Honoring the Corvette’s 50th Birthday Contest
With the flagship of GM turning 50 years old and well known motto’s of
“Need for Speed” and “Life begins at 180 MPH”
This is a perfect time to salute the Corvette’s history by experiencing what a American muscle car is all about, Speed and plenty of it.
Going to a drag strip or a racetrack gives you a taste of speed but only for a very short distance. How can we truly feel the true power of our American muscle cars?
Have you every been tempted to pull the hammer and just stay at the maximum speed your car can do with the only reward a hitch in jail?
Consider 100 miles of a public road, you know where speed limit signs have us moving along under 70 MPH, heck any ole car can do that, so what if that road was shut down and you were given the OK to haul ass for that whole distance?
Well it’s not make believe, it does exist via a grass roots racing group by MKM Racing.
This is called Open Road Racing (ORR) and anyone really can attend one of the three ORRs MKM Racing will be again doing for 2003.
Concept is simple, depending on the type of safety gear you and the car has would allow you to run a maximum TECH speed.
There are several divisions and each division has TARGET speed groups.
Let’s say you have a Camaro, you put Z rated tires on it :
A 5-point harness bar and belts and you (and if you want a navigator) are wearing Nomex clothing, shoes, gloves and a helmet, well that would allow you a maximum tech speed of 160 MPH!
Let’s say then you select the Grand Sport division and the 130-target speed.
This means you have to complete the 100 miles exactly averaging 130 MPH to win your group.
This allows you to run lets say turns at 110 MPH and to make up the time 160 MPH on the straights. The task is to overall end the race at the tech speed you chose.
Turns are not like city corner turns but sweeping highway turns so some can be taken as low as 100 to about 130 MPH.
We have been doing these ORRs for almost 10 years and it clearly allows our muscle cars to show what it and our skills of adding performance to them and our driving skills.
If you do not think you could run these speeds on a public road consider my very 1st ORR was in the 130 MPH average speed and within 3 ORRs was in the 155 target speed and within 3 years was in the 200 MPH speeds, so you can do it too and plenty of us out here that can help you learn and plan to also feel the speed.
The roads used are in Nevada and once race begins you have the whole distance and all sides of the road to crank the power on and stay there.
If you want the highest speeds possible there is the Unlimited division where speeds of 240 plus MPH have been seen and for those wanting to run lower speeds the Touring division has speeds from 90 to 115 MPH.
For 2003, MKM Racing dates are:
1. Bonneville 100, June 19-22
2. Pony Express I, July 25-27
3. Gamblers Run, August 22-24
MKM Racing has donated 1 free entry to Team ZR-1 for our years of attending and supporting this American grass roots racing and we have decided to give that free entry away as our salute to the Corvette’s birthday by a simple contest open to all our GM family by sending me via private e-mail
Consisting of no less then 500 words of what it means to you to do this type of racing with your car.
Include a image of your car,
What mods it has and
Explain why you should win this free entry which if you bought would be worth from $300 to $500 depending on what division you would run in.
I must receive all entries to this contest by the deadline of December 30th 2002.
This then gives time for the lucky winner to read the ORR rules, make changes to their car to meet the safety rules, and study the race video and course notes to plan their run for either sole fun or to win their target class group.
Winning is for the free entry only and any other costs to do the race is yours.
The free entry can be used for any ONE of the 3 ORRs MKM Racing hosts for 2003.
Being only one lucky person will win this contest, that should not stop you from attending these ORRs and either be a driver, navigator, or course worker.
First day is used for getting the car through safety tech, 2nd day is used for practicing at speeds on the road and 3rd day is race day.
In the evenings there is dinners, get togethers and having fun with all the racers.
Other events are a car show;
All racecars parade through city and last evening is the awards and a dinner.
So come join us next ORR season and salute the Corvette by getting out there and showing how fast our GM muscle cars can really go.
Let’s Go a Racing . . .
