This clip shows driver Alex Moya in the #33 Datsun 510 during the Sebring Historic Fall Classic 2011 event during qualifying. This clip shows a great pass against Andre Herke’s potently fast 1968 BMW 2002. We hope you enjoy the footage as much as we did. Drop us a line and tell us what you think.
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Although we had a massive engine failure during the Saturday race, the weekend was not a total loss. Here are a few event pictures of our Datsun 510. A video will soon follow.
After Roebling Road, an event where we experienced exceptional reliability, the HSR Sebring event on October 14 -16 proved rough on our Datsun 510. Thursday’s three practice runs were uneventful. Knowing Sebring is so hard on equipment, our plan had been to inspect our brake rotors after our last practice. An existing stress cracks had opened enough to warrant installation of new rotors prior to our next run the following day. During Qualifying on Saturday, a vibration was experienced and we cut our run short to investigate. A discrepancy in the steering was discovered and corrected. Our plan was to run the 1-Hour Enduro, but we decided to run a shorter race that preceded it as a further testing session and found the vibration was still present. The culprit was traced to a problem in the drivetrain. This was rectified with no time to spare before the Enduro. Unbeknownst to us, our real problem laid just ahead. During the Enduro pace lap, our driver reported that the vibration was gone and everything was normal. Later, coming down the back straight at close to maximum rpm in top gear and just before the braking zone, two loud bangs were heard in rapid succession. Our crankshaft had broken, ending our weekend. We had planned to run one more event with this engine before the end of this year. Then, install a new engine that’s already being built and freshen up the existing one for a spare. The flaw that resulted in the catastrophic engine failure could have been detected if only it would have lasted for one more event. I guess that’s why they say “that’s racing”. Our research on the history of our Datsun prior to Moya Motorsports does not tell us much about its engine’s service history, but we do know the short block was built in 2006. The failure will put us out for the rest of this year. In consolation, the fact that the failure was unpredictable and not caused by anything we did, or failed to do, is encouraging.  Broken Crank -- Catastrophic Engine Failure
The next event for the Moya Motorsports’ Datsun 510, piloted by Alex Moya, will be the HSR Sebring Historic Races, October 14 through 16. The duration of each session is approximately 1/2-hour, except for the 1-hour Enduro on Saturday. The schedule should be as follows: Friday, October 14: 8:35 am Practice Session #1, 10:55 am Practice Session #2, 1:40 pm Practice Session #3. We have made some minor changes since Roebling Road and the car is ready. As always, we will have a full report posted soon after the event.
Ride along and enjoy our 1 hour presentation of VDCA’s Hurricane in Savannah 2011 in the cockpit of the #33. We at Moya Motorsports hope you enjoy the video as much as we do. We welcome feedback and comments. The 1-Hour Enduro: We were gridded 8th for the start and were very cautious at the beginning of the race, dropping several spots before the 3rd lap, when we picked up the pace. By the end of the third lap we were back up to 5th and caught up to the red Porsche of Ronald Monfils. The chase continued until he pitted under Caution on lap 13. Laps 10 through 17 were run under Caution due to a single car accident on Turn 4. We came into the pits for our scheduled stop on lap 15, right behind the 240Z of Henry Costanzo, the eventual winner. We left the pits, still under Caution, just before the 240Z and entered the track in 6th behind the pace car, with David Bearden in his white Porsche 911, who had already pitted, just in front of us. When the Green Flag was displayed, we followed the Porsche, passing two cars on the front straight. At this time there were no other cars in front. We held the spot for three laps, when Costanzo and another Z driven by Steve Lipsky, who may have been a lap down, passed us and David, opening the gap between David and us. We closed the gap on David and almost passed him on Turn 3. Then, under braking into Turn 1 around lap 26, we tried a move on the Porsche and ended being passed by the BMW, dropping us to 4th, as captured in the photo sequence down the front straight. By this time, the 1st place 240Z of Henry Costanzo was way ahead. A few laps later, and close to the end (it may have been the next to last lap), both the BMW and our Datsun, passed David’s Porsche, who may have pitted. Although we lost ground on the BMW, we stayed ahead of the fourth place Porsche of Ronald Monfils, whom we had battled earlier in the race and who had more legs than us, but ran very similar lap times. We were engaged in two or three battles that lasted for many laps. The display of strong, but clean competition among the participants was very exciting during the 36-lap Enduro on this 2.02-mile track. Seven cars finished on the lead lap. We had the 10th fastest lap out of 25 entries, but our consistency and reliability rewarded us with a 3rd overall! View the results on http://www.mylaps.com/results/showrun.jsp?id=2083770 It was a great event! Not only well organized, but the Vintage Drivers Club of America (VDCA) has a true vintage racing spirit, and we felt very welcome participating in our first VDCA event. We met with some old friends and made a few new ones who had some really well prepared cars. We found Roebling Road to be a very challenging and fast track, but felt fairly comfortable getting up to speed in a few laps. Conquering Turn 5 seemed to be the hardest. We witnessed a few off-road incidents, but our driver’s smoothness and discipline in learning the track resulted in not putting a single wheel off track. We received several gratifying comments from other competitors on our performance and on-track behavior. Our main event was the 1-hour Enduro on Sunday, where we finished 3rd overall in a field of 25 cars. We were extremely happy with our team’s accomplishments. Our Datsun 510 was on track five times throughout the weekend and performed flawlessly without a single malfunction. The 950-mile round trip was well worth the effort. We will definitely return. Enjoy the photo sequences below. Soon we will be posting our in-car action video of Sunday’s Enduro from the cockpit of our #33. The list for work to be accomplished on our Datsun 510 racecar during the summer had over 50 items. Although at times it seemed the summer wasn’t going to be long enough, we managed to complete all work two days before departure (the earliest we’ve ever been ready) for our next race; this will be the VDCA event at Roebling Road on September 17-18. Some changes to suspension hardware will require testing and adjustments at the track. Hopefully, this will not take too long and we can be up to speed quickly. Since the last Mitty at Road Atlanta, we had our Datsun 510 racecar at the body shop, for a couple of months, for some modifications and minor repairs. It is now back in our shop and is being readied for competing at Roebling Road, on September 17-18, with VDCA. There are no major issues, mainly general inspection, fluid checks/changes and adjustments. Suspension alignment will be verified due to the off-road excurssion we had on Turn 10 at the Mitty. We are looking forward to our first visit to Roebling Road. We want to thank Wilson Motorsports Photography (WilsonMotorsports@comcast.net) of East Ridge, TN for donating the following photos of our Datsun 510 BRE Tribute racecar in action at the 2011 Mitty at Road Atlanta.
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