I had the opportunity this weekend to repay a kindness to the Brits by
giving Donald Wales a ride in my Camaro.... Donald's uncle was a fella
named Donald Campbell.... his Grand dad was some fella named Sir Malcolm
Campbell..... and they were a couple of the folks that gave Donald Healey
the itch to go to a place called Bonneville and set some records.... Of
course it was Donald Healey's exploits that got me interested in this stuff
in the first place..... so it seems life comes full circle now and again
doesn't it?
Donald Wales goals are to run an electric streamliner to 300mph in the
future. ( he currently owns the electric car record in the UK at 142mph) To
do this at Bonneville one has to make several lic. passes on the salt or
acquire a lic. elsewhere at one of the 3 approved sites..... Maxton and the
ECTA of course being one of them.... I was approached by Malcolm Pittwood
to aid Donald in getting his first Two lic passes.... one at 125 and the
second at 150...... Here is the break down on how it went.
Picked the Yahoo's up at the Motel..... found a radical problem
communicating .... they had this really strange way of using the english
language..... okay fair enough.... I speak Hick.... we'll get by I
suppose.... off to the track and our initial practices in the car.... fire
drill sorta stuff.... here are what switches go where and what puts the big
Fires out.... hmmm "DONALD.... Ya don't understand.... that is where the
passenger seat would be if we had one.... OTHERSIDE YAHOO" Big Grins....
HEY Donald.... have you ever shifted with your RIGHT hand? yes Don.... you
HAVE to do this 5 times with a Six speed..... Geez is this going to be a
LONG DAY..... ( thinking of a monkey and a football bout this point.... But
they even got that comment wrong.... Lots of laughing going on here)
Finally get our first pass in the 140mph range.... we had a D lic. Second
Pass..... 157mph like he had done it a million times before... C lic...
Done... Perfect... so now we are sitting around looking at each other
going what are we going to do with our time..... Hmmm I had to totally
rebuild the car in a Month as I had lost both my Race day motors at
Bonneville this year and the 6 speed as well as the rear suspension.... I
didn't have time or the finances to put a race day motor in the car and the
Mule Motor just doesn't really have enough in it to get up to 175 for the B
lic..... kind of a bummer really...... So we are hanging out with another
Pal of mine who own's a Bush Grand national car.... and the next thing you
know we are bolting Donald into the seat..... Yep he goes 190mph and gets
his B lic..... PERFECT..... now all he has to do on the salt is check out
the car and make his first pass at 200mph.... thereby limiting Battery
issues associated with his type of race car.....
I can't even begin to tell you what all of this was like for me
personally.... to help a legendary tradition of racing continue into the
future... to be part of something like this was truly wonderful.... and the
fact that Donald Wales and Malcolm happen to be great folks just put a bit
of icing on the cake..... we had a damn Blast...
Just had to share it with you folks.....
Keith Turk ( why yes I speak English....it's those blame limey's got it all
wrong.... but I set a couple of them on the straight and narrow )
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