The poor man's adrenaline rush

In a deserted parking lot, a group of amateur racers are pushing their Volvos and VWs to their limits -- and getting off on a big, fat, primal buzz

By Tim O'Sullivan

You're nervous now, aren't you?" Craig Wilson asks me through the driver's side window, a wolfish grin across his face. I nod my head and laugh timidly. The butterflies are slam dancing in my stomach as I try to steady myself. The flag flies, and the butterflies vanish, and I shoot the car forward. Nik Rende, who volunteered to ride shotgun, coaches me through the course, giving alternate commands of "Easy, EASY!" and "Go, go, GO!!!" I lose track of the laps and Nik has to convince me that the race is done and I need to cross the finish line. Once the car stops, the butterflies return, and I'm shaking and grinning, jacked up on adrenaline. My heart is drumming out of my chest and my mouth is dry. "I can go faster," are the words that spill out of my mouth as another car races onto the course.

It wasn't always like this. Earlier, it was just a calm, cool Saturday morning. Dan Morency was mapping out a race course in the parking lot of Old Orchard Beach High School with old yellow and red pylons. As he plotted and measured the track, though, his intentions became clear: his design showed none of the tight turns and abrupt course changes that call for high technical proficiency on the part of a driver; he was laying out these bruised and battered pylons with an eye toward the cheap thrills that only a long, fast straightaway and

sweeping, tire-squealing turns can provide. The race that was to get started in another couple of hours -- one of the last Cumberland Motor Club autocross races this season -- isn't so much about the competition; it's about seeing just how fast that sedan you drive to work every day can go. But at the time, Morency was also thinking about his wife, Karen.

"We wanted to make an open, flowing course, in contrast to the tight technical courses," explains Morency, CMC's president. "Karen's arm is hurting, and it's harder for her to make the sharp turns."

No, a CMC autocross is not Formula One racing, but it is a skills contest none the less. The object is simple: drive fast, keep the yellow cones on your left, and the red cones on your right. And don't wreck. It is a contest, but it's also a big, fat, primal buzz.

"Racing allows an outlet for that nutbag in all of us to get loose," observes Craig Wilson, nine-year autocross veteran, who, along with the other racers, rolled in around 8 a.m. and started lining up their cars: a Volkswagen Rabbit mounted on a trailer; a Jetta that had been "dead in a front yard just a month ago"; an Eagle Talon with sponsor decals; Dodge Neons plastered with magnetic letters and numbers; a souped up Hyuandai Tiburon; a confident red Ford Mustang; your neighbor's silver, four-door Volvo; a rusty Pinto; and so many more -- Porsches and Preludes, Civics and BMWs -- all ready to rumble.

And then there's Jerry Shields's 1972 Tui Super Vee, a spectacle of a machine that looks like a cross between a go kart and a Formula One racer. The electric blue Tui has an open engine sparkling with chrome, a one-seat cockpit, wide, smooth, and sticky racing tires, and a massive winged spoiler that looks like it might allow the thing to take off into flight. Shields, of Littleton, Massachusetts, bought the Tui for $12,000, but says that to build a car like this one from scratch, it might cost as much as $50,000. He races in autocross events almost every weekend during the April-to-October season, and even went to the national autocross championships in Topeka, Kansas, last month. The Tui gets transported in the back of a hauling truck, complete with tools, extra parts, and a winch that eases the car out of the truck and onto the pavement. In racing around high school parking lots, Shields has found his drug of choice.

"The faster you go," he explains, "the faster you want to go."

