After confirming to mental health officials that I am legitimately certifiable by way of participating in the first ever 24HeursDeCitron at Wakefield, I decided to take the concept one step further and form my own team for the 2016 race. This is scheduled to happen on the last weekend in October.

We are looking for spectators, please. Granted, I know that Goulburn is not the most exciting place to visit. The Wakefield grandstand consists of few plastic chairs straight out of a 1960s government waiting room, and let’s face it, years out in the elements have not improved their looks, function or comfort, but we are desperate, OK? Last year we had a huge number of spectators, totalling six, of which four had been rejected for the monthly Goulburn Supermax prison visitors’ list.

OK, this is how EMC Racing was born on the 11th November 2015; it now even has its own bank account with $9.85 credit. I am in the process of buying an MX5, from which I will need to “sell” parts to get the value under the $999 mark as is required by LeMons. Let’s just say that a huge amount of cheating will have to be undertaken in order for me to pass scrutiny. But hey, I can do that.

Our race team consists of six weekend hackers. Few of us have a CAMS licence and the others have not even been out at Wakefield. Should be fun, says she, hoping for the best. The plan is for John Boston to find me a Mazda MX5 and turn this into a little race car, its main purpose to be our car for the 2016 24HoursOfLeMons and then be used as a fun race car at Wakefield or even as a little runabout for days at Eastern Creek days with Trackschool skid pan days. John Boston’s involvement in the venture is a huge turn around. His reaction to me participating the 2015 LeMons race was nothing short of hostile and derogatory. For 2016 he even volunteered to be our Team Manager, not that I am 100% sure he means it. Let’s revisit this closer to the date. I will just be grateful if I get a car out of this.

A meeting of the not-so-serious race team in preparation for the 2016 24HoursOfLeMons left us searching for a team name. I have registered the team as the Australian Fun Police on the Oz LeMons website, but apparently this is illegal; you are not allowed to impersonate or pretend that you are the real police. Fine, I can understand that. I can use the AFP acronym, but the P cannot be used for ‘Police’. Once again, no problems, even though the car will not be road registered, so cannot be confused with a real police car.

But then you enter the deep dark world of the world wide web and everything is turned on its head. I can legally purchase genuine AFP caps; yes, they are last year’s model. I didn’t realise that they change and I am sorry as a member of the public if I do not know whether the guy talking to me is wearing the up-to-date version. I can buy a genuine used police shirt; I can even purchase some old 3-4 digit police badges. Once again, I didn’t know by looking at them that these were classed as out of circulation. If I am stopped by someone dressed as a police officer, and they are wearing what seems to be correct uniform, I am not about to argue. When I posed these questions to the guy who was unlucky enough to answer the phone at the AFP offices, the answer was: “No, you cannot use the word ‘police’ on your car, but you can buy almost a full police uniform on the internet without breaking the law.” Go figure.

Not only that, we are alive and finished 16^th out of field of 39. So many participants decided that this was the 24HeuresDuMans, despite the fact that we were at Wakefield and large numbers of participants were dressed funny and most of us had cars rescued from wrecking yard.

Tuesday morning and all of us have been up since before the sparrows, scrutineering is nothing like what I expected. Memo where the information about gates opening at 9am was largely ignored and the line outside the gates attested to that fact. It very quickly became obvious that some teams had gone to incredible effort; we had a car with wine barrel on the roof, but since none of us were allowed to drink it proved to be a huge shame for all that effort going to waste. We had an old Merc masquerading as a German tank with crew dressed as Hogan’s Heroes, whenever the car slowed down it played endless loop of the Hogan’s Heroes tune, which only goes to prove that you can do anything you set your mind to when you have vision, determination and endless supply of expendable labour. The only disappointment was the lack of female participation. Just me and lady called Dee from across the ditch. Perhaps next year we could get an all-girl crew to tone down the testosterone.

The organisers had a unique way of dealing with offenders who were there to “Win”.

