2006 Targa Newfoundland Daily Log 
Introduction - 2006 Targa Newfoundland Overall Winners
What a week! After years of coming close we finally put "The Burnt Squirrel" in the number one spot. It is a tremendous feeling that we won't soon forget.
Winning is great but Targa is about so much more. The event is really about the intense competition, team work, fellow competitors, Leading Tickles, Harbour Mille, The Burin Ladies Lunch, Giannou Corner, Seiko Cove, Pavri Hump, Swain Hill, Greenspond...the list is endless. And best of all, the joy of driving your car flat out along some of the most amazing roads in the world. That is what Targa is really about.
The 2006 edition of Targa was the best yet. The stages were more challenging, the competition was fierce and the event logistics ran smoothly.
Targa is a life experience that every adventurer or motorsports enthusiast should put at top of their list of things to do. Interested? Join Us There in 2007.
Special Thanks to our 2006 Sponsors:
- The Burnt Squirrel
- The Halifax Group
- K&B Auto
- VimX Ignition
- The Docyards
- Darlington Media Works
- Gamblins and Associates
- RS Designs
 |
| Photo: Mardon Erbland |
Click here for 2006 Entry List
Click here for Detailed Stage Maps
Pre Event Testing
Our vehicle preparation has been ongoing since the end of the Targa in 2005. As usual we have made some substantial changes to the car for this year's event.
Some of this year's improvements include:
- Upgraded Engine
o New cams to improve the torque curve - New Transmission Gear Ratios
- New Coralba Rally Computer
- Revised Suspension Geometry
- Leda Shocks
- Smart Racing Sway Bars
- Doors that stay closed
Thank you to everyone who helped us prepare. It took a tremendous amount of effort again this year.
August 18-20
We just completed 3 days of testing at Le Circuit St. Jovite. It was a great
test and we worked out many of the bugs in the car. All the engine mapping
work on the dyno really paid off. The engine is crisp and pulls through the
entire torque band.
We worked on our suspension set up and now have good wet and dry set ups. This will be the first time we have gone into Targa with a decent wet set up. Hopefully it will pay off.
August 30
We spent the day at Shannonville testing the new Leda shocks. We tried many
different configurations and arrived at some great set ups for different types
of stages. I was amazed at how sensitive the car was to changes in shock settings.
We are now able to dial in the handling for different road conditions with
just a few clicks on the adjusters.
We also improved our engine mapping for getting out of the tight corners. Now we just need to improve the launches and starting.
Last minute fine tuning.
Friday September 8th - Test and Tune, Argentia
Seven teams attended Friday's test and tune. Several special stages were set up to help teams make the final preparations for the event.
Saturday, September 9th - Registration
Saturday went smoothly. The St. John's Curling Club has proven to be a much better venue for Targa than Mile One. The extra space and available parking has made preparation logistics much easier.
We are having some trouble calibrating our new Coralba rally computers. It appears to be a sensor problem. The sensors are hall effect but we are trying to trigger off magnets. Something for us to fix after the event.
72 cars are entered in the event. The field is very strong and there are probably 20 teams that could contend for the overall win.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| Photos: Brad Smith |
Two conservative runs during the qualifying stages gave us a 6th place starting position for Monday's first leg.
Qualifying Results
1. Richard/Paynter Subaru WRX STi
2. Townsend/Horsey Subaru WRX STi
3. Arnold/Ryall BMW
4. Bell/Swain Corvette Z06
5. Buchanan/Adams Canso
6. Clarke/Gamblin Porsche 911
7. Jakabouski/Carmicheal Porsche Cayman
8. Gilles/Wagner Caliber
The car is running great. After selecting the shock and sway bar settings we worked on finding optimum brake bias and tire pressures. The new shocks are allowing the car to rotate very well into the tight corners and this is giving us a good exit out of the corners. The shocks are also excellent over the bumps. The car has much better grip and stability than previous years.
In the Pleasantville stage we were quite happy to set the same time as the factory Subaru STi (500 ft-lbf torque at the wheels) driven by Patrick Richard.
 |
| Photo: Mardon Erbland |
Leg 1: Goodyear - North Avalon
The Day of Attrition!
