Author Topic: Rallye des Princesses (Read 14380 times)

JamesL · « **on:** May 31, 2015, 16:40:44 »

This morning, I waved au revoir to my beloved (and the wife :wink: ) in Paris as she spends 5 days doing a navigation and regularity rally to St Tropez in "her" Pagoda. Female only crews. The Porsche 964 is about the youngest car there -although one of the "followers" is in a Carrera GT - with a wonderful range of cars: 2cv, Renault 4cv, Healeys, 356s, Dinos, 300SL roadster, 190SL and 4 Pagodas, various Morgans, AC Cobra (and a Bristol powered AC Ace), '67 Corvette, Beetles...

Not the youngest crowd participating (unsurprising given the quality of the cars and the price of entry!) but a bit glamourous nevertheless. Mostly French - understandably - but a crew from Uruguay, folk over from new Zealand, two Finnish crews and two lots of Americans (one of whom shipped their 308 over for the summer). Likely not as serious as the sort of thing Peter does: I just got sent a selfie from the finish line of the stage today and there are two heads and two glasses of champagne while still in the car

I go to St Tropez on Thursday to bring the Pagoda home over the weekend :bounce:

Raymond · « **Reply #1 on:** May 31, 2015, 21:56:57 »

Looks like loads of fun. Where is a photo of your wife and car?

hauser · « **Reply #2 on:** May 31, 2015, 22:12:36 »

I'll guess and say it's the third picture?

JamesL · « **Reply #3 on:** June 01, 2015, 05:51:56 »

Hauser, yes, she is in pic3

JamesL · « **Reply #4 on:** June 01, 2015, 10:02:11 »

350km today with some laps at Magny Cours

Peter van Es · « **Reply #5 on:** June 01, 2015, 10:30:46 »

Lovely... maybe next year James, you and I should dress up in drag and infiltrate...

JamesL · « **Reply #6 on:** June 01, 2015, 10:56:10 »

Obviously, we'd take our wives along...

Flyair · « **Reply #7 on:** June 02, 2015, 16:13:23 »

James
just be more precise: each of us will take his own wife

Peter van Es · « **Reply #8 on:** June 03, 2015, 12:00:41 »

You've both got it wrong... Rallye des Princesses is for ladies only. I meant it when I said: James and I should dress in drag and sign up also...

ja17 · « **Reply #9 on:** June 03, 2015, 13:47:03 »

Very Nice James, it's unusual to find the ladies so involved in motor sports.

JamesL · « **Reply #10 on:** June 03, 2015, 14:19:44 »

She's running 65th out of (now) 82 as of last night - which is not bad for a complete novice (they'd not even seen the tripmeter before they started!)
Sunday was bad but so were many people, but Monday pm they got lost and lost a lot of time/points on the last of the 4 regularities of the day. However, they are banging out ~350km a day so it's not exactly a breeze.

her best regularity section was the 4 laps of Magny Cours
" Sighter" was 2.44 followed by:
2.43
2.42
2.42

2cv and 2 Ferraris broke yesterday and someone had a crash too. I will be at the finish tomorrow!

I am constantly distracted by the results - posted here...
http://jbtimeconcept.be/rp2015/index.php?page=displayRT

JamesL · « **Reply #11 on:** June 03, 2015, 19:31:00 »

Up to 57th
Someone had a bad afternoon - they were first last night and 65th now. U shall be posting more pictures when I get home Sunday.
St Tropez, Gap, Epernay, London (what's not to like)

And I was wrong - the 2CV is still in but 2 Ferrari 308s have given up the ghost

Peter van Es · « **Reply #12 on:** June 04, 2015, 08:45:54 »

Not surprising that the 2CV is in and the Ferrari's are out... The question is though: Is Tamara having fun? How is the Pagoda keeping up?

And I know, regularities are NOT easy... After training my driver for a long time, we can now do regularities within +/- a couple of seconds, and occasionally score 0! The trick is to get the driver to drive on RPM instead of speed, and for him to count the number of seconds (in his head) that his RPM is lower than target, and to then exceed the RPM's for the same time after the slow down (the turn, or the hairpin, whatever). That way you keep your average speed about the same, and the corrections he needs to make are small.

Key is: get the right route first. If you drive the wrong way, your time becomes the least of your problems.

