
Lunch
again was put on by the amazing townsfolk, and so long as you weren’t a
vegetarian you were fine. When
asked if there was any salad, we were pointed to a bowl of lettuce….
After lunch it was time for us to run the same stage but in reverse. Last year, we did exactly the same time out as in. This year we were 4 seconds quicker… so I guess we can drive a little harder! Seriously though, we only misread one corner which upon reflection only slowed us by a second. Absolutely fabulous stuff..... we could just do an entire day going back and forward on this awesome road.
At the Republic of Whangamomona Hotel
We arrived into
Wanganui and after the usual checking, went to the McCormick’s for the night
and one of Leigh’s fabulous dinners.
The boys had already loaded up the fuel so we had a very enjoyable
night and looking forward to tomorrow.
The weather forecast was not all that great, with a cold front and
rain on the way. We did not put
new tyres on as we wanted to keep the new ones for the end of the week in
case the rain really poured in like last year. We should have put them on….
We awoke to rain and cold. Oh
well. We have 167km of special
stages and 305km touring today, running back up the island towards the ski
fields and finally down to the central town of Palmerston North.
We had a 60km
tour to start the morning, running north to an old WRC stage that is now
tarmac. It rained all the way
there and as we climbed the temperature dropped like a stone.
Even with the fancy anti-fog stuff on the windscreen it made driving
even at touring speeds tough.
Once into the stage it was clear we should have put the new tyres on the
front. The road was slippery
and with no grip and little vision we could do little except drive it to the
end without falling off the road.
Team Nanook of
the North... And yes… snow is falling!
Yes Phil… it’s snowing.
A little heavier now…..
OK… now where’s the start line??
"Dashing through the snow…
on a 100hp sleigh… over hills we go… laughing all the way…” We
had a nice lunch at Taihape and although the Gumboot toss was not compulsory
this year, Big Gary gave it his all to try and win the title again. (Sadly
he was beaten in the end by some freak who threw the gumboot 35m or
something…. clearly Gary will need to practice before next year!).
“I said LEFT!!!” Stage 29, Marton, is a
29km ripper. It starts though
with an HIS speed restriction zone which is designed to keep the average
speed of the stage to below the FIA-Mandated 132km/h.
With cars also capped at 200km/h top speed, every time we encounter
one of these HIS zones we know the stage is balls-out fast and suitable to
the big cars. We lose
seconds/km on these stages to our competition only because we don’t have the
top end. Very frustrating. This stage also has the
famous “Cop Corner”,
a 90° left onto
a bridge where a few years ago the lead police car went off into the creek!
It is here that every TV camera, photographer and spectator set up camp to
capture the antics. As we roll
up to the start, Phil always talks me through the instructions and when we
came to this corner I said “Just tell me it’s Cop Corner.” At this Phil
groaned. All week we get our car up
on three wheels and sometimes two wheels, especially for the cameras.
And there would be LOTS of cameras at Cop Corner.
It was interesting as the car was already way up on two wheels well before the apex of the corner. It did make for an interesting photo sequence though!
At about 46 degrees, it was soon apparent that she wasn’t coming back down the way she went up. Our little beast decided that she was tired and wanted a little lie down. Once we had settled, I was waiting for the throng of spectators to come running and flip us back on our wheels. It took some concerted tooting of our horn to get them over, but finally they put us back on our wheels… thanks guys!
Time for a lie down……
Alleeee-ooop!!! And
awaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyy…….
We got out and quickly surveyed if there as any major damage, and apart from
the cosmetics, the car was fine.
Once the carbs filled with fuel again she fired up and we were away…
much to the cheers of the crowd!
It seemed like an eternity, but only two cars passed us while we were
stationary, so the whole exercise cost us no more than a couple of minutes
and we still completed the stage!
There was a long tour and one more stage to run before we could get to
service. We called the boys and
told them to find a panel beater.
They quickly put two and two together and realised that since we
didn’t say “find a panel beater and bring the trailer” that we were mobile.
The last stage was another boring racetrack one, thankfully the last one we
will be running, at Manfield Raceway.
We got on with that and of course needed to get to service ASAP.