The range of penalties was hilarious at best. We have had the worst ever Rap performed by one of the offending teams, given that they were using their smart phones to reference their lyrics and phone coverage at Wakefield is patchy at best I don’t see them as an entry into Australia Got Talent anytime soon. There was a crew holding hands walking the pit lane and the driver allocated loud speaker to apologies to all other participants for being an idiot. Drivers sitting on the floor assembling child jigsaw puzzle, Rubik’s Cube sat forlorn awaiting the next person who decided that their name was Lewis Hamilton and there were many contenders. On the second day of Drivers Briefing a special mention was announced to the F1 candidates. On the first day when we had a safety car on the track and all the F1 wannabes started to weave in and out F1 style to keep the tyres at temperature, which got the resounding “You are at the wrong race”. However it was once the race was on the way, I was astounded by all the help everybody was willing to provide. We had a VW that spent 30 years on the farm with authentic moss growing on it, the poor car spent most of the race in the garage, but everybody was happy to help push it in to the garage or out of the garage depending on the circumstances.

Racing was huge fun; well for us it wasn’t as much as racing, more like keeping the car running. We lost a starter motor on the first day. We lost two of our drivers and that made refuelling and driver changes that much more interesting. I forgot to bring a pillow so that I could actually see out of the car. John was introduced to the local workforce at the Goulburn wreckers that has set his therapy back for years. Neither Dean nor Michael had yelled at us amateurs for being just that, amateurs. Poor Grant has turned himself into a jack of all trades, he not only fed all of us, and he also helped with driver changes, refuelling, and anything else that was needed. Boy am I in his debt!

I would love to do this event, again. However next year I’ll make sure I’ll bring a pillow. It may help if I am able to see where I am going.

After the astounding feedback I received from all of you, I shall continue to keep you abreast of our endeavours to win a race very few people know or care about.

Our $250.00 supercar has progressed from being in one piece to being in lots of pieces. Where once we had an interior, there is now enough space to hold a game of cricket, if you ignore all the loose wires and bits and pieces. However, I am told this is progress. In the meantime, Captain Queeg is in Asia driving Lambos and gold Ferraris. Only goes to prove having lots and lots of money does not mean you have any class. Who in their right mind would paint their Ferrari gold? On the positive side, our $250.00 supercar was taken for a run at 120km/h, and most of the wheels stayed on. The air con and the radio refuse to work but the roll cage is in.

Our fearless leader signed off with: “OK, the car is looking good, but what about the drivers?” Well friends, I am worried. This 24-hour race is a test of man, machine, the local toilets and our pit crew, which unfortunately at the moment is Michael. Anyway, there are months to go, so let’s see what happens. I do not share his laconic attention to timeframe because according to the rules we have until 15^th September to get the car ready and that does not give us lots of time. Unlike our captain, my preparations for the race are complete. My race suit is finished and the embroidery on the back looks just fabulous. My helmet has corresponding decals, I have a new pair of Puma race shoes and my CAMS licence is heaven only knows where, lost as only Australia Post can lose things. I may not be allowed to race, but gosh I will look just great.

Some of you may have heard about a world-famous race called the 24 Hours of Le Mans. For those of you unfamiliar with this race, the cars cost in excess of millions of dollars, and it attracts some of the best, and in case of ex-Doctor McDreamy (aka Patrick Dempsey), also best-looking drivers around. Well 24HoursOfLeMons is nothing like that. Our cars have a price limit of $999.00, including all that important stuff like roll cages, must be mass-produced, four wheel drive, and legal for Australian roads at the time of manufacture. They must also have a 5-point driver’s harness. These are hugely uncomfortable for the male species, and I hate them as well as they are so restrictive. Also because I am so short, if I do it up and forget to close the driver’s door, I have to undo the whole thing and start again. I am also sad to inform all of you that Patrick Dempsey is not participating.

All drivers must part with $900.00 as an entry fee. This goes towards the hire of Wakefield raceway, ambulances, fire engines, morticians, body bags, and paying insurance for the whole event. Whatever is left over will go to prostate cancer research.

