The Road to Maderas

So here we are, this is what all our hard work and preparation had led up to - the first day of racing. It's time to become a navigator/co-pilot. Getting dressed, I realized that this was the real deal, putting on a driving suit, fireproof socks and shoes, strap on a helmet and don't forget the route book, this day would was going to be like no other.
Downstairs at breakfast, we said our "hello's" and "good luck's" to the drivers and navigators we saw, and were advised to eat hardy, because this could be the only meal of the day. Our pal Logan, who was going to drive our support vehicle, was now co-driving for Chip John, so he was off to the Falcon camp. Once down at the car, our last minute adjustments included checking the basics- air, water and oil, and fiddling with a video camera we brought but hadn't mastered. Chip's wife Jo, was towing a trailer, so we threw in a couple of parts and an extra spare tire, just in case.
The master plan was for all the cars to line up at the hotel and be escorted across the city to a plaza there the town folk could take a look, someone could say a few kind words, and there would be a ceremonial start of the race. Chihuahua is a pretty fair sized city, and Friday morning traffic can make things interesting. Our escorts were the Transit Police in their Nissians and Federal Police in their new Dodge Chargers. About every intersection was manned by a police, but someone always tries to sneak through, that's where our REALLY loud horns got people's attention. Once we got to Plaza Hidalgo, the cars lined up around the statue of Pancho Villa. There were maybe 50 to 75 curious onlookers checking things out, as the race director Chacho Medina, did his thing for the crowd and participants, a few pictures taken, then we were off towards the first velocity section. Now it was full speed ahead north, about 50 kilometers. We still had escorts, and the traffic was moving better so the trip out of town was pretty quick. There's something mighty neighborly about barreling along at 100 mph and having a Federale pass you, giving the "thumbs up". After the turn towards Aguacaliente we came to the first speed section. We were starting lucky 13th, which was kind of a surprise since we were inexperienced at this. Rick's a good driver, but we thought we'd be at the back of the pack. Maybe they wanted to keep all the "C" Historic cars together. As we waited for our turn, I'll admit I was a little nervous, we had talked about making a check list so we wouldn't forget anything too important, like putting on our helmet, or pulling the safety pin for the fire system. I even remembered to get a time card. The tech inspector came by and reminded us to tighten our seat belts and not to drive off any ravines. All good advise. Around then, the in-car communications failed, I could hear Rick, but he couldn't hear me. I was going to be doing a lot of yelling and pointing.
Both the Chihuahua and the La Carrera races are set up as what's called a pro-rally. You have a route book and there are penalties for arriving too early or too late at timing points. Basically the navigators job is to comprehend all this and get us to the right place at the right time. As we moved closer to the first timing official or what's called the the "Z control", the realization came that I didn't have a clue how the timing worked. We were sure that if you got there too early the penalty was worse than being too late. We decided to stay a minute and a half behind the car ahead of us, and hope he knew what he was doing. The car in front moves to the next control, "A" and is given the green flag to start the speed section. We wait for 90 seconds and move up to the starting point. The countdown begins .... 3,2,1, GO, and we are off. The other part of the navigators job is to read the route book and tell the driver what's ahead. Everything that's on the road is listed in the book. The turns are rated from 1 to 4, 1 being a very slight curve and 4 being a hairpin turn. All the kilometer and road signs, bridges, and slopes are listed also. This part I grasped very quickly, wanting my driver to know there was a 3 1/2 rated left hander coming right after going 110 mph over a blind slope. But that's what makes it fun!










Unfortunately, it didn't take long to know something wasn't right with the car. It started to act like it wasn't getting gas, even though we turned on the auxiliary electric fuel pump. At least one car, a 544 Volvo, had mechanical trouble and was already finished. This first speed section had lots of uphill driving to it, which we made it through, but it became clear that the car had something very wrong with it. It just would not accelerate, it could cruse along a little, but then it wanted to die. We nursed it ahead through the transit section, as every other race car, officials car, ambulance, and donkey cart passed us. Finally, that was it, we had to stop, it was find a fix or get a tow.


So now we have Rick under car investigating the whole fuel system, starting at the tank. With no gas getting to the fuel filter, suddenly the words, "why are you using that old electric fuel pump, even as a back-up" were burning in my ears from Rick's son Matt. We're using a mechanical pump for the primary, and the electric as a back up. The diaphragm had quit, and wasn't letting gas get through. Twenty minutes later, a bypass with the fuel vent line, we are back on the road. Now we tried to play catch-up. The car still wasn't right, but now it was just a miss, and we could deal with that. At the beginning of every speed section now, the timers had already moved ahead, so we just pushed on and tried to catch the tail end of the race. As we got to a twisty downhill section outside Maderas, we were flagged to slow down as the Silver Mustang was on its side. Nobody hurt, just a little reminder of what was possible. As we got down the hill we and saw some of the racers coming the other way, we realized two things, we were running on empty and there was a strong smell of gas in the car. We needed to find a Pemex and an auto parts store to vent the fuel cell again. This was the start of siesta time, but we got lucky to find a place just closing.




Now the race turns around and reverses course, same speed sections, backwards. We came upon a few other casualty's on the way, like the Studebaker that went off road into some pine trees. Finally at the last section we caught the end of the race, with the touring class. These cars were timed, but they're results were not counted in the standings. And unfortunately, our time wasn't taken because we were just too late. This day we would have only one of eleven speed sections counted.
On the way back to Chihuahua we made a quick stop at AutoZone and picked up a new electric fuel pump. Back at the hotel, there was lots of activity, with everyone making adjustments on their cars. We had fixed the gas problem, and now were trying to figure out why we had a ignition miss, and the carburetor still wasn't right. But that's another story, and there's a drivers meeting to get to, some dinner to eat, and let's do it again tomorrow.

Next Time: Divisadero and the Copper Canyon

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