The track this fine racing tale takes place on is Mosport International Raceway located near Toronto, which boasts the highest average speed of any North American circuit. Some call it a mini Nürburgring because of its ridiculous speed and off-camber, blind and dropping corners. It challenges even the best of drivers to get the very last tenth out of the car - to go fast at Mosport, you have to do things that, well, just aren't smart. But when done right, you're rewarded with blistering lap times.
The race car me and my co-driver would be piloting is my very own SG-Motorsport '03 350Z. I race it part time in a pro racing series called Koni Challenge (now named the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge), as well as in local endurance and GT races. The car was built in 2003 by Unitech Racing and run with quite the healthy budget; in fact, one of the biggest names in road racing, Boris Said, raced the car on numerous occasions. We've since upgraded the car, but you'd be surprised by how stock it still is. In Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge, a lot of components have to remain stock, and therefore the engine is actually a bone-stock VQ35DE with nothing but Nismo street cams, our own headers, a 3.5-inch exhaust system and a few external bolt-on bits.
My co-driver for the race would be Mr. Yuke Taniguchi, who came all the way from Japan where he has raced professionally in Japanese Le Mans, World Touring Car and has even won championships in Japan's Super Taikyu series racing with Tarzan Yamada. But by day Mr. Taniguchi runs Yuke's, a video game company that has created titles like WWE SmackDown, and more relevant to guys like us, D1 Grand Pix! Needless to say, I was very excited to have him driving with our team and was interested to see how he fared at Mosport for his first time. Not to mention, Yuke had never raced a LHD car with an H-pattern gearbox before, so the stage was set for an exciting (yet possibly terrifying) race.
For an in-depth look at one of SG's all-motor VQ tuning tricks, check out the Proving Grou
I had made some changes to the 350Z prior to the race and was anxious to see how they would perform. I revalved the dampers with more rebound and installed stiffer springs (to cope with the downforce our new splitter and wing were creating), as well as solid spherical suspension bushings in all of the front suspension joints. The morning practice session on Friday was cool and crisp, a perfect testing ground for the new parts. As I strapped into the car, there was no stopping the butterflies in my stomach. Rolling out all you hear is the exhaust resonating off the steel guard rails as you slowly get the engine up to speed. I tell myself I'll take one full slow and easy warm-up lap, but that never lasts.
By corner 4 I'm already testing the limits of the cold tires, sliding down the hill at more than 120 mph and going hard on the brakes (hoping they've warmed enough to slow me for corner 5, which is essentially a hairpin at the top of a crest). Up through second, third, fourth and at the top of fifth gear I crest the hill and see how late I can wait before I have to jab the brakes, catch fourth and watch all three shift indicators light up like a Christmas tree as I coast into corner 8 at more than 100 mph. I have to be patient and focus on getting a good run onto the front straight, but all I want to do is slam the throttle down and hear the VQ scream. When you get it just right and go over the curbing and up onto the thin patch of asphalt at the exit of corner 10, you get a ton of exit speed for the short front straight. Then the real fun starts as I fly down the straight getting ready to attack corners 1 and 2 (my favorite) at maximum aggression.