“Oh lord, I’ve had enough of these people out here.” I think to myself as I’m lining up for my 3rd race of the hot, sunny day. I grab the stick and hold the clutch on the fully built 2019 Toyota GR. I slowly start the launch, “2,000 RPMS … .5,000 RPMS” as the red needle slowly goes up the gauge. The car is screaming at this point like a little kid who dropped their ice cream. Flames shooting out the back of the blue and purple titanium exhaust. The light goes green. Off the clutch, gas in, and go. Climbing the RPMS, “come on,” I say as I slam the clutch in and throw the shifter into 2nd, “Boom, keep going, keep going.” Back to 3,000 RPMS and climbing. My back is pinned to the carbon bucket seats. I can see the end, 7,000 RPMS dash lit. I slam the clutch for one more shift, grab the shifter, and pull down to 3rd. My back sinks even more.
“8.2 seconds in the GR,” As the announcers go over the intercoms of Fernald Dragway. I throw the car in neutral and hit the brake as I come to the end of the raceway. “How am I supposed to get under 8 seconds? We have been building this car for months,” I say to myself as I pull over to the ticket booth. “Sweet run, man, here’s your time,” the guy says, handing me a white piece of paper. “¼ mile 8.2 seconds,” I stare down as I know my friends and I have been working for months to build a car that can go a quarter mile in under 8 seconds. It feels like a never-ending trial and error.
I met Ethan around 9 years ago, and we have both bonded over cars ever since. Dylan, his cousin, is a few years older than us but shares the same love for cars. We found this Toyota GR at an auction sale, we bought it, and have been building it to be a dream ride ever since. We swapped the motor, drivetrain, and plenty more. Ever since we were kids, we had wanted to build that dream race car; we were so close to that dream.
I slowly drive through the area back to our tent setup. I pull the car to the lift and get to work. “What do you think we do?” Ethan says to me, ready to do whatever it takes to get a good run. “You guys do the maintenance, and I’ll work on this tuning,” I replied as I took my laptop out of my bag and plugged it into the car port. He looked at me with a smile and nodded. We spent as much time as we could perfecting the tune, running test runs, and more, all well waiting to get one last race. We top the liquids off and close the hood, “think we are ready,” I say to Ethan. We check the tires and give them one more run down, and we are ready. I turn the car on and pull it up to the line of cars waiting to get a race. Sitting there, thoughts running over my mind, can we do it? Will we ever get it under 8? Is this even worth it? I stared down at the fully custom steering wheel I got for my birthday from Ethan. I knew deep down we were doing it.
I get to the line, I line up staring at the light, yellow means ready, it goes down for 3 yellows to green, 3,2,1 go. I put the clutch in, grab the stick, and slowly put it in on the gas, 3,000 RPMS, 2nd yellow, 5,000 RPMS, 3rd yellow, 7,000 RPMS. “Green baby”. I lift the clutch, put it in gear, and go, tires squealing, back getting pinned deep into the seats, the smell of rubber burning on the hot track. The car is already at 7,000 RPMS, “what the” I yell as I slam the clutch in quickly to shift at redline, 5,000 rpms, the tune is working, I’m already half way down the strip, One more shift, I’m moving so quick at this point things start to blur, including the timers, I slam the clutch in and pull down on the shifter. 3rd gear, it pulled from here, over the line I went, I didn’t hear the time over the speakers because everything was moving so fast. My heart was racing as I drive quickly over to the ticket booth, I stop and jump out to grab my ticket, “wow dude what the hurry, here ya go” the guys says to me, “¼ mile 7.5 seconds” my worry and fear goes away, I smile huge and jump into the car and drive to the tent, I give the ticket to Ethan, “WE DID IT!” he yells as he reads over the times, “there is no way we did it” he says in disbelief after almost a year of working on this. “I’ve had enough of these people out there. Let’s go home,” Dylan says from under the hood. I laugh, “Yes, I agree, let’s go”.