Targa NZ 2010

[RENOholic]

Hi all,
Targa is happening again this year.

I had the Alpine  engine out and refreshed it because it has done 2 Targas which is an equivalent to a little over 1500 km endurance race. That is all the special stages added but it excludes the touring between stages.
I had some drama when the crank failed the crack test. Eventually all was sorted and we now have a spare as well. It is the 2nd crank that cracked. I think we have come to the limits of hp on this type of engine. It is still reliable but you can't push your luck.
The motor is in and the owner just returned from a test drive, about 40 k's, and is smiling. The car will go to a rolling road dyno on Thursday just for a good check up. We haven't done an engine dyno this year because we know the power output and nothing was changed.

The start this year will be at Manukau shopping center again and all the cars will be at the events centre on Monday morning for rego's and stickers. Then they will do the prologue and we will be away on route to Wellington where it will end Saturday night.

This year the Alpine is on the poster. Very happy about it.





Regards

RENOholic.

[cammmy]

The lushness of that car astounds me!

[K-Bar]

Thats awesome! stoked! all its missing is a FF sticker lol

[Lord Page]

It is so choice being on the poster, I needs one for the garage!

[RENOholic]

This story comes from the owner and is copied and pasted from an email. Pictures is from me.

Regards RENOholic.

Hi fellow Alpinists or should that be Bon Jour! (or Gidday!)

Good Luck to Ernst & Sonja for the Targa High Country this weekend.
ALPINE VA BIEN!

Rhys Nolan & I have just come down to earth with a thud after our Targa NZ last week in my A110 1796cc (ex 1600S) Berlinette with the Group 5 bubble flares that I got from the UK in 2004.
Auckland to Wellington over 6 days with over 700kms of special stages. People ask me if I enjoyed my Targa. A week away from the wife and the kids being able to drive as fast as I like? Well, yes.

My Alpine was the poster car this year and featured on all the official documentation, route books etc. Undoubtedly, she was the best looking car in the rally and judging by the number of people that came up to us to talk about the car and take photos, the most popular too.
I am pleased to report that the Alpine performed magnificently. This is directly as a result of Frans Cronje's great work at rebuilding the engine over the past few months and Brett Matthews from Berton Automotive being so meticulous in his preparation of the car. Frans and Myles Hicks also crewed for us on Targa doing a magnificent job at keeping us serviced and fixing the small things that did go wrong.
Targa is divided into Classic and Modern classes. Within each class are different categories. For example, Early Classics was Category 0 for classics up to 1970 and included a '68 Monaro, 64 Fiat Abarth Corsa, '61 Sunbeam Rapier and a Sunbeam Tiger. The Alpine was in the 100 category for Classics up to 1978.  Our competition came from a V8 Valiant Charger, a 131 Fiat Abarth, 124 Fiat Coupe, Torana SS 5 litre V8 and an XU1, and some Mark I and II Escorts. I managed to arrange my number to be 110 in the 100 series and thought that was extraordinarily flash! After that was the late classics in the 200 category and later classics in the 300 category and so on.  400 category is reserved for modified classics, such as Alpine owner Neil Tolich's amazing Perana Capri. From 500 onwards, the cars are in the modern category, and who cares about them!  In the Renault camp, there was a Megane R25 with a Quaife LSD entered in the Targa Tour that travels in front of the main Targa.
First came Prologue Day on our Labour Day Monday 25th October with 2 sessions on Hampton Downs Race Track. The car felt good and powerful with 132.1 bhp at the wheels on HiVelocity's dyno (186 at the flywheel) the week before. Brett Matthews was in the crowd spectating and overheard comments from the  crowd about how wonderful the car looked and sounded, so I am happy!

Day 1 took us from Auckland to New Plymouth over 7 special stages. Fog in the early morning made driving a little difficult.  The day fined up and the car felt good and I felt good too, so I gave her a bit of push.

Day 2 saw us doing 4 stages including the Taranaki jumps and the superb 40 k stage into Whangamomona where we had lunch and then did the stage in reverse after lunch to come out again.

Day 3 took us to Palmerston North.  On the second to last stage of the day we were warned of extensive gravel on the road. Unfortunately I got caught on a particularly tricky corner when I tried to drive around the outside of the gravel only to be caught by the "marbles" on the outside of the corner, making us spin. I clipped a fence in the process, damaging the flare on the right hand rear of the car. The damage was superficial but the car wouldn't restart. I found that wires had jumped of the starter, so fixed that, but it still wouldn't start. Rhys tried too but with no success, but he realised that the rev counter wasn't working, so on checking the coil, I found no wires on her either!  With that fixed, we were off again, but at a subdued pace. We are allowed one assessed time per day so only lost about 3 minutes. Frans and Myles soon had the guard reinstated with alloy pieces, pop rivets and matching blue racetape so you'd never notice.

Day 4 took us to Wellington and with very worn tyres, the fronts from last year and the rears from the year before(!), I took it easy over the last 2 stages when the rain closed in. We took 4 new tyres at overnight service incurring a 2 minute penalty for 2 tyres over our allocation of 6, but the forecast was for rain. The final day turned out lovely and fine and involved a loop out and back into Wellington. Included were 2 of my favourite stages, Moonshine and Paekakariki, which are twisty narrow suckers, just suited to the Alpine. Both were intended to be repeated but a bad smash involving a Subaru on the first pass meant the second run through Moonshine was cancelled. Overall we were 5th in our category, behind the Charger, Fiat 131, XU1 & Torana SS and 21st in Classics. Taking the 5 minutes off would have placed us 3rd out of 10 in Category and 15th out of 39 in Classics.

Times were not important until this week, when the pressure is off.  I drive to have a good time, not turn the thing on its head.

And another email from Neil that won the Classic group in his Capri Perana.

Hi Alpinistes

Its worth pondering the scale of Targa New Zealand and the achievements' of Donald and his team. The European Rallies are 'walks in the park' by comparison. Even Targa Tassie is only half the distance in special stages. I have been lucky enough to compete in some of them including the French Tour Auto and The Italian Cento Ore, driving an Alfa GTA/Alfa GTAm/Porsche 2.7RS. In these events, the A110s are stunningly quick, particularly when French rally ace Jean Ragnotti is behind the wheel . However, the special stages in Europe are between 4 and 14 kms long, and cover a total distance of around 200kms. By comparison, the New Zealand stages are between 10-50kms long with most around the 20km length. Total closed road distance is up to 900kms depending on the route. So, the feat of endurance for Don's Alpine to compete and finish is huge.

As we all know, the diminutive beauty of our A110s is awesome. And seeing them on the road is a very rare treat. So it was a buzz to have a 'daily dose' of Dons A110 on the road every day (and even Lloyds driving towards us outside of New Plymouth) from behind the wheel of my Perana Capri. The public and competitors adore the wee car.

Well done Team Alpine.

Neil Tolich

[you wont get parts for it mate]

hawt.