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I went to Gene's house because my race tires are in his
garage. Both sets of them were in his garage. There's a long
strange story behind that, but it will keep for the time
being. I went there to borrow his truck and take my
unmounted, new set of tires to be put on the wheels in place
of the old set. We have an event coming up in Pahrump, and I
want the new rubber on, now that we're not running in that
parking lot at the Casino any more. When I explained my
mission to Gene, he said "Sure. Keys are in it." And that's
typical.
The only problem is, Gene is a hard-core member of the
"Rotary Club." He just loves those Mazda beer keg motors
that don't have pistons. He's always telling me how much
power they make, and how high they rev, and how reliable
they are. He usually tells me these things while he's
helping me work on my British car. On extremely rare
occasions, when he has a very bad day, I have outrun him. I
try to rub those in good, because I know what's going to
happen the next time. And the next. And the next.
But it wasn't always that way. Early in his career, he
lived (and raced!) in Oklahoma. Gene's first race car was a
Bugeye Sprite that he bought in several pieces and
re-assembled. Prior to that, he had been a pit crew member
for a variety of wonderful British Steel (and
Al-You-MIN-Ee-Yum) such as a Lotus 11, a Lotus 51 (the first
Formula Ford), and a Lola Formula A, the cars that later
evolved into Formula 5000. Yes, George, I am going to
mention JK [Jackson] in this article. Gene went to
college at Florida State. At his first SCCA meeting in
Tallahassee, he spoke up and said he was interested in
'crewing' for a racer. Fellow named Jackson answered him.
The rest is history, as they say. Gene was JK's pit crew in
the XK-120 days. They used to load up the Team Transporter,
"Hawg Truck" and go to the races. "Hawg Truck" is a story in
itself. It's a 53 Chevy Stakeside. JK still has it. But I
digress…
After Tallahassee, Gene moved on Montana. He autocrossed
in a Datsun 1600, and was second at the Nationals in 1973 in
it. Later he lived in Wichita, and ran a Honda. You see,
somewhere out in the open plains, some seed of
evil/modernism took hold in Gene's mind. He plunged into
"The Dark Side." In other words, he quit racing British
cars, and started running "something else." Hmm, think I
might be biased? Later still, after a stint overseas, Gene
came back to the States and discovered the RX Cars. He won
road races and autocross events in RX-2s and RX-3s, and then
just fell in love with the RX-7. Been racing 'em ever since.
Knows all the tricks to make 'em go fast. Knows how to fix
'em, knows how to drive 'em. Just loves those things.
Then last year, I showed up. Of course JK had told me to
look for Gene at the first meeting. As it turned out, we met
before that, because he had to help me tow a dead XJ-6 to my
house. (I got it running that weekend, but that's another
story, too!) We hit it off immediately, but he was ALWAYS on
my case about the British car thing. Maybe it was because of
the way we met?
Then, the Miracle occurred. I was at a friend's house,
putting a new battery in a motorcycle and I called Gene with
some question about motorcycle batteries. He answered me and
then said, "Guess what I just bought at a yard sale?" I
couldn't begin to, so he told me. "A Lotus Europa." I nearly
wet my nappie. A Lotus? AT A YARD SALE? Yep. It was true.
Gene saw it in the garage, asked if it was for sale and
before you could say "Free Enterprise," closed the deal. A
drop-dead gorgeous blue Lotus, 1969, I believe it is. Runs,
everything on it works, mostly original. Very nice car. I
congratulated him and hung up. About 10 minutes later I
called him back. "Gene, you know this makes you a British
Car owner again, don't you?"
He sighed, "I knew you'd realize that sooner or
later."
We went together and picked it up the next day We've
since worked on it together, I made it not-run, and Gene
made it run. Flushed out the radiator, replaced some fuel
lines, moved the electric fuel pump to a better location.
Then Gene moved it again to a location where it would
actually work. I had a ball with it. I think he did too.
I was telling JK about all this the other day. He
suggested that perhaps that was the reason I had been "sent"
to Las Vegas by whatever cosmic forces run our lives, that I
was on a mission to pull Gene back from the Dark Side. Maybe
he's right. Maybe that's why I came here. I feel good about
it all. I think I've saved Gene from the peril. I can feel
it, he's a British Car Guy again. There's just a certain
light in his eyes while he's looking at the Lotus. Huh? What
was that Gene? An RX-7 Turbo motor would fit just fine
WHERE????
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