Dia 1: Oaxaca - Tehuacan

The nights sleep was a sound one for me, with no dreams of flying.....off cliffs, or turning browsing cows into tenderloin. Our morning routine had been to eat breakfast at the Hotel Victoria and that stayed the same. Since we would now be only staying overnight in hotels we were packed, and Scott, being our lead mechanic and bellboy, got all our stuff to our truck and was off early to meet us down the road. Time had come for us to suit-up, and find our place at the start. All our days supplies were packed in the car, camel backs full of water - check,... snacks for the road - check,... full tank of gas - check,... all switches on - check, all was good. The Chevy was parked on the steep downhill at the hotel, and I do mean steep. Rick settles in, ready to go, pushes the start button..... click, ...nothing..., zero..., car doesn't start. I start thinking, maybe I'm still asleep, and am now just having a bad dream. Rick is thinking, we left something on, and drained the battery. We are on the long downhill, so a rolling start in obvious, except it won't start. We get to the bottom of the hill and still, ...nothing. Now we're at the bottom of the hill, with a sharp left hand turn that leads us through some flat lands toward the hotels main entrance. Looks like it's time for some morning exercise for the co-driver, and fortunately there were a couple of the hotels gardeners nearby who helped with the pushing, as the flat lands weren't exactly flat. And still, we have no start. Just before getting to the last bit of downhill, out the driveway and into traffic, we tried turning the main outside battery switch off and back on again, and we get a start. It turned out, that switch was bad and could have failed anytime that first day. We wound up bypassing it later on, and all was fine.
The Victoria wasn't too far from the Zocalo and as we got closer, the crowd got bigger, until the crowds and traffic became one big entity. The transit police finally got us to where we needed to be and we had enough time to get out and take a some pictures and say a few hellos.

It was time to get the show on the road and now we were moving toward the ceremonial starting arch and I'm thinking " WOW, this is it, this is what we worked almost two years getting ready for, and now it's time to go, go go!" As we became the next car to start, Eduardo Leon, the main man, gave us the 'ol keep the rubber side down speech, and a thumbs up, and we were on our way. The first stage was the same stage as qualifying, but longer, and the ride out of town was an exercise in waving and horn honking to the gathered locals.
Once there, as might be expected, at the first stage, on the first day, had it's confusion finding the time cards, starting order, the official time and various other ingredients you need as a co-pilot. But as with most things in Mexico, with a little patience, it works out. The big news of the morning was having one of the Mustangs in our class removed to the exhibition class for having aluminum heads. Surprisingly it's sister car was not DQ'ed, a better paint job on the heads, I would think.
So now starts the beginning of the speed sections, where the actual timing occurs, these being between two to about ten miles long each. The line of cars moves up until you get to the first control, where you had over your time card, wait, move to the next control, time card, wait, and next is the countdown and the green flag.

And....... we're off! To try and tell about every section or even the day, forget it, I can't hardly remember anything, and I didn't take that great a notes. I do remember a few choice moments though, that I'll drop in. We were on the road to Tehuacan, which would take us through Huitzo and Asuncion Nochixtlan, on to Telixtlanhuaca and through Cuicatlan to Teotitlan de Flores Magon, Zinacatepec and finally Tehuacan. Now if you've never heard of any of these places, that's understandable because they are on some way back roads north of Oaxaca. Absolutely gorgeous country. The first section had probably our most memorable moment of the day, as we caught and passed the Mustang that started in front of us. That only lasted for a few minutes as he repassed us at the finish of the section, but it's always fun to pass somebody.... and never fun to be passed.