Parc Ferme was out in the open in the main Square at Palmerston
North, so we hoped the weather would hold because we had a bit to do now. The main problem with the car was that I could not open my door as the rain gutters had rolled over. The front guard was a bit scrunched but amazingly the headlight was unbroken! Sadly the same could not be said of my quarter window, as when the car laid down the door mirror punched out the glass. Couple all this with gravel rash and a buckled roof courtesy of us kissing the bridge guardrail, and it didn’t look pretty. But mechanically the car was fine. Sadly no panel beater in Palmerston North could be bothered to stay open for us, which is a Targa first: normally car-guys pull out all stops to help… sign of times maybe? Oh well….. thanks to the TR2 crew we borrowed some hydraulic rams and tools and Gary and Dave managed to get the worst of the bumps out and get my door working again. The roof dent was still there though. We were all a little cautious with it, but not Alan Thomson (who was crewing for Grunta). A couple of well-placed size 10’s from inside the car and bingo…. good as new!
Ouch is right. But headlight is
unbroken, so still road legal!
So then came out the matching red, white and black duct-tape.
As we have had the odd bump or two over the years, we always carry
matching tape as it is the best 10 minute paint job you will see!
Once done, from about 5m you couldn’t tell that the car was damaged.
Well the odd-angled headlight was a give away, but the rest looked fine.
There is an engine there under those carbs somewhere!
We managed to get done in time for our traditional dinner at a great steak
place in town. We were all pretty buggered: it had been an amazing day!
Without doubt one if not THE most amazing day in our Targa history:
Snow, hail, two wheeling a bit too far, engine out, body repairs….
phew! And we are still two days
from the end. We are a solid
second in Category, way behind the rocket-ship Ford Anglia, but as always in
Targa, you never ever give up because anything can happen….
Day Five…
Palmerston North to Wellington
The first stage today, like last few years, is Windmill Alley. NZ’s largest
wind farm is up on the ranges out of Ashhurst and the road is fabulous but
this year the morning dawned wet and cold, so we took it very carefully.
The penultimate day is historically
a car breaker.
The second stage today, Ormondville, is the longest of the event of 44km.
It starts with a 500m speed restriction zone, so you know it is
quick, but the first half is really winding and fun…. just don’t look out
the side windows. When they say
“Sheer Drops” they mean it! I
especially love the bleedin’ obvious stage notes that say “DON’T GO OFF THE
ROAD”. It was still raining
off and on, and the roads were slippery. During a little stage through the
back streets of Eketahuna, coming around one particularly tricky corner onto
a one lane bridge we felt the front end start to slide. We managed to get
over the bridge ok to see a zedka (safety triangle) on the road.
A few metres along and we see Dr Nick in his Valiant Charger rolled
through a very nice fence and someone’s garden, and resting against the
garage. They were ok, but
clearly that corner had claimed its first victim. Next was the lunch stop at that famous NZ icon, the Tui Brewery. What a wonderful scenic and historic place to stop and enjoy lunch….. oh… and did I mention the Tui Girls were there again?
Yes Phil… I know…. same age as my daughter… I get it… I get it
Some more fast stages this afternoon which would not bode well for us,
especially the last one before service as it had a 1000m speed restriction
zone! And it is only a 13km
stage! We drove it as we saw
it, and managed to get to the outdoors final service in the lovely town of
Martinborough. It was here we noted
the absence of a couple of cars, one being our team mates Hayden and Greg.
Sadly their rally came to an end when they left the road and hit a tree.
Luckily both ok, but the car was stuffed.
We also did not see our arch-rival in the Anglia.
It seems he had engine trouble in one of the earlier stages and could
not get out and had missed the afternoon division.
With penalties applies, this meant going into the last day, it would
be another close finish… no cruising to the finish tomorrow then.
The long tour to Parc Ferme at Wellington’s Taranaki Wharf meant we had to
re-fuel before entering. That
done, we put our battered and bruised baby to bed for the evening, looking
forward to the roads around Wellington tomorrow as they are all tight,
twisty and bumpy… yee haaa !
