A Classic Mini

Surrounded by tires and a light smell of fuel with a Gatorade in one hand... discussing the recent radiator leak we found, a flag station crew casually walked over to our pits and half jokingly asked "a couple teams complained about an aggressive mini... is it you guys? first time I heard somebody complain about a mini on track"...


I smiled, we looked at each other, we knew who it was... but we kept it quiet, and laughed it off.
It was a 60's Austin mini... a right hand drive, a first for me... on my local track, the famous ridge motorsports park. A dream come true...

I would be racing with the famous Mr.Spank who brought a two British car team for the Pacific Northwest Lemons race. While the team won #1st in class C with an Austin America, the mini came in class 3rd, due to some radiator problems. More coverage here on Car and Driver lemons blog.

More of mini racing action later in the video.. which probably will give some hints on how my 2 hour stint really was, but racing with Spank was a unique experience in its own that deserves some attention.

Lemons is widely known as a place where old and shitty cars retire in the hands of teams, drivers who have poor judgment... that's for sure, I would know as I'm one of them.... Costumes, great bbq's, odd penalties...and personalities, cars and creations that make no sense what so ever are raced for hours at a time... worked on days if not weeks prior...

Why do we spend this much energy, $$$ and time in crap can racing... I will never know, I'm only here for the race.. for the drive, that's what I'm good at. But there are quite a few personalities, talented individuals.. who otherwise could have spent their talent inventing, curing diseases or even improving other peoples lives...

Spank is one of them, a talented.. an interesting, a deep, humble fellow... who is well known in the mini cult, but more known in the lemons quarters, for his crazy creations... During Saturday, a Top Gear spin off conducted some interviews by the pits, and I captured some of that with my go-pro... lets hear it from Spank himself on his latest creations... then we'll top it off with me "spanking" some faster cars in a classic mini, enjoy :)