How good are Celicas??, Report from www.bathurst24hr.com Options

[Crelica]

I know this is about the 7th Gen celica but they would'nt be so reliable if it wasn't for their babies. It was about a 24hr race in Austrailia.

Crelica...



Unstoppable Celicas First And Second In Class At Bathurst

25/11/2003:
Two near-standard Toyota Celicas have finished first and second in their class in the grueling Bathurst 24 Hour race last weekend.

The 1.8-litre Celicas beat cars with engines as much as three times larger, due to superior handling, braking and reliability.

The winning Celica took out Class E by more than nine laps.

Both road-registered Celicas were driven to Bathurst and then back to Sydney after the race on Monday, none the worse for wear.

In 24 hours of racing at maximum revs, the Celicas’ twin-cam engines used only 250ml (a quarter of a litre) of oil each.

The Celicas used the same brake pads throughout the race and needed just two replacement front tyres each to complete the round the clock marathon.

Car owner Colin Osborne, who shared the winning Celica SX with John Roecken and Trevor Keene, said the cars required little more than refueling during the race while their rivals replaced components regularly.
The class-winning Celica completed a total of 2708.87km – the distance between Melbourne and the Cape York Peninsula – in the course of a single day.

It completed 436 laps of the daunting Mount Panorama circuit at an average speed of 112.62km/h.
Apart from mandatory safety equipment, the Celicas only differ from those on the showroom floor in having minor suspension and exhaust modifications. They also use racing brake pads.

“The cars are close to standard and we basically didn’t touch them during the race,” said Mr Osborne, who won last year’s Australian Production Car Championship outright driving the same Toyota Celica SX.

“The Celica was one of the smallest capacity cars in the race so we lost a bit of ground to the big V8s going up the hill, but we were blowing the other cars away in the twisty stuff across the top of the mountain.

“It’s just amazing to use only a quarter of a litre of oil in such a demanding race and we finished without a scratch, so the car is basically ready to do another 24 hours.”

Osborne Motorsport is an amateur team, using only volunteer helpers to prepare the Celicas and tend them at race meetings.

[SpedToe169]

Thats sweet!

Most people don't understand how hard a race that long is. Its insanely hard on the cars, the drivers and the crew. Even if the car prep is perfect you can still have a lot of bad luck in a race that long. Just finishing is a HUGE accomplishment. I just got back from the 25 hours of Thunderhill, the longest roadrace in north america. It was insane. We were running our spec miata which is a mostly stock miata with suspension and a cage. We finished, but not without problems. We had one driver that was particularly hard on parts and broke a differential and a radiator as the result of several off-course excursions. Despite our troubles we ended up 33 out of 75 overall and 12th in class. We were happy with that, but mostly, we were just glad to get to sleep!!