Being in Wellington also means we stay at Phil’s and a home cooked meal
(thanks Rachael!) Early to bed
tonight again… Day Six tomorrow… wow. Day Six… Wellington back to
Wellington
A short day
today, with only 90km of special stages, and 210km touring. But what a 90km!
This year we
start the day as we (hopefully) will finish: Shelley Bay is being run as
both the first and last stage today.
Shelley Bay is a beautiful road that hugs the Wellington Harbour.
Usually every year somebody goes off into the water, so the Coastguard
rescue team is in attendance just in case someone goes in the drink.
And yes, true to form, someone did! But luckily it was low tide and
the car ended up being stuck on rocks… ouch.
We looked
forward to a great day today.
The weather, though cold, was fine and with several repeated stages, so as
long as you got the stage correct first time through, in theory the next
time would be easier. Great Abarth stages, with the original goat track,
Moonshine, being the only place in the whole event where even we had to get
back into 1st gear for several hairpins. No margin for error on
these roads that’s for sure.
We got to lunch
service and heard that the Anglia had stopped in one of the morning stages
with a blown head gasket. We now had to focus on finishing more than ever.
The very last
stage of this magnificent event was a re-run of Shelley Bay but run in
reverse direction to the morning’s stage.
It is an interesting feeling starting the last stage of the event,
knowing that in spite of all the dramas during the week, we had finished
every stage and once this one was completed, would give us an amazing
result.
We rolled up to
the start, and as we do at the start of every stage, Phil and I shake hands
and patted the roof of our baby… only one more time and she could have a
rest. And we did finish
the stage. We toured into the official finish Taranaki Wharf, where Gary had primed the crowd with the radio control model Abarth.
Gary and Dave in
‘promo’ guise with Mini-me…. When we crossed the line, we got out and Dave gave us a bottle of bubbly that we were keeping for this very moment. Sure the headline outright cars deserve their day in the sun, but hell…so do we! TV3 came over afterwards and asked us to re-construct the bubbly moment as their cameras didn’t catch it live. No problems of course (sponsors note!) and we made the national news again that night. We accepted our finishers’ medallions and then headed off for a well deserved beer!
Best bubbly we
have tasted for a while….
We cleaned up
and all the Fiat Team had a bang-up steak meal.
Apart from Heyden’s demise the rest of the Fiat-eers were home.
Tomorrow is prize giving and then the long haul back to Rotorua. Day 7 –
Prizegiving Team ENZED Abarth performed well again this year. We won coveted Targa plates for finishing every stage and won the Historic Category for the 4th year in a row. Further, we also won the coveted Index of Performance trophy. AWESOME!!!
Team ENZED
Abarth
Now 15 starts -
15 finishes.
An amazing
unbeaten record. Our top crew, Gary
and Dave, are the best! Thanks
guys you did an amazing job. We
are a great team: good mates that know what it takes to get an old car like
ours to the finish every year and just getting on with it.
As always, Phil
deserves a medal for not only sitting in the passenger seat with me for a
week, but also not hitting me when we had our little ‘incident’.. thanks
mateJ.
But at least we gave our sponsors
valuable exposure!
Which leads me to
thank the most important people: our sponsors.
Team ENZED Abarth wouldn’t be that
without ENZED. Thanks Mike and
the team at ENZED Rotorua …..now into our 15th year of
sponsorship, a NZ record!
Thanks of course to
our other major sponsors for 2009: SANDVIK and BONFIGLIOLI. Thanks so much
for your support. I trust you
have seen us promote you in a most professional manner.
CASTROL supplied us
with the best fluids that allowed our little 1000cc engine to keep on
keeping on! And to Sweeney Townsend
& Associates and the gang at SFS International, thanks to you guys as well!
We have an
expensive re-build ahead of us before the start of the 2010 season, so I
hope all you guys don’t mind me contacting you soon!
J
Merry Christmas to
all, and we look forward to Team ENZED Abarth competing for the 16th
year in 2010.
Cheers Team ENZED Abarth
Footnote
When we arrived back in Rotorua, Paul Lyons dropped around a little project he had been working on since he saw us on TV…. talented bugger isn’t he! Thanks Paul… love it! Especially the 46 degree mark! LOL.
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