Peter

JamesL · « **Reply #13 on:** June 05, 2015, 14:56:52 »

NOW you tell me

to be fair, she also forgot about the the gearing (and manually shifting the auto) in hairpins and hills! Clearly the relationship between navigator and pilot is key. More than one crew were barely on speaking terms at the end and I am fairly confident that I couldn't navigate for her or vice versa. She wants to go again next year though. The 2cv limped in last so the only abandons were prancing ponies: both 308s, one with a dead water pump and the other is rumoured to have crashed but I've not had a chance to check on that.

Tamara came a very happy 55th. And improved throughout the week (70th at the end of days one and two). And the car has done just fine.
Not going to commit too much on that as I am currently in Gap, with another chunk of the Route Napoleon to do in the morning and then the autoroute to Epernay

kampala · « **Reply #14 on:** June 05, 2015, 17:08:00 »

Quote from: JamesL on June 05, 2015, 14:56:52

with another chunk of the Route Napoleon to do in the morning and then the autoroute to Epernay

Epernay --- there are 5 reasons to go to Epernay --- and they have nothing to do with the Autoroute --- You better have an empty boot and parcel shelf! I have a feeling James will be filling up the Pagoda with more then fuel in Epernay.

1. Moet & Chandon
2. Piper Heidsieck
3. Taittinger
4. Veuve Clicquot
5. Mumm

And many others ---

Enjoy.

JamesL · « **Reply #15 on:** June 05, 2015, 18:13:40 »

well, there's a thought

JamesL · « **Reply #16 on:** June 07, 2015, 11:33:44 »

OK, made it home! Yay!
3100 miles driving 9 days out of 10.
London- Paris (me)
Rest
Paris - Beauval (her)
Beauval - Vichy
Vichy - Aix-les-Bains
Aix - Avignon
Avignon - St Tropez
St Trpez - Gap (me)
Gap - Epernay
Epernay - London
All kinds of roads and surfaces and generally problem free...
I really need a new crankshaft oil seal as it's costing me a fortune in engine oil... and the throttle linkage needs a little tlc, as does the front exahust box mounts but trucked along very nicely. Tamara loved many of the cars she was doing the rally with but cannot imagine a better car than the Pagoda for the job.

Stopping St Tropez...

JamesL · « **Reply #17 on:** June 07, 2015, 11:41:12 »

As for the journey home.. the autoroute was dull after a blat up the Route napoleon at dawn...(pic below - no I didn't stop to take it!). I did the same 5.30 start this morning to get home before it got too hot (and my sunglasses broke). Top down all the way apart from the first stage of the rally (rain) and a couple of thunderstorms in the alps on Friday...

But the autoroute was worth it as I pootled around the champagne region... I sense a weekend away coming up. Fabulous area and some decent plonk... And I may have come home with 6 bottles...

I have a magnetic "GB" sticker on the back of the car. Here's what 3100 miles does to a shiny Pagoda..
Before

and after

View My Video

JamesL · « **Reply #18 on:** September 10, 2015, 10:31:11 »

A little update...

I mentioned that the car was a bit leaky in the oil department so I took it into Colin (Stick)
Crankshaft oil seal was gone so that was a pain.
You may recall his video of the crank with the longitudinal movement... that was mine. I had shells the wrong way round and in the wrong order...and the crank movement wasn't helping the seal be, well, a seal.

The engine was rebuilt by another "specialist" a couple of years back (top end went before our Spa event) and it clearly wasn't done well. Indeed, we had scored bores from cleaning media being left in the block prior to reassembly (which also explained the fact that before the rally, we replaced the oil pump as it wasn't pumping; blocked)

So the car ran faultlessly (oil leaking aside) more through luck than judgement and could well have ended up in all manner of nasty outcomes. As it was, Coiln sleeved the bores, rebuilt it and other than the fact I am back to no more than 3000rpm, for a while it's running really well and I am no longer keeping Shell in business...

Oh, and it looks like she will sign up to do the Rally next year. Which means next summer, it's London - St Tropez and back and then to Merano and back.

A very expensive lesson in choice of "specialist" and hopefully one that won't ever be repeated!!!

News:

Author Topic: Rallye des Princesses (Read 14380 times)

hauser