Want to go racing, but don’t have a lot of money or talent? Then look no further than the 24 Hours of Lemons! The BFE GP was held at High Plains Raceway last month. The relaxed atmosphere, hilarious cars, and intense racing make for a weekend of automobile shenanigans found nowhere else; think of it as Burning Man with cars and fewer naked people—that’s right, I said “fewer.” And trust me, you don’t want to see most Lemons folk naked!
The thing is, the racing is absolutely fantastic. While there are vast differences between the performance of the cars and drivers, the racing is cut-throat. My favorite thing about Lemons is the ability to unleash raw aggression on the track that just wouldn’t be appropriate in the more serious organizations I race with. Contact is discouraged, and the rules are strictly enforced—sometimes through public shaming—but the “less-precious” nature of beater-car racing encourages pugnacious acts that would normally be beneath the civilized BMW gentleman racer.
The utter absurdity of what shows up at Lemons is nearly as entertaining as the racing. You enter a bizarre world where a two-ton Chevy pickup truck can go around corners properly, but not as fast as a topless engine-swapped Volkswagen Vanagon. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it! Getting passed by either in a BMW would be an ego-shattering blow that is as delicious to watch as it is humbling to experience.
This year I abandoned my beloved Roundel for a Toyota—specifically, the 1988 Supercharged MR2 of Team Volatile RAM, captained by Larry Sanders. The high-strung, lightweight, and most important, reliable Toyota MR2 is a great Lemons car.
Larry expertly builds his Lemons cars; in 2014 I raced his two-engine MRolla, a Toyota Corolla FX16 literally grafted to an MR2. Two engines powering all four wheels were an engineering feat that made it a serious competitor. It challenged my multi-engine flying skills with the need to monitor two sets of gauges and timing shifts so that the rear engine wouldn’t over-rev the one in front.
The 1988 Supidcharged Toyota MR2 was much simpler—and properly fast. Some mid-engine cars are prone to snap-oversteer, but this MR2 was as well-mannered as the Queen’s butler. It was simply pleasant to drive near the limit, which allowed for heroic aggression in the heat of battle.
Toyota evolved the forced-air-breathing 4AGE motor from a reverse-engineered Ford Cosworth racing engine and shoehorned it behind the seats of the MR2—mid-engine, rear-wheel drive, two seats. In the race, the MR2 didn’t have the overall speed of the 1991 Acura Integra from team Drop Packet Racing that won the race, or the 1982 turbocharged Britzka Racing BMW 528e that set the fasted lap time of 2:14.6, but the overall package made it a formidable opponent.
That puke-yellow Britzka Racing turbocharged E28 was one of our most fierce competitors before it was sidelined due to engine issues. The big BMW and I had the Lemons version of a David-and-Goliath battle over a dozen laps. The classic Fünfer was a beast, compared to the nippy little MR2; on the back straightaway with the turbo fully spooled, it would blast by me while blowing out a cloud of black smoke that would make a diesel Dodge Dually driver blush. Then it would give it right back to me in the first two turns of the twisty section as the laws of physics swung into the MR2’s favor.
Finally, deciding that I was ultimately faster, he would still close my hard-earned gap on the straightaway with raw Bavarian power, but allow me the faster line through Turn Four as I inched ever-forward through the pack.
“Raw Bavarian power” are not the first words that come to mind when speaking of a 528e, but that is the absurdity of the 24 Hours of Lemons.
Our favorite brand was well represented, with no fewer than eleven BMWs in a field of 61 teams. Models included a 2002, an E21 3 Series, a slew of E30s and E28s, and several E36s. My favorite BMW was actually an E30 disguised as a Subaru Brat; it was a 1986 325e that was hacked into a pickup truck—no doubt an effort to cheat the E30 into the Lemons $500 original-purchase-price requirement. It was painted Espresso Brown in theme with the team name of Panda Expresso. The word “Brat” written vertically along the B-pillar—just like the classic Subaru pickup truck—was effective camouflage. Two fake jumpseats in the bed occupied by stuffed panda bears made a compelling visual argument that it was in fact a Brat; I didn’t realize that it wasn’t until the second day of the race, which relieved my utter astonishment that a Brat could be so fast!
The 1986 535i from team Orgasmatron finished in a very respectable 25th place, despite running the majority of the race on four cylinders. Another favorite was the beautiful bright orange Jägermisters Racing 1984 533i. Even with a poorly fashioned late-1960s Dodge Daytona Charger rear spoiler, it was not the fastest BMW. That honor went to Team GTI in their 1986 325e—but I suspect that it did not have an eta motor under the hood.
Team GTI was also the only BMW to beat us, thanks to a two-hour mechanical delay when the MR2’s distributor literally fell out of the car in Turn Six. I happened to be threading the needle, three abreast, through the tightest turn on the track when the engine stalled so violently that the rear wheels locked up.
Somehow I managed to keep it from spinning and making contact with the cars that I had very rudely stuffed myself between. We found the distributor dangling from the cap wires in the engine bay.
The biggest delay of the repair was finding new bolts, one of which was unknowingly donated—i.e. stolen—from Team GTI. I used my BMW CCA credentials to gain access to their pit, and then made off with an M10 bolt before anyone was the wiser—such treachery could only be expected at Lemons.
The delay dropped us to 48th place, but over the next two days, we clawed our way back up to finish fourteenth.
The Stupidcharged MR2 cut through most of the field like a shark through a school of jellyfish. It was fast enough that I could back up my aggression with enough speed to keep my passes clean and my chance-taking less chancy; we didn’t get one black flag during the entire race.
The MR2 had composure that just shouldn’t be possible in a 1980s Toyota. The combination of a high-strung supercharged four-cylinder engine in a well-balanced chassis was absolutely intoxicating—and a reminder that BMW’s Bavarians weren’t the only ones who made a great four-cylinder in the 1980s.—Alex McCulloch