The event will run likes this:

Tuesday 27^th October                     Scrutineering

Wednesday 28^th October              Race

Thursday 29^th October                   Finish the race, scrape the last remaining cars off the tarmac. Clean up, ensuring that bodies (human and vehicle) are not left on the track, and depart. Oh, and whoever is left will get a cheap trophy purchased on eBay for under $1.00.

This is our car. It cost the princely sum of $250.00. It is, or more accurately, it was a BMW 318i. Since it was purchased in South Australia I have not seen it, so cannot confirm that it has an engine.

Our team consists of:

John Connolly, Phillip King, Tom Connolly, Michael McMichael, Dean How and Grant Crofts.

“We, the unwilling, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have done so much, for so long, with so little, we are now qualified to do anything with nothing.”

So, This is How it Will End?

According to some obscure statistic someone sent me while ago, most people die within a 20 km radius of where they were born. In my case, this is highly unlikely. According to Mr Boz, I am going to die a few kilometres from Goulburn at Wakefield Raceway, during 24HoursOfLeMons. I was expecting a reaction from John, just not that one. Sam, the marshal at Wakefield, was far more inclined to see the funny side of things. Bozman gave me a lecture of epic proportions taking me back to my teenage years.

• What roll cage are we using?
• Where is my neck support, will it be compatible with the seat?
• What seats will be in the car?
• How many points seat belt?

The blank look on my face and my ignorance of all of the above sent Boz into an eye-rolling state of disbelief which did not abate for the rest of the day. My reasoning that our $250.00, 3 series BMW might not make it past the first two circuits of the racetrack did not lighten up the situation at all.

I was kind of dreading the next question, so when it came, I decided to throw all caution to the winds and answer truthfully. Perhaps not one of my better ideas. The fact that I am one of the drivers for John Connolly, he of Weekend Australian Prestige Motoring fame did nothing to ease the situation, given that one of our other drivers is one Michael McMichael, known for putting a hole in the petrol tank and trying to see how much fuel is running out by using a lighter. So perhaps Bozman is not totally wrong here.

It’s always funny until someone gets hurt.

The IT industry is splintered. Many global companies have IT split pretty much 50/50 females to males. In some of the government agencies this ratio is skewed more towards males, especially in the infrastructure space. Hence, I am finding myself more and more being the token female in many meetings. Having an interest in cars opens conversations, and I am finding that it breaks the ice very quickly. It was a pleasant surprise when one of the vendors at my current contract, a weekend warrior with a red Nissan R33 GTS, volunteered to join me at Wakefield.

Let’s just say it was eventful day. Much to my embarrassment, David arrived at Wakefield a full hour ahead of me, even when I had had less than 100 km to travel, thanks to my overnight accommodation at Sutton Forrest. The first session included a young guy in an old Mini hitting the ripple strip. The momentum flipped him on the side and he ended up on the roof. I finally understood the term “in slow motion”. There was nothing I could do to stop it. Luckily, Boz was out of the car before I realised what was happening and pulled the driver out of the car. So I got very familiar with the Fish Hook Turn.

A few sessions later, a driver in a car whose logo is the Trident sheared off all his wheel nuts from one of his rear wheels. This had me and about half a dozen other people walking the track looking for them. The strait before the final turn looks much wider when you are walking it. Who would have thought?

On Monday morning I parked my car as usual. A few seconds later, a black A8 Audi pulled alongside. A middle-aged business man and his teenage son got out. The man made an admiring comment about my car. That in itself was lovely, but the next sentence stopped me.

“You are very lucky to drive a car like that.” I believe there is an old Amish saying, attributed to Thomas Jefferson, “the harder I work the luckier I am.”

Am I lucky? I suppose I am. My parents immigrated to Australia, allowing me education free of political meddling. My work experience was never marred by my father’s anti-communist rants. I grew up knowing that my chosen career was only restricted by my ability, not my gender. On the flip side, luck has little do with my choice of car. It is more to do with taking on the cost and being able to afford it. We all make choices in life. This is mine, and I do not regret it for a moment.

On the lighter side, a friend sent me a feel-good message not so long ago: girls that like cars and racing are not weird. They are a rare gift from God.