Autocross and car clubs are a national pastime, with groups ranging in size from the relatively small CMC to the Sports Car Club of America, one of the nation's largest grassroots sports organizations with 55,000 members, 109 regional chapters, approximately 2000 events per year, and the massive national championship held at an air force base in Topeka. This year there were 1093 drivers at the two-day event. Shields said it took him a half an hour to drive through the "paddock," rows and rows of the autocross racecars on display. The Auburn, Massachusetts-based New England Regional chapter of the Sports Car Club of America, founded in 1944, is the oldest in the country and the second largest, behind the San Francisco chapter. The CMC is not affiliated directly with the Sports Car Club of America, though it does use their autocross rulebook. The general consensus among members of the CMC is that the Sports Car Club of America events are too "anal" and "competitive." These Mainers like their adrenaline rush served friendly.

The CMC was founded in Portland in 1958 by Charles S. Morrill 3, Sonny Estes, Steve Belyea, Lee Nickerson, and John Ames, and is one of the oldest car clubs in New England. There was an existing organization, the Downeast Car Club that folded after the CMC was born, and sponsored Auto Slaloms (then called gymkhanas after the equestrian event) and short car rallies. But Nickerson wanted to take it to another level. He started by creating an all-night car rally -- a low-speed race for points on public roads -- through the mountains of New Hampshire. He then developed a much publicized 24-hour winter rally that ran for 20 years but was a victim of the first Arab oil crisis and ultimately a loss of interest.

Dave Snow, 66, was the president of the Downeast Car Club and an original member of the CMC and has fond memories of the club's early days. "My most prominent memories are of laying out a leg of the 24-hour rally on paper company roads north of Rockwood. I was in a 1961 Porsche with no snow tires and no studs and thought I might be trapped between two hills until spring."

Snow, who is currently running for state senate, says that the biggest change that has taken place in the club is the loss of interest in putting on long rallies, and the increased interest in autocross and its instant gratification.

It's certainly not as sinister, but the autocross does have a certain Fight Club quality to it: a group of guys looking for a release from the day-to-day grind by opening up the family car in a deserted parking lot. As one racer says about preparing to drive: "I equate it to standing on the edge of an 80-foot ledge above a quarry." Another says, "Trying to temper your adrenaline is the hardest thing." A quote from the Sports Car Club of America Web site says, "It's like being in a movie chase through a parking garage."

While they may not be as intensely competitive as other car clubs, the CMC is not lacking in technology. As the set up continues in Old Orchard Beach two laptop computers are hooked up to two electronic timing devices at the start and finish line. Every racer's name, class (distinguishing a Porsche from, say, a Pinto), and car number are logged into the computer, and then race times are recorded by the system to the thousandth of a second. The program is able to handicap the times according to class as well as calculate rankings. Nik Rende, who will later accompany me around the track, is a senior programmer/database analyst for the Maine Legislature, and helps set up the computer equipment. He's also a member, along with Craig Wilson and Mike Picher, of the 8 Rod Racing team.

8 Rod Racing derives its name from 8 Rod Road in Augusta where Mike, Craig, and Nik all live. Craig's first autocross was July 4, 1991, at the annual event the CMC holds at the Augusta Civic Center. He placed first in the novice class as well as first in his car (Isuzu Impulse) class, and was hooked. Mike and Nik became addicted after their first spin on the autocross course as well. Initially, they all raced their own cars: Craig a tricked out Volkswagen Passat, Mike an Audi A4, and Nik a turbo-charged Mitsubishi Galant VR4 (which, in another legislative connection, formerly belonged to Senator Jane Amero of Falmouth).

As the Passat, Audi, and Galant raced for glory on the weekends, the cars started to get a little worn out, and the 8 Rod Racing wives put their collective foot down: if the team wanted to continue to race, they'd have to find something else to beat on. Soon enough they bought a 1983 Volkswagen GTI Rabbit for $500. A complete account of all the work put into the Rabbit, detailing the type of part, where they were purchased, their cost, time spent installing, and number of beers consumed during repair can be found on 8 Rod Racing's Web site, www.tkiweb.com/~mpicher/8rodracing, along with plenty of photos of the car.

