WARNING: LONG STORY!!!

Ok, so I'm a local resident of Advance Auto parts, as many know. I should just get a job there since I know that catalog so well, and tend to help customers waiting. Anyways, back to the story. I'm just killing time Saturday night, talking to Ben, a worker, and this red Beretta pulls up. I immediately thought it was this girl who had been driving around that night, with a red Beretta, Nos stickers on the side windows, and a fart can coming at a 45 degree angel from the bumper. Well, needless to say I was staring at the car, and it turned out to not be her.

Instead, three guys, maybe 18ish, get out of the car. They come inside and the driver asks about a used battery for his car. While he and Ben go wander on back looking for the right one, one of the guys comes up to me and asks "Is that your Grand Prix?"
I respond with "The Turbo Grand Prix? Yeah."
He hears 'turbo' and perks up.
Next question: "Do you race that thing?"
"Yeah, sometimes" I answer. "Why, do you wanna race?" Measuring up the slightly beatn Beretta, I was just joking with him.

"No, but I got a friend who might." He picks up his phone and begins to call someone. While waiting for him to answer, he begins to tell me "He's got a 95 Eclipse. Just got it, but the clutch is starting to wear out."

I tell him "No way. I don't help people ruin their cars. He can come by and I'll check it out though."

By this point, I'm still relaxed at the counter, knowing what I have under my hood, and they don't. I'm all calm while these three are jumping around like the flying monkeys from the Wizard of Oz. I start to think "Jesus, this is the new crowd of racers in this town? We're screwed."

Flip to the outside setting, we're standing by my car, the red Beretta beside me, a white Beretta beside him, and the blue Eclipse beside him. They're all getting out popping their hoods. Kinda nice seeing a stock 3.1 for a change lol. So I pop my hood since their all just begging for it.

"OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO----AHHHHHH." Jesus, I think to myself. Then I realize that instead of judging these guys as little punks, I should actually embrace the fact that they want to learn about it. So I begin to tell them about it, what mods I've done, what came stock, and a little about the history of it. After each sentence someone had a question or a statement....I felt like a teacher, and I'm only a few years older than them. The Eclipse guy asked me about what turbo he should put on his car, and I told him to go out and by some books about it, not just read online topics. I recommended Barnes and Noble's auto book section, as there's quite a few turbo books there.

Anyways, they decide there's a guy, Caleb, who would be a good race for me. The guy owns a 200 GTP, with a full system and an UDP...but that's it, besides neon stuff. The one guy tels me that the guy in the Eclipse was approached the the GTP guy, and was asked to put $400 on a race between those two. The Eclipse guy said "No i've got a bad clutch, but I'll race you for fun." Eclipse lost badly. Caleb tells me that when this GTP comes, tell the driver that my car isn't running right, and that the turbo's out of it...I laughed and realized they don't much care for this guy. I said sure.

GTP pulls up, and this short, BIG guy gets out and walks over...I tel him what I was supposed to, and he asks if I will put money on it. I don't cheat, so I told him no...it wouldn't have been right, you know?

We agree on a place, and head out of town. By this time, there's myself, the GTP, 2 Berettas, the Eclipse, and a Cavalier with a ginormous scoop cut into each side of the front fenders. (Like I said, I mourn the younger ricing crowd lol) We get to the straight stretch, and the GTP and I line up. He and his buddy in the passenger's seat, me and Caleb in my car. Two people each. I notice the weight disadvantage and thought about offering him one length, but remembered he's driving a supercharged vehicle lol.

We have the white Beretta drive down a ways, until the odometer moved 4 places, making it just over a quarter mile. He flashed the lights Once.....TWICE......THREE!

We spun off, mine spun very shortly, the GTP for a small amount longer. I take him.........all the way down. By the time I past the white Beretta, they said I was about three lengths ahead of him. We pull up next to each other at a STOP sign.

"Turbo's out my ass!!" are his first words.
I start rattling off my mods, and watch him jaw start to fall and his head shake. He rebuttles:
"Wanna race again? Let me take my subs out first."
"Ok," I say. "Let me take mine out too!" LOL I owned his ass! He just drove off. Not sure what the time would have been but I was at about 103 before I let off....and he was nothing but far off headlights lol.

Got back to town, dropped Caleb off with his buddies, and their all laughing at the other guy, asking for rides, and I tell them I need to go because I have plans with my girlfriend. I tell them maybe another time, and drive off. Got to my girlfriend's, and I check everything out, the oil, the tranny fluid, listened to the idle, gauges...everything. Nothing seemed to run bad, nothing out of place, nothing leaking. Perfect! I now know that she can take that amount of racing, though the next race will have to be more appealing lol.

And if you're still reading this, thank you!

I should probably add it was a sedan GTP, not coupe. Any myself and my passenger together prolly weighed 300 pounds lol.

Nice!  That was fun to read :laugh:  The next time we meet up, we'll have to show them both TGPs :icon_twisted:

Thanks Nick! Yea definately! I'm still pretty stunned that I outran a GTP, even with my mods. Maybe it's just the first real race after everything's been done to it. Yeah no kidding, whenever I write something I tend to trail on like a book...but it's generally worth reading! :icon_biggrin:

That was pretty nice, around here they would have still bashed the underdog even if it wins.  There poor poor generation, what will ever happen to them?  lol

I know, like I said...I mourn this generation of racers/ricers. Oh well, atleast they were good sports...kinda made some new friends which is nice since almost all my old friends left for school and only come back in the summer.

Quote from: grinders_18 on February 04, 2008, 06:51:41 PM
I should probably add it was a sedan GTP, not coupe. Any myself and my passenger together prolly weighed 300 pounds lol.

Coupe or Sedan, there isn't a whole lot of difference to be honest.

I've seen the heaviest version of the GTP(sedan with sunroof and all options) run several 14.3's and 14.4's at 95.XXmph stock. Some guys with coupes have went 14.1-14.2ish @ 96.XX mph. This of course is in great weather with a pretty good launch. The average GTP time is around a 14.6-14.7 or so.

You should take your car to the track and get a time on it. ;)

I'd LOVE to get a slip or two, but I don't know where I can go in MN for 1320 racing...

Quote from: grinders_18 on February 06, 2008, 05:06:20 AM
I'd LOVE to get a slip or two, but I don't know where I can go in MN for 1320 racing...

Looks like you have 3 in the state :)

http://www.na-motorsports.com/Tracks/MN/index.html#DragStrips

Ken

I vote we go to Litchfield or Brainerd

I've heard from several people that Brainerd is awesome

Man Nick when you said Litchfield you had my hopes up, but there isn't a Litchfield track listed lol.

BIR is an awesome track from what I've heard. I wonder what it costs to run though? So damn far for a piece of paper too...like 4 hours lol or more

Kyle, the track in Grove City is just barely west of Litchfield.  Looking at this map: http://www.mapquest.com/maps/map.adp?searchtype=address&country=US&addtohistory=&searchtab=home&formtype=address&popflag=0&latitude=&longitude=&name=&phone=&level=&cat=&address=&city=grove+city&state=mn&zipcode=56243
Being I'm just outside of Cambridge on the right side of the map, it would be almost equal distance for me to go to Brainerd or Grove City..  Grove City is pretty far out west though.

I didn't realize it, but you're right. And I go to Litchfield all the time in the summer for the drive-in movie theater. Looking at it now, I could have saved half an hour on my trip to Alexandria by going through Litchfield instead of the way I took lol.

Do they have a 1/4 miles though Nick?

Not sure.. it was one of the three places in MN listed on the site Cobra posted.

Let me ask Rizzo at Tires Plus. He constantly races, I'll find where.