At the service stop, we met up with Scott, had some lunch, filled the car with gas and on to another speed section. The day wound down to a last transit into Tehuacan of about 75k. Now I believe Tehuacan had never hosted the Carrera as an overnight stop, but the race has been through here a number of times. These guys were ready! As always, in the transit sections, there were people lining the road, waving and cheering us all on, and entering Tehuacan was no different, except maybe a little more enthusiastic. This wasn't the first time Rick or I had finished a race in Mexico, being in the Chihuahua Express, but the these folks were going nuts! I remember driving toward the Zocalo and the finishing arch, handing over our time cards and getting the first of seven daily finishing medals, put around our necks by beautiful Oaxican girls and then driving around to try and park. There was a stage with a band playing, dancing girls, a DJ, all at about 11 on the volume scale. The place was packed! As we crept along, autograph books, t-shirts, posters, scraps of paper, babies? were thrust through the window for us to sign. After finally getting parked and out of the car, we started handing our "El Platillo Volador" postcards, which were a big hit. These people wanted stuff , whether it was an autograph, a picture holding their baby or one next to the car, or a hello and a smile, it was great! These folks were into it! All the rest of the end of the day ceremonies were fun, but this was the best. As more cars pulled into park it got even more crowded and crazy. One of the Studebaker's decided to have a small engine fire just as it got to where we were parked, causing even more excitement. With that put out, Chip Johns and I scampered off and brought back some beers, and we all hung out for another couple of hours till having to go off and find our hotels. And just to mention, the Chevy ran terrific, what a great car.

And finally came dinner, the drivers meeting and days awards with fireworks, pretty girls, music, all good. Again, this one was better of these affairs because I hadn't yet realized how late they would go, and they didn't pass out the information we were waiting for until the very end, making us all a very captive audience. But when all was said and done, this was one of the

all-time great days for me to remember from the Carrera.

The first day was about 285 miles total, tomorrow is on to Puebla.

Today we are 28th overall, 7th in class.

This days blog is dedicated to Jerry Churchill, who we lost in 2008.

Next Time: Dia 2: Tehuacan - Puebla

We Be Qualified

Thursday was the day for qualifying, this was to get a starting order for the race and for your own class. Qualifying is not mandatory, you would just start at the back of the pack if you decided not to do it. A few of the cars had mechanical problems and some were still trying to get through tech inspection, but it looked like a pretty good crowd was going to make it. Qualifying was scheduled to start about 3pm, so again, the morning was spent at the ballpark. Now is where you started to find out about the little things in the race, like giving out the starting times for qualifying and the time cards. This process started about 10 am and was put off, delayed, and postponed through the early afternoon.

As chasing the time card was what I was doing, Rick was busy helping in removing the engine from the other Chevelle that was in the race. The guy loves working on cars, any car.

Our start time was about 3:30, we got changed at the stadium and started out at 2 pm to find our spot, with Scott taking off with the Sayther BMW crew. The drive out was the same way we came into the city and took us to a toll road where everyone was making some good time at high speeds. On the last downhill, before getting off, going about 100 mph, we got on the brakes pretty good, and whatduya know, the oil pressure light comes on, never ever a good sign. We stopped to see what's the problem, if we have an oil leak or what. We decide that it was from hard braking, going downhill, and maybe not enough oil in the car. Who knew it took 9 quarts!?

Everyone seemed to be there a little early, so we chatty chitted with who ever was parked next to us till things started to move forward. It finally got to be our turn to start, and we had taken the words at an earlier drivers meeting to heart,"

DON'T CRASH DURING QUALIFYING", which meant, we were going to take this real easy. Which we did. Easy enough to get caught by the Bill Shanahan Corvette with about three turns left. Rick let them by as he could, but when we got to the turn around, Shanahan made mention that he thought we were "blocking him". Now that's a good one, since we got over as soon as he came up behind us. He realized after talking with us that he was a bit anxious and all was well. The drive back to Oaxaca was less eventful than the drive out, and that night at a government building we were wined and dined. This was the first of many nights of speeches by race and state officials, as we waited to get the piece of paper...... the one with the results and the next days starting order. Number 377 would be starting 30th. As that only became available at the end of each meeting, we were in for some late nights. But so it goes, outside afterwards was a fiesta showing off traditional Oaxican dance and dress, very cool, and that's what makes Mexico so great.