The stage times are significantly more challenging this year and it appears that many of the teams are falling victim to the pressure. A combination of driving mistakes and mechanical difficulties are cutting into the field. Some of the front runners experiencing problems include:
-Richard/Paynter Subaru WRX STi - broken rod
-Arnold/Ryall -blown head gasket
-Jakabouski/Carmicheal -crash in Gander
-Hopkins/Hughes -blown radiator hose
Mini USA and the Toyota Echo had significant crashes that has put them out of the event. The Echo crew were taken to St. John's for observation and the Mini navigator sustained a bit of whiplash but no major injuries were sustained.
 |
| Photo: Robert Ryan |
We had a great day. The car is running very well with only some
minor technical issues.
The engine is pulling strongly. Our previous overheating problem has been
corrected and the engine map seems to be perfect.
On the first stage we hit a bump on the entry to a curving bridge at approximately 175kph. The car went airborne for about 100 feet and we landed in the opposite lane. We were lucky to get the car under control before we kissed the guard rails.
Visibility was an issue today. The bright sunshine and time of day made it very difficult to see in Gander. Many times we could only see the end of a straight by picking up the silhouettes of the spectators. (If they knew that I was using their shadows as braking points they might have stood somewhere else.) At one point in the stage I had to slow to almost a stop to find the next corner which caused us to take a 4 second penalty.
Ernie Jakabouski had a big off with the Cayman. Approaching a 90 left, the ABS kicked in over some bumps and he could not get the car stop ped before running across a lawn and into the front of a house. The navigator jumped out and invited himself to dinner while Ernie extracted the car from the front porch. Significant damage was done to the front of the Cayman and Ernie had to retire from the race. He is now headed back to Toronto to prepare the car for Daytona next month. (Note: The house survived with only minor scrapes. Score: Porch 1, Porsche 0)
 |
 |
Leg 1 Results
1. Buchanan/Adams
2. Clarke/Gamblin
3. Hopkins/Hughes
The engine is incredibly strong in the stages but continues to be difficult to start and is bogging a bit off the start line. The good news is that we are starting to get a handle on the issue. When the car comes off a stage and sits for a period of time the air temp sensor is heat soaking. The sensor is falsely indicating an air temp of 50C+. This causes the Motec ECU to lean the fuel mixture by almost 20% which is leading to the difficult starting and bogging. To combat this problem I have programmed a mixture switch on the dash that allows me to change the fuel mixture manually. I put in extra fuel for starting and launches. Once I get the engine above 6000rpm on the start I dial the mixture back and it runs off the standard fuel map. For now this fix is working fine. When we get home we will relocate the air temp sensor so that it does not heat soak. We can't change its location now as I would have to drop the engine to get the sensor out.
Bill Arnold was experiencing similar starting problems with his new race engine. The problem turned out to be a sensor/ECU incompatibility problem. It is possible that we have a similar issue and we will investigate this when we get home.
For some unexplained reason the RCMP are targeting competitors this year. We are being shadowed by at least 4 ghost cars and several cruisers. They are ticketing the slightest transgression and this is causing some interesting problems on the transits. We are driving at the speed limit and this is causing long lines of traffic as the locals who are used to traveling at 15-20 over the posted limit are getting frustrated and they are taking chances to pass us in dangerous locations.
Leg 2: Thrifty Car Rental - Exploits
Leg 2 was pretty uneventful. We had great runs in all the stages and only took 3 seconds on the Glenwood stage. Glenwood was gravel covered pavement. It was impossible to get the car into the corner with any appreciable speed so we had to treat it as a point and shoot. We took the least penalty points on this stage which allowed us to move into first place overall.
We added some rear brake bias and the car now rotates nicely into the corners. The handling, strong low end torque and the long first gear make the car extremely quick in the tight stages.
Leg 2 Results
1. Clarke/Gamblin
2. Buchanan/Adams
3. Hopkins/Hughes
4. Swain/Bell
5. Townsend/Horsey
The Subaru team changed the engine over night and made it back into the event. Today they had clutch/flywheel problems which required the engine to be removed a second time.
Bill Arnold also changed his engine overnight and expects to be back in the event on Wednesday.
Leg 3: Telegram/Transcontinental - Kittiwake
Hurricane Florence
Today was not pretty. The rains and very high winds started early and made a mess of the stages.
