Thought I'd let you guys know how the couple of Datsun 1200's that were competing went at the QSSS Final.

There was over 160 cars registered for QLD Super Sprint Series making it the biggest Sprint Series in Australia. These cars were split into two separate qualifying series', A and B. The top cars from each series came together last weekend for the Final to determine the QLD Champions for each class. The format for the final was a standing start, 4 lap, multi car sprint.

Improved Production 0-1600cc
won by Craig Allen in an A14 powered 1200 coupe. 2nd place went to his father Malcom in the same car. It has about 108 bhp at the wheels, and although not as fast as mine in a straight line, it handles and stops significantly better due to the lighter weight and the huge track. It must be a foot wider than mine! They both peddle the little thing pretty damn well too. It's great to see it rounding up some of the more fancied and much more powerful LJ/LC toranas, and keeping right on the heels of 13B powered RX7's etc

Improved Production 1601-2000cc
won by the insanely fast 16v twin cam Escort of Gavin Wilkinson. (Also currently leading Imp Prod circuit racing State Championships, and finished 2nd in the previous weekend's Imp Prod National at QLD Raceway) I finished 3rd by 0.48 seconds to Frederick's 2l Gemini. That's 0.48 seconds over 4 laps, so it was pretty close.

I made a few suspension changes since my last outing and was on a different type of tyre as well. So my first run was just a bit of a 'sighter' to get the feel for the car and the tyres. That run turned out to be as fast as I had ever gone in any of the qualifying rounds through the year! So I was very happy and looking forward to a good dice with Chris Berry's 1600 for 2nd place. I knew I had no chance of catching Wilko's Escort based on the times he posted over the course of the year. But I had beaten the Gemini before, and with the improvements made to my car, I was confident that I had his measure for the weekend.

Chris (1600) stripped the teeth of the oil pump and dissy driveshaft and failed to post a time for the weekend. He loaded the car on the trailer and went home to prepare for next weekend's Noosa Hillclimb. So I thought I'd be pretty comfortable in 2nd place, but on the 1st lap of my second run it jammed in 3rd gear coming out of Turn 3, a fast left hand sweeper which leads onto the back straight. So I held it at about 8000rpm in third all the way up the back straight. Couldn't get it out of gear for the downshift to 2nd for the hairpin at the end of the straight, so I lost more time through that corner and the following esses with the engine off the cam. Managed to finally get it out of gear on the main straight - I wasn't exactly being gentle with it by that stage! But from then on it was pretty difficult to persuade it to downshift, even when paying extra attention to rev matching and heel and toeing.

Anyway to cut a long story short, although it never jammed in gear again and it somehow managed to hold together for the whole weekend (7 runs), I never managed to go faster than that first sighting run due to the baulkiness of the downshifting in particular. Instead of simply heel/toe downshifting under brakes and focusing on your line and entry speed, your had to fight all the time just to get that gear, and sometimes you simply couldn't get it in untill much later than you needed, and you should have been back on the throttle to balance the car throught the corner. Even so, it took the Gemini 4 runs to beat that time I set on my first run, and I finished the weekend comfortably in third ahead of the rest of the cars that made it to the final in my class. It was pretty frustrating, but at least i came away with something, and I was very happy with the improvements in the handling. Hell, it was worth the trip just to see some of the other cars that were there, and for the piss-up on Saturday night...

I've arranged for a loan gearbox for the remaining 2 events this year, Noosa 16-17/11, and Mt Cotton Hillclimb Dec 1. Now all I have to do is change the bloody thing one night this week.

Jeez, I just hit 'Preveiw'. That's alot longer than I planned. Sorry but now that I've written all that it would be a waste not to post it!