Next Time: Dia 1: Oaxaca - Tehuacan

The Clutch That Slipped

The next day, with tech being out of the way, we needed to find out about our suspect clutch. The way to do that was to just get out and drive the car. And in doing that, it slipped enough to know that if it didn't get changed , we were asking for trouble. The thought of doing this on jack stands at the ballpark was a last resort, so we started looking for some sort of repair shop while driving around. What we needed was just a place with a lift, we had the tools and the new clutch. Along the main road going North out of Oaxaca there are lots of these places, we stopped at one that did brakes and clutches, but what they did was put new linings on them, not change them. Rick got a twinge of nostalgia there, because the kids were knocking rivets out of truck brake linings, like he used to do for his Dad. A taxi driver, who happened to be there, took us us down the road to a Continental Tire shop, and these guys were the best. No problem using the lift, for a La Carrera car, anything goes. They had a truck to finish, so we helped unload truck tires to pass the time. Changing a clutch is a bit of a procedure, the exhaust and drive shaft have to come off, the transmission has to come out, the bell housing off, and then deal with the clutch. The clutch was changed in a record time of one hour and forty minutes, and believe me, that's quick. The rest of the day was spent getting the Terra Trip working and thinking about qualifying coming up the next day. That night was the first of the driver/co-driver meetings and and it was heavily stressed not to crash during qualfication, very bad form. In 2006, four cars went down before the first day. Rick and Scott decided to turn in early, so I went my favorite taco place in Oaxaca, Taco Roy's and had a late dinner. Things would start to pick up from here on out.

Next Time: We Be Qualified

Oaxaca And Technical Inspection

Our arrival in Oaxaca meant we could get a little extra sleep, we would be spending four nights here before the start if the race on Friday. Technical inspection is a process where the car is
looked over for safety and mechanical violations. They want to make sure you have a helmet and driving suit, seat belts and fire extinguisher and don't have something under the hood you shouldn't. The tech inspection was a few blocks down from our hotel at a baseball field where the local Oaxacan team played.
The car and it's suspect clutch went down on the trailer, and all seemed to work again during the unloading process. Now began a long day of standing in lines for registration and for the tech guys to look at the car. Registration consisted of getting your Mexican racing license(we already had ours from Chihuahua), a medical examination, getting a tracking GPS unit, your route book and official the swag, and generally just sighing your life away in case something happened during the race. I'm glad we started early to get the car done, because as the 3 days of inspection wore on, tech seemed to get more rigid in their scrutiny of the cars, especially the roll cages. A crash last year by a convertible XKE Jaguar that seriously injured the co-pilot had the tech guys send many cars to the welder to add reinforcement. That was good for some and not so good for others because of the quality of the work. The Chevy passed tech, with a couple of recommendations for improving our cage. Last came putting on the colors of the La Carrera Panamericana. That was something I had looked forward to for a long time, we were officially in the race! The rest of the day was spent talking with other teams, having the cars name painted on and a map of the race route on the trunk. We met a lot of great people here, and I'll start mentioning a couple of them here. Parked next to us was the Scream Tangerine Team, two almost matching Porsche 356's, driven by 2 brothers and their friends. Their objective for the race was to beat the other brother, and it didn't matter where they finished overall. They also had the Scream Team Girls, cute Mexicans girls who would not have their picture taken with the Chevrolet. On the other side was Eddie M. and his crew

from Saugus, CA., who was driving a monstrous Camaro in the Unlimited Class. Everyone at the paddock was excited about something, whether it was passing tech, or not passing, qualifying coming up on Thursday or the race itself. The day ended with most everyone leaving their cars at the field with security watching over things. That evening our third Musketeer arrived, Scott Kirn, who would be crewing and following us in with the truck and trailer during the race. Our next hurdle would be to see if our current clutch was going to make it or not.

Next Time: The Clutch That Slipped

Which Way's Mexico City??

That's just a little joke, the idea is to bypass Mexico City at all costs. The convoy usually makes the trip thru the city at midnight, on a Sunday, to avoid the police and having to have the right number for the right day on your license plate. This time the plan was to go around. Our convoy had grown to around 25, some coming to San Miguel early, and others already across the border at Nuevo Laredo. This convoy is not a long line of cars and trailers, but usually small groups that string out because of pit stops, gas stops, and who ever has a chance to pass slow traffic.