It was raining in Gander at the start so we put the wet set up on the car. When we reached the first stage, the rain had not yet arrived so we were forced to run the dry stage with the wet set up. The car was not optimal in these conditions and we took a 10 second penalty.
The weather continued to deteriorate over the course of the day.
Disaster Strikes
New Wes Valley caused us quite a bit of trouble. We had a pretty good run going until a gust of wind blew the car slightly sideways at a crest. I over corrected and the car slid sideways down the next hill. When I finally got it back under control the engine had stalled and it did not want to refire. We took a 34 second time penalty on the stage and this effectively knocked us out of first place overall. This was a costly mistake that could be significant later in the week.
A number of competitors got together at lunch to discuss the weather situation and the saneness of continuing with the competition in the Hurricane The combination of the wet pavement and high winds were the concern.
The Eastport and Port Blandford stages were cancelled due to the storm surge but the organizers decided to go forward with the Greenspond stage.
Greenspond is a little island separated from the mainland by a causeway. The spray from the waves was braking over the causeway on the approach to the island. The open cockpit Factory Five Cobra took a direct hit from a wave. They got a bit wet. The extremely high winds and wet conditions made this great stage very treacherous. Spectators on the stage reported that they were having trouble standing up in the wind. I questioned the organizers decision to run the Greenspond stage. I was very concerned that a gust of wind would blow a car off the road on the high speed run up the hill. I was told that I was a wuss and that this was rally not road racing. I colourfully informed the official of my concerns and we carried on. (I always speak my mind, good or bad.) I have a lot of respect for the officials. They do a great job of making this event happen. The problem I see is that the organizers have extensive gravel rally background but maybe not enough pavement experience. Gravel does not lose much grip when it is wet but pavement is a completely different environment. Pavement grip can go from good to zero with no warning. I want this event to go on and become bigger and better in the future. To risk the future of the event for the sake of one or two stages makes no sense to me. Fortunately no one had an incident and we made our times.
On the Greenspond stage I had trouble getting the car slowed. I had too much rear brake bias and the back end kept stepping out on the entrance to the low speed corners. We corrected this for Clarrenville.
 |
 |
| Photos: Garth Gullekson, Darlington Media Works | |
The engine is not terribly happy in the rain. It is great at full throttle but struggles at part throttle and on the transits. I think it is a mixture issue but I have not been able to sort it out. We boosted the idle speed to 3500rpm to ensure that the engine would not stall again.
The transit back to Clarrenville was pretty treacherous. The Trans Canada highway has recently been repaved and they have not done a good job with the surface. It is extremely slippery in the wet and it is hard to keep the car straight even at 80kph. Richard Kimber had a spin in a straight line and was lucky not to be hit by on coming traffic.
Leg 3 Results
1. Giannou/Felice 44 seconds
2. Buchanan/Adams 49 seconds
3. Bell/Swain 50 seconds
4. Clarke/Gamblin 51 seconds
5. Townsend/Horsey 57 seconds
We are only 7 seconds out of first place and with two days to go, we are pretty confident that we have a good chance of getting back into the top spot.
 |
Paul Racine and Rob Martin broke second gear in their Subaru WRX. The transmission is being replaced overnight and they should be in good shape for Thursday. |
To make the day even better, the trailer hitch broke off the truck. The hitch was rusted through at the truck frame and finally broke from the load. Roy Hopkins crew hauled the trailer from the lunch stop while Mike headed to Clarrenville to get the truck fixed. Add this to the fact that Mike backed into a lawyers car in St.John's and got a speeding ticket on day one and you can see that we are having lots of fun with our support vehicles.
 |
Roy Hopkins does a valve job on his BMW 2002 at the Clarrenville arena. |
Tomorrow we are headed to the Burin peninsula. Supposedly the area was hit very hard by the Hurricane with substantial damage.
We have also heard that the RCMP will be taking a zero tolerance approach to any vehicle marked with Targa decals. Supposedly the head of the RCMP in Newfoundland wants his officers to ticket any car traveling 1kph above the posted limit. I guess they are not filling their quota of tickets and can't afford fresh donuts. (an uncalled for cheap shot). We certainly respect the police officers and we realize that they are just doing their job as prescribed by their boss but I would think that this is bordering on harassment. I am interested to find out who this chief of police is and what bug he has up his ass! He sounds more like Boss Hog than a professional law enforcement officer. Someday he will need a favour and guess what...
