We love the start of every race season because it represents new possibilities. In winter of 2019, we decided that 2020 is going to be a year where we’ll be more focused on endurance racing. While we love the NASA Super Touring (sprint racing) series, we realized we enjoy enduros even more. As a team, we are aiming to win (our class), podium, or at the very least finish the 25 Hours of Thunderhill with my E36 BMW M3, “Heidi.” So, that’s what we’ve set out to do.

In January, Jon got to work making sure “Heidi” is capable of racing efficiently and reliably for long periods of time. He added a differential cooler, transmission cooler, LED lighting, window defroster, JAWS light, rain light, and an extra battery. In February, we decided to sign up for the 3.5 Hours of Willow Springs (Big Willow), Round 1 of the NASA Western Endurance Racing Championships (WERC). As a former ST4 car, Heidi is classed in E1 class for enduros.

On Friday, February 28th we loaded up in the Wunder Aligner USA rig and set off for Willow Springs International Raceway. Our objective was to test all of the additions and changes, and as racers we also wanted to win our class and finish well overall. One catch? Graham hadn’t driven Big Willow in at least 10 years. Liam had never driven there before. As for me? It would be my first time at Big Willow, as well as my first ever race at night. Don’t say we don’t love a challenge!

The schedule for Saturday was interesting. We didn’t have any track time before WERC qualifying. This meant that Liam and I would do our first ever laps of Big Willow during the 20 minute quali session. We decided to split it, 10 minutes each. In the end, I managed to put us in P4 in E1 class with a time of 1:39.7. Not fast by any means, but it would have to do. Unfortunately, we would later discover a small (that’s putting it lightly) complication. WERC uses 180lbs as the driver weight, and not actual driver weight. This translated into being underweight when we went over the scales, so our qualifying time (and position) was DQ’d. Lesson learned for future WERC events. But for this time around: we would have to start the race from dead last, 25th on the grid. Oof.

Our driver line-up for the 3.5 hours would be as follows, I would start the race. Liam would do the middle stint. And Graham would anchor. From 5:15pm to 8:45pm, we pushed hard. When I got out of the car after 1.5 hours, I had moved us up from 25th to 14th overall, and P3 in E1 class.

We got dinged with a pit-speed penalty which Liam ended up serving, this cost us a lap. But despite this setback, he fought to get us up to 12th overall and back on the same lap as the P2 car in E1 by the time he got out of the car. With 45 minutes to go, Graham charged from 12th to 8th overall and when the checkered flag dropped, we had secured P2 in E1 class. What a race! Our Toyo Tires Proxes RRs performed phenomenally over the course of 114 laps. They were consistent, predictable, and confidence inspiring. One can only imagine where we would’ve finished if we didn’t have that DQ.

Congratulations to my co-drivers, Graham and Liam, and to our team that day: Andrew, Ashly, Rory, and Max. Special thanks to Benny for lending us your fuel jugs. Drew, Jon, and Victoria, you were missed!

Ride-along with me, Liam, and Graham as we charge from last place on the grid to 8th overall and P2 in E1 class at Big Willow:

So what’s next? While we are stoked about the overall mechanical performance of the car (both trans and diff coolers worked wonderfully, we never saw temps above 180F), there’s still plenty of work to do. We need to make some improvements to our lighting package, both in and out of the car. We also want to move some switches around, and we may even consider going to a PDM. Needless to say, we hope to be an even more well-oiled overall machine by the next night enduro: Saturday April 18th at Buttonwillow. See you then!