We were up and running before dawn, Gerie again leading, with two routes picked out to take us east of the worlds biggest city. To accomplish that, we would be on some back country narrow roads, with big rigs and slow traffic, my favorites! It was another long day, 11 hours, of driving with a few wrong turns, missed exits, a hard rain outside Puebla, and some major construction delays before Oaxaca. We finally made the city just at dark, and I knew about where our hotel was located. The key word here is "about". We drove right past it, and into a major traffic jam. Some which way, we got the truck and trailer turned around and headed back the right direction, and before getting lost over again, I stopped a taxi and he led us to our hotel, The Victoria, which is on a hill that overlooks the city. After getting things unloaded and checked in, it was time for a beer or two and to watch the stragglers make their way home. We would have 3 days in Oaxaca for tech inspection, qualifying, and whatever else. Remember, the clutch was still an issue.

Next Time: Oaxaca and Technical Inspection

Where the Cars Are Stars!

The car show in San Miguel de Allende was a benefit to help feed hungry school kids. It was held at the main Zocazlo, in front of the big Cathedral where no cars are usually allowed. After the Chevy got washed, we drove down and found a good spot to show it off. The day started kind of quite in the morning, but as it went on, the square filled up until there was a pretty good crowd checking things out. People had lots of questions and took lots of pictures. In fact, I had my first chance to have a picture taken with the Corona girls, so I didn't let that pass. There was plenty of music, a band playing for the show and another one in the park, a Battle Royal of sorts. San Miguel de Allende is a beautiful town that I would definitely like to spend more time in someday.
The show went till around 4 pm, and we needed gas, so decided to take the long way back to the hotel, which would also be easier on our somewhat fragile clutch. At the time the car was built, we didn't have much choice in rear end gears, and used a 308 ratio. That means it's high geared, and difficult to get started without slipping the clutch. When we got back to the hotel and put the car on the trailer, it was all on the uphill slant, meaning.... hard on the clutch. For the topper, somehow a strap slips, and suddenly

I'm watching Rick chasing the car across the parking lot, trying to figure a way to stop it before it goes thru a chain link fence and into a ravine. We were lucky, no one was parked behind us, the drivers window was down, and Rick had the smart sense to turn the wheel and have the car go uphill to bring it to a stop. That could have been real ugly! But now, it has to go back on the trailer, more slippage, more smoke, and now, no clutch. The thought was, after it cooled off, maybe things would be fine, but Rick called home to have the shop send a new one with our third pardner, who was flying into Oaxaca. That was enough excitement for one day, we would be up early again the next morning, and on to Oaxaca.

Next Time: Which Way's Mexico City??

The Coyote Convoy

The Coyote Convoy was started a few years back as a way to cross the border with a race car, trailered or driven, a bunch of spare parts and tools, and not get hassled by the Mexican authorities. At the meeting the night before going into Mexico, Gerie Bledsoe told us once we went across the border, just to keep on going unless an officer insisted a stop, then, show your papers, and keep smiling. Everyone was up for a 5 am breakfast, and a 6 am departure.

G.B. led the group of about 20 thru Laredo and into Nuevo Laredo without a hitch, and we passed the 15 km check just as quickly. The drive south started on a long straight toll highway, which goes toward Monterrey and Saltillo. Then the road becomes more demanding, into the mountains, near San Luis Potosi. This was the first of some challenging, third world trailer pulling, with steep drop offs on both sides of narrow lanes.... get used to it. The last section into San Miguel became really tight, the phrase,"threading the needle" comes to mind.

This would be our first stop, San Miguel de Allende, to participate in a benefit car show to feed school kids. A welcome two day layover before going to Oaxaca.

We made the trip in about 10 hours and found our hotel with no problem. The first night we had the option of going to a dinner regarding the school program or hitting the town with a traveling Mariachi band, I chose the latter. San Miguel is a beautiful town with old world architecture and new world trappings. We wound up at a place called Mama Mia's, and watched some of the twenty year olds try their luck some of the local beauties. My first night in Mexico came to an end about 2 am, we had a car show coming in the morning.

Next Time: Where the Cars Are Stars!