Racer rebuild: Alfasud Sprint Veloce
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
Last month Geoff Gordon explained why he wanted to race an Alfasud Sprint Veloce. Will that be possible before the year is out?
How has progress been since last he spoke to Motor Sport? Geoff Gordon chuckles. “Gentle is probably the word,” he says, “but that’s always the way when you try to build a racing car during the summer months – stuff gets in the way…”
To recap, Alfa enthusiast Geoff sourced a well-used ’Sud Sprint Veloce to race in Peter Auto’s Heritage Touring Cup and commissioned Raceworks Motorsport of Royston to prepare it for purpose. “It has been a very busy time of late,” he says, “with Raceworks committed to running cars in the Spa 6 Hours and the Goodwood Revival [where, as you can read elsewhere, Motor Sport’s resident racer Dickie Meaden took Geoff’s Giulietta to a heat win and shared second overall with Steve Soper in the St Mary’s Trophy]. But we are now at the stage where this is pretty much an assembly job.
“Dave Ashford at Brunswick Racing did the engine and has been working with Nigel Rees of GSD RaceDyn. Nigel wants to make the car as stiff as possible and the two of them work together to see how that can best be achieved without compromise.
“DC Electronics is making the wiring loom and the fuel system is already fitted – Advanced Fuel Systems has plumbed it for both fuel injection and carbs. As I said last time, we will eventually use a period-correct Kugelfischer mechanical injection, but that’s quite complex and first we just want to get the ’Sud up and running.
“Getting an oil tank made was quite interesting. Pro Alloy Motorsport undertook the job, but had only a very poor black-and-white image to work from. They’ve interpreted how they think it should be and we’ve been told it looks OK, so gradually it’s all coming together.
“Raceworks takes a great deal of pride in making sure everything is done correctly and that tends to be my attitude – probably something to do with my engineering background! If something is worth doing, it’s worth doing properly.
“The target is to race the car in the final HTC event of the season at Paul Ricard [October 20-22], where I’ll share the car with Dickie, but I guess that’s going to be tight. Hopefully there will be an opportunity to do a couple of test sessions beforehand, but if we aren’t ready for Ricard we’ll have the consolation of plenty of time to test and prepare ahead of 2018. Next year the plan is to tackle the full HTC season and also as many UK events as we can. If the car is eligible for any races at the Donington Historic Festival or Silverstone Classic, we’ll be there.
“I have a bit of learning to do, because I have never previously raced a front-drive car – and Dickie tells me he’s a little rusty. I’ll perhaps book in for a bit of tuition at a track day beforehand.
“It’s a lovely feeling watching a new project like this come together. I think there’s as much pride to be had from the build and preparation as there will be from the actual racing.”
Next month: Will the car hit the track in time for Paul Ricard? News from the car’s first test… hopefully
Thanks to: Geoff Gordon, Raceworks Motorsport www.raceworksmotorsport.com