Leg 4: Rogers Yahoo - Heritage
We loaded the car in the trailer this morning for the long transit to Marystown. There is no sense stressing the car any more than necessary. We can save on tire wear and fuel (race fuel is running around $3/liter) as well as minimize stress on the drive train. I don't want the sewing machine noises coming from the drive train to get any louder than necessary.
The transit is also giving me time to get this web page updated. Brad is driving his Cobalt while I type. The scenery in the Burin peninsula. is very impressive. The sun is shining and it looks like it is going to be a great day.
Thursday was a real emotional roller coaster. On the start line for the Marystown stage, Dave, the camera man came running up to the car to tell us that we had fuel dripping onto the exhaust headers. 110 Octane fuel dripping onto a 1300degree header was probably not a good thing. We were in the start control zone so we could not fix the problem without incurring a penalty. I told Evan to be ready with the fire extinguisher and we ran the stage. We would look at the problem at the finish. (The fire would be behind us anyway)
At the end of the Marystown stage I opened the engine compartment and found lots of fuel leaking out of the fuel pressure regulator. When I tried to tighten the fittings, the regulator broke off in my hands. The fitting had failed in fatigue. This is probably the first time in my life that I actually experienced shock. That lasted about 3 seconds and we got to work on fixing the problem. Bill Arnold, Gary Ball and the VDG support crew helped us come up with a fix. After several different attempts failed we managed to make a gasket out of Gary's M&M meat shop credit card and some duct tape. We dead headed the fuel pumps. Now we have 100psig fuel pressure on the injectors. I expected the engine to run extremely rich but I was able to dial back the mixture using the adjustment knob we installed on the dash. It took 11 minutes but we finally got back on the road and headed for stage 4-2. (A side benefit of increasing the fuel pressure was engine starting. The engine would start first crank every time.)
 |
The Fitting - notice the card is starting to push out of the cap. We ran the next two stages with the temporary patch in place. I was very aware of the reality of the situation. All we had between us and a huge fire ball was a couple pieces of the M&M meat shop credit card and some duct tape. If the "Red-Green" fitting failed, we could expect to lose the car, however, we wanted to win so badly that we never once thought of giving up. |
Prior to the Burin stage, Mike and Brad managed to catch up with us and give us some proper -6 caps. We ran the rest of the day with the pumps dead headed. Pumps should not be dead headed and I was very concerned about burning out the bearings. Luckily we have two fuel pumps and I was able to alternate their use to keep the temps down.
Brad was able to patch the system back together on Thursday evening so that we had a pressure regulator for Friday's stages.
 |
U-Boat Commander Craig Seiko and his First Mate Ian O'Halloran made Targa history by becoming the first team to go swimming near Frenchman's Cove. No injuries but they did report that the water is quite cold. They were able to flush out the car and drive across the finish line on Friday. |
 |
Ian and Craig were rescued by a fishing boat. |
 |
On the same stage, Jason Byrne introduced his BMW M3 to the corner of a house. (House 1, BMW 0) |
The rest of the day was flawless. The car flew through the stages and we were able to regain first place overall with a 14 second lead. Sound like a perfect day? Wrong! During our evening maintenance session, we were informed that we would be assessed a 54 second penalty for being late to stage 4-2. This dropped us to 4th place with a 40 second deficit to the Corvette. We exhausted every appeal to no effect.
A 40 second deficit on Targa is huge. It was my opinion that we were done. I can accept being beaten by a better team, a mistake or a car problem, but I have a very hard time accepting being beaten by a transit penalty. As a road racer at heart, I am used to winning or losing on the track, not in the rule book. I was so enraged by the penalty that I could barely think. Thursday was a very unhappy night, something that I wanted so badly now seemed to far away and I couldn't accept it.
Leg 4 Results
1. Swain/Bell
2. Townsend/Horsey
3. Buchanan/Adams
4. Clarke/Gamblin
5. Giannou/Felice
 |
| Photo: Garth Gullekson, Darlington Media Works |
Leg 5: Goodyear Tire - South Avalon
My anger over the penalty continued all day Friday. However, instead of turing into red mist, I was able to channel all this rage into focus. I drove better than I ever have in my life. Evan's calls and the turns all seemed to flow together.
