Like a Postman keeping to his appointed rounds, it takes a lot more than your average New England weather to keep a Factory Five owner from a day of racing and general fun.  So, even as hurricane Floyd was bearing down on New England, many of the Factory Five faithful were nonetheless making plans to join us at our annual autocross on Cape Cod… I mean, what’s a little rain and 100+ mph wind to a bunch of guys that have built their own cars?!

As it turned out, Floyd didn’t stick around long enough to spoil our fun, but instead cleared a path for the most gloriously beautiful mid-September day imaginable.  A

bright sunny morning in the low 60’s gave way to a perfect 75 degree cloudless blue sky day that from the outset, warmed faster than the engines in the cars at the starting line on the Otis AFB autocross track. 

The threat of Floyd did have a few FFR owners cancel their plans to attend, (the hardcore need not taunt here), however this year’s event did bring together 18 local cars.  The day was planned to have a good mix of food, racing, fun events and camaraderie.  In addition to the 18 or so drivers in attendance, there were a half-dozen or more owners who came without their in-process snakes. 

The primary event was the autocross.  The morning was

for practice and learning the course and the afternoon would be for timed runs in a solo format.  We like to run at Otis with the Cape Cod Sports Car Club since this course has the best of both worlds.  It is both safe and challenging.  Plus it is designed in it’s 1.1 mile route for maximum speed and braking instead of being a bit boring like a standard SCCA 30 mph steering contest.

The FFR guys had driven on this track so many times, it was decided they would run in the pro group with street tires.  It was enjoyable watching FFR’s Mark Smith slide around on radial T/A’s with a 560 horsepower big block powered car underneath him.  Always the competitor, Mark ended up wrestling with a pine shrub off course en route to trying to beat the best time of Rock Bisson, who

won the pro class.  Mark was awarded the coveted “weed-wacker” award for 1999.  FFR customer Gary Cheney was pleased to have finally gotten rid of that title (Gary won the weed-wacker award two years ago for his off-track excursion before the last straight and in full view of all in attendance).

Most memorable was customer John Bachuber who decided to invent his own line around the track, taking a straight line to the return sweeper instead of going around three cones near the chicane.  Engineer Jim Schenck took the same line all morning!  The route was faster, but you’d have thought the DNF marked on their time slots would’ve tipped them off that there was a problem with their run.  By the timed runs each had figured the track out.

Denise Smith, (wife of FFR owner Dave Smith) was ready to battle the men in her street roadster but last minute babysitter plans fell through.  Dave spent the day with his two oldest daughters while mom kept track of their youngest.  Don’t worry Dave, you might get a chance to win against your wife next year.

In Denise’s place, FFR admin team member Elizabeth Langevin jumped into a red corvette and proceeded to take out her frustrations on some poor defenseless cones.  When the carnage was over she had clinched the women’s class by virtue of being the lone entry.  A win is still a win!

This event was also a good opportunity for guys to compare notes.  Most owners were just as interested in seeing their fellow builder’s innovations from the standard build-up as they were interested in racing.  The winner in the most unique modification category was clearly local Massachusetts boy Michael Langen, who modified the FFR kit to accommodate a ’97 modular V8 (4.6L).  Michael brought his kit still unpainted to show off his motor tricks.  It attracted most everyone (eventually) away from the throng of car show winners.