As start time approached Nik asked if I wanted a ride in the Rabbit on the opening run. I eagerly accepted and was soon buckling myself in and strapping on a helmet. As we waited in the staging line, Nik went through his pre-race routine. He talked about where he could shift, brake, and floor it. I listened to him and watched an Audi Quattro rumble its way around the track in a punishing run. Nik cracked his neck and knuckles, adjusted his helmet and seat belt and took a deep breath. The green flag dropped and he told me to hang on. I did.

Nik spun us onto the track and through the timing gate and immediately floored it as the course -- a sort of reverse B-shape -- opened in a straightaway. I was surrounded by the smell of racing engine and burning tires. I gripped the door handle and a ridiculous smile smeared my face. We reached the first corner and Nik explained his braking and accelerating as we roared through the turn, my body pressed to the door. Nik powered his way through the next two laps and before I knew it we were at the stop cone and I was laughing and shaking. Nik, all souped up himself on a whopping dose of adrenaline, frantically reported the track conditions to his fellow 8 Rod Racing team members.

Rick Snow, son of Dave Snow, saw how thrilled I was with my first ride and offered me another. He was initially apologetic, explaining that his Mazda RX-7 had blown a clutch, so he was forced to bring his mother's car to the autocross: a 1987 Porsche 924 S.

Before the race, Rick explained that autocross is "good for young people to learn the capabilities of their car." He says that driver's education classes do very little to prepare you for an actual emergency situation (like racing around a high school parking lot), whereas autocross is a practice in high-speed decision making and quick reflexes. Dan Davis of Augusta chimed in: "Last weekend I was the lucky recipient of a tourist's dream, sighting a moose in his native habitat. This particular moose's natural habitat being Rte. 219 in West Sumner, after dark, on the backside of a hill, in my lane. Now, my car-handling skills have no doubt increased since I began autocrossing, but perhaps just as important is the fact that I am now more diligent when it comes to the braking system, suspension and tires on my car. I still gave that moose a little love tap, but it could have been disastrous had my car and I not been as prepared as we were."

Rick Snow equates learning how to maximize your car's abilities to spending a dollar. "If you spend the whole dollar on acceleration," he explains, "you have no money left for turning or brakes. Your tires can only do so much. You learn what you can do with your car."

The Porsche's engine raced as the green flag dropped. Sitting in the sports car's low seat provided a different view of the course, the pavement whizzing just below me as the cones sped past closer to eye level. Rick handled mom's car beautifully, and it felt as though we were going much faster than in the Rabbit. But once the race ended and again I found myself shaking and grinning madly, I realized the Porsche was only a couple seconds faster than the VW.

Craig Wilson saw my smile and realized I was hooked. "You need to drive," he said, more of an order than a statement of fact. I didn't disagree with him. Quickly I'm signing insurance waivers and choosing a number under which to race. The 8 Rod team volunteers their beloved Rabbit and just like that I'm a racer. Nik volunteers to ride with me on the first run and again we wait together in the staging line, buckled securely into the car.

"You're nervous now, aren't you?" Craig asks me.

For the remainder of the afternoon I was a driver. My ears piqued as I listened to people analyze the course. I watched intensely as Craig, Mike, and Nik drove the Rabbit, trying to learn something from their line around the track, where they would shift and brake and corner hard. I wanted to go faster. I needed to go faster. As I waited the second time in the staging line I was alone in the Rabbit and could feel my competitive juices replacing the butterflies.

Each driver was allowed six runs on Saturday, and by the end of the day I had earned second place in the novice division and won a trophy, which Morency presented to me. It was a Hot Wheels VW Beetle mounted on a wooden stand.

I lined up with the racers one last time on Saturday, but this time we all rolled slowly out of the parking lot. The OOB police station is within sight of the high school, so no one risked a final tire squeal. The rest of the ride home was a fight between adrenaline and better judgment, the urge to test freshly honed skills versus speed limited reality.

Tim O'Sullivan can be reached at timanddenise@earthlink.net.