Harbour Mille was a great stage but unfortunately it was cancelled due to a big crash by the Pavri/Burnet Acura. The launched over a crest, landed on the nose, flipped onto the roof and rolled into the ditch. Luckily they rolled to the inside, the outside would have been a drop into the ocean. No injuries and both Ken and John are keen to come back next year and try again.
On the way back out of Harbour Mille we saw Bob Esselstine running down the road with the OK sign. We never saw his car. Later we would find out that his Datsun launched off a bump, caught the wheels on the top of the guard rails and flipped into the trees at a high rate of speed. No injuries although their car was quite beat up. The strength and safety of our cars reflects well on the thoroughness of the rule book.
Our run through Osprey Trail was incredible. Knowing that we had to make up every possible second, my risk tolerance went sky high. We were taking blind crests and corners flat. The Toyo's were screaming in 5th gear corners.
Upper Island Cove is probably now my most favourite stage. It is made up of very tight and twisty alleys that didn't appear to be much wider than the car. I remember hitting the driver's mirror on a hydro poll about 1/2 way through the stage. I don't know how this happened as the mirror only sticks out about 1/4" more than that bodywork. The car must have been rolling at the time. We took a significant bite out of the leaders on this stage. Both Swain and Townsend had trouble on the stage. Mark Swain took out a fence damaging the front of the Corvette and Keith Townsend said he was doing donuts in the middle of the stage looking for the correct route.
By lunch time we had climbed to within a few seconds of the lead and we knew that we could pull it off. It was like being back in football camp.
After lunch we attacked Brigus with everything we had. The Subarus had run the stage ahead of us and every corner was gravel covered. (the 4 wheel drive cars love to cut the corners). The first right hairpin actually had a road sign right in the middle. Keith Townsend said he caught the sign as he tried to slide into the corner.
 |
The Brigus Sequence We tried to jump the bridge but came up a bit short. The run up to the bridge was not long enough and we were only doing about 100kph when we launched.
|
 |
From this sequence of pictures shot by Robert Ryan, you can see that we bounced once about 3/4 way across the bridge. I had hoped to clear the wood and land on the pavement on the other side. |
 |
The new shocks did their job. The landing was very smooth and the suspension did not bottom. (We took some pretty big air in Burin and I hope that someone got some pictures) |
 |
Look at the compression on the rear wheels as well as the sparks coming off the rear sway bar drop links. |
After Brigus we ran Marysvale and Colliers. All the front running teams cleared these stages and we were not able to make up ground.
It all came down to the final stage - Torbay. We were now in second place with one stage to go. We drove Torbay as hard as possible. I took every risk that I saw including pitching the car into a big slide at a hairpin backed with a rock cut. It paid off and we were able to reach our goal.
 |
| Photo: Garth Gullekson, Darlington Media Works |
 |
| Photo: Robert Ryan |
Final Results
1. Clarke/Gamblin
2. Buchanan/Adams
3. Townsend/Horsey
After four years of trying we finally reached our goal of winning overall.
It was an incredibly satisfying win. Climbing back from our Thursday night deficit made it all the better.
We also did well in the team awards:
Kenzie Cup: 1st place with Giannou/Felice, Saville/Saville
Churchill Cup: 1st place with Giannou/Felice, Kenzie/Bourbonniere
Event News: http://www.targanewfoundland.com/news.asp
Results Graph: http://www.rallyscoring.com/results/2006/Targa/graph1.htm
We are looking forward to another great competition in 2007. Hopefully Mr Bill's car will hold together and we can take him on in a straight fight.
We want to thank everyone who supported our efforts before during and after the event. Without your help, we never would have done it!
We also want to congratulate the other Ottawa teams who completed
at Targa.
Paul Racine / Rob Martin
Ralph Neumann / Phil Tughan
Cameron Jones / Geoff Wright
Craig Seiko / Ian O'Halloran
Thanks,
Glen/Evan
Car 604
 |
| Photo: Robert Ryan - At the finish line with Dr. George Verrilli who competed in the original Targa Florio and the Mille Miglia. |
Targa Awards Banquet
 |
 |
| Photos: Garth Gullekson, Darlington Media Works | |
