My 131 abarth (never ending) story - 2017 season updates

[miro-1980]

First of all: the race!

Poznan tace track:

Poznan race track map.jpg (91.72 KiB) Viewed 14483 times

track data :
width : 12,00 m
curves 14 (5 x teft , 9 x right)
straights 11
Longest straight : 560 m
Shortest straight : 60 m

I won a race in the highest category of 160+ bhp.

CUP POZNAN .jpg (49.49 KiB) Viewed 14482 times

The average speed over a 4.08 km race course was 105 km/h.

One car was racing as a guest (without classification). Lucky me - otherwise the race would be no fun at all - the rest of the cars could not even get close enough to smell abarth's exhaust fumes ...

The guest was a BMW 635 CSI with a specially prepared 285 hp engine.

I was beaten by this car by two lengths but the race was very exciting and a great learning experience.

My start was good and i took initial lead on the first straight .The BMW took inside track on the first right turn and seized the lead ( I left him too much space on the right ). I got the lead back on second lap.

starewozy-294.jpg (243.24 KiB) Viewed 14482 times

The lead I was gaining was so convincing that it seemed not worth to push the car too much ... (BMW clearly was loosing time on every turn, regaining minimally on the straights. I had a feeling we have already beaten the BMW and as a result I slowed down on this lap (loosing 17 seconds over my best time). Three turns before the end of a race BMW suddenly caught up with me took the lead ( I felt so secure I did not even see it coming ... ) BMW - being much slower on the curves defended the lead fiercely blocking my every passing attempt. I lost to BMW by two car lengths...

Note the BMW had a car with 100 more bhp than 131 abarth

It was an interesting race and quite a learning experience. This was my first race with the GC engine. I was not going 100% ( 85 % at most )

Few people who watched said it was the most exciting race in quite some time.

The GC engine worked perfect - providing phenomenal amount of power and torque. The traction provided by the suspension and the R-888 tires was fantastic.


Miro

If someone want to taste the track - here is a virtual ride on it:

http://vimeo.com/3957164

and this is an on board from a yellow racer ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxEwE_t0 ... r_embedded#!

M

[TomLouwrier]

hi Miro

Congratulations!! That sure is a nice cup to drink your champagne from.
Beautiful track too, a lot of interesting turns there.
Ooh.. BMW 6'er, I used to have one too. Great travelling machine, but a bit too heavy for the short and twisties I thought.

regards
Tom

[Guy Croft]

WELL DONE INDEED MIROSLAW

Man and machine in perfect harmony.

Now - where is your in-car footage?!

G

[Brit01]

In-car footage certainly would be fun to watch.

Congrats on your trophy, driving and performance of GC's engine. Very impressive.

[miro-1980]

Guys

I am not sure how to brake the news

I did not turn the external on camera on !

......

Pressure and concentration on the start was such that I was not thinking about it at all ....

Next time .

[Guy Croft]

Not exactly on the scale of loss as Robert Capa's photos from Omaha, but totally try not to do that again, OK?

G

[Daveyboy]

Great race Miro, but never let up for a second. You never know what may happen round the next corner and a healthy gap might make all the difference ;)

[Guy Croft]

2 position racing:

1. full throttle
2. maximum braking

there is no 'in-between'.

few master it and live to tell the tale. If you try it in a production car and don't crash you will burn out the brakes and wreck the engine in 50 miles.

G

[Daveyboy]

I was watching a documentary about `1960's Grand Prix racing earlier in the week and a something that seems particularly apt is a little conversation between Jackie Stewart and the late great Jim Clark. Jackie was discusing a big 'moment' he had had on a particular corner. Jim's reply was "Did you crash?" Jackie told him no, I managed to collect it back together and make the corner. Jim was suprised by this and told him "If you made it then you were'nt going fast enough" (Bearing in mind Sir Jack was no slouch this must have come as quite a shock. I guess the point is there is a limit for every corner/circuit, the good guys get near the limit or died going over it, the truly great guys were treading the knife edge of the limit all the time. Just watch Senna in qualifying or any race for that matter and you will see someone really grabbing it by the scruff of its neck and wringing every last bit of performance out of every last inch of track (Not something for mere mortals like us to emulate but an interesting thing to see compared to his contemporaries) and that is what makes racing truly spectacular at times.

[miro-1980]

Reports of my death are grossly exaggerated ! - (to quote mark Twain after my almost two months long disappearance from this forum seems appropriate).

Due to a complex series of personal events I had to devote myself totally to my business and personal affairs.

