What’s New
Can you believe that it is March already? Where has the time gone this winter? When you are reading this, our opening day at Lime Rock will be scarcely 40 days away! If you have not uncovered your car, unplugged the Battery Tender, and started getting things ready, well, now would be the time. For many of us, the preparations for the track season can be a daunting task, both in effort and expense. Making matters worse, the economy is obviously not great, and not getting better anytime soon. Let’s face it, with the battle going on between the dynamic Mitt Romney and the enigmatic Newt Gingrich, the only things Barack has to worry about is picking a new Secretary of State, and deciding if the curtains in the Oval Office need to be updated. So with that, I decided to put together a compendium of sorts spanning the obvious to the overlooked. Here are some tips that I have accumulated over the years that may be of some help to you as you prepare for the season.
Buy early, buy often, buy wisely. There is no question that this hobby is expensive from a parts and maintenance standpoint. You can lessen the blow however, by picking things up well before you may need them and getting some deals along the way. Take brake pads, for example. For whatever reason, I always find myself in a time crunch, usually right before a track event, searching for the right pads for the car. I end up buying them at full retail, and then add insult and injury by needing expedited shipping. If you keep your eyes and ears open, though, there are often savings throughout the year. Shops will run sales, often in the winter months. You can also get great private sale deals. Many times a club member will change Porsches, and sell the extra parts from the former car in our Porscheforus Mart or the “for sale” section of our club website. Swap meets like our own NNJR “white elephant” sale every January, or the famous annual Saturdday Hershey show on April 21 are also great sources. Case in point, I watched a fellow club member this past weekend at the white elephant pick up two sets of new Pagid front pads for “Big Red” brakes, plus a set of rears, for $100! Full retail on those Pagids is easily more than $800. Another example is motor oil. Many Porsches use tried and true Mobil 1 synthetic oil and if you have a 911, you are buying eleven quarts of it for each oil change. Buying it when it is on sale, or in bulk five-quart containers, can literally cut the price in half, from around $9 a quart to $4.50. You can apply this logic to almost anything, of course, the common theme is to avoid waiting to the last minute to buy things you need. Stock up on those expendables that you know you will need throughout the season. Do not forget about bottled water and sun block, either.
Since before I could drive, I always wanted a Porsche 911. But not just any 911 though, I wanted a Red Targa, as that always seemed the most aesthetically correct combination. I had this want long after Red Targas fell out of fashion. Heck, even after air-cooled Porsches fell out of fashion. I also wanted a Red Ferrari 308 Targa, but that is a different story.
Then one day in 1997 my better half and I were at a used car lot investigating a Mercedes 300TD to replace our dying commuter car. And there it was: a slightly rough looking but beautifully classic red 1974 Porsche 911 Targa. My childhood desire was for a later car, complete with obligatory whale tail, but this was better! I forgot they even used to have brushed stainless Targa bars! I had to have it! It was cheap (relatively) and I justified it by saying that I always wanted to have a project car to work on and that this was just a glorified Beetle. Right? Well that argument worked and both the Benz and Porsche came home with us.
It seemed like a good idea at the time. I accidentally planned a business meeting in Montreal at 9:00 AM on a Tuesday morning, followed by two days at Lime Rock on Wednesday and Thursday. Of course, with roughly four hundred miles each way between home in New Jersey and my client’s office in Montreal, it would be pretty tough to make the round trip in time to turn around and head back out for the two and a half hour ride to Lime Rock. So, I decided to do what any reasonable person would do; I packed up my twenty seven year old 911SC, threw in my clothes bag, briefcase, tools and helmet, and headed up the New York Thruway into the Great White North.
It all was working out beautifully. The three liter engine of my 911 settled into a beautiful, cacophonous mix - part mechanical, part whirring from the huge engine fan. I got into such a groove that I drove non-stop, past Albany, past Saratoga, through Lake George, all the way until the “sortie” signs clued me in that the US/Canadian border was approaching. I took the last exit in New York for a McDonald’s and gasoline break.