Now I am back and kicking.

[TomLouwrier]

hi Miro

Good to see you again! We thought you were preparing a massive write-up on 'How to build a cabinet for your trophies'...

regards
Tom

[miro-1980]

Thanks Tom,

Life is only life and the trophies keep accumulating.

I do not have the space for all of them any more, but .... a cabinet is a thought - but I might need a room to put this cabinet into :-).

I will soon release a my web page (prepared both for fans as well as for the potential sponsors).

As we have ambitious plans for next season sponsors will be extremely useful to helpful to off set the costs. Thus the page will be released publicly soon.

The parts of the page addressed to the fans are more demanding and will require sequential release of partial information, devoted to specific subjects.

There are many pages on 131 Abarth and some are extremely good, while some are very superficial. I want my page to contain interesting elements of 131 Abarth history and basic data for the general audience but I also want it to be really interesting for the elite group of advanced fans who want and need detailed technical knowledge about this car. Its unique and ingenious, but simple construction, sports use, (i.e. fine tuning its suspension, selecting brakes, tires, safety equipment, etc.) as well as specific technical issues one faces trying to rebuild it.

I have collected a lot of data, documents and pictures as well as built a body of knowledge I feel may be useful to others. There are many places that very interesting data can be found but never in one place. Hopefully, this page will become such a place. In fact I want this page to be in a sense complementary to this forum, devoted strictly to building a performance replica of 131 Abarth and concentrating on – non-engine related - technical and safety aspects of it.

It is an ambitious project and without input of people like you, GC and other great members of this elite forum it will not be possible. Hopefully, this page will gather enough interest among real experts from this forum to assist me in making sure technical and historical information contained here is as accurate as can be.
I hope you and others from GCRE forum will help me in making sure the data published on the page is technically sound and accurate.

My intention is to run technical data to be published on my page by this forum’s experts before it is published, so that information published is complete, accurate and truly useful for fans of 131 Abarth.

With Guy’s approval I hope to have the opportunity to draw upon the expertise of GCRE members to create good, internet based, free source of detailed technical information on building a replica of 131 Abarth.

Miro

[miro-1980]

www.131abarth.pl

Here is the link to the page www.131abarth.pl , which is not public yet!

The page still is under revision and any comments will be appreciated.

The technical info to be submitted will be first released here for comments of the distinguished members of this forum.

Note the page requires registration!

Miro

[WhizzMan]

It looks very good Miro.

I take it the registration will be taken off as soon as you are going public? If at all possible, it would be nice to see a completely English version. Right now there is still a mix of Polish and English in it. I understand you want to aim it at both Polish national people, since they will be your local fans and your sponsors, but also at international visitors? Having the site fully done in two languages usually helps for that.

Also, if you want to get it rated high in Google, Bing and such, make sure you get some links to your website from friendly people that also maintain quality web sites. Keep on filling it up and updating it. That will help keep a high visitor count, which will be beneficial for you and your sponsors. Don't be afraid to open it up once you have the basics in place. People have been eager to follow this thread on Guys forum, and they will be just as eager to watch your own website. You don't need a complete history and all photo's you have of the car on the site at the start, just a few will be enough then.

[miro-1980]

Wizzman,

The page when released publicly will be totally in English. (My page IT developer feels easier with Polish, so there is a bit of a temporary language mix).

Language Logic : GCRE is in English only and people from all around the world are its members. In all honesty speaking (reading) English is a true prerequisite to build a 131 Abarth replica, or any other replica of a classic sports car. I also know of no one involved in (or truly planning) rebuilding or replicating a non-local-production car in Poland that would not speak English. All the experts or serious amateurs in this field here do speak English. This is really an elite club and this club is a real target audience. Also English is to remain the page language.

Polish language version will follow. This will be targeting general Polish audience (to show off to the sponsors) and will be - in reality - promotional in content.

Registration Logic: "Going Pubic" does not necessarily mean making it available to search engines. The English version shall remain registration based and most likely "membership based" very much like GCRE.

The Polish version will likely start with registration based access. Later maybe we will make it open. Maybe there will be two separate sections: one for general audience and one for registered users.

I am facing two conflicting postulates:

One : to make the page very detailed for en elite group of experts, serious amateurs and professionals sharing information/data/pictures I do not really want to be readily "googlable". This is my real target and objective.

Two : making it widely available to the public through search engine. I probably need this as general audience and media access and to make the sponsor happy.

So , it is a bit of an unusual project ...

Miro