The Road to La Carrera Panamericana.

La Carrera Panamericana is a historic race that started some time in the 1950s (you are at a computer, you look up the history of it) that started somewhere down in the south of Mexico and runs up to somewhere in the North (you came to me looking for specifics? I don’t have them.) Originally it was run unlimited all the way meaning that every mile they traveled was as fast as you could. There were breaks in the in the 2000 mile trip for servicing, but only for a couple of hours and they were off again. As all these huge races faded in the late 50s and 60s, so did the Carrera Panamericana.

Until sometime in the Eighties where it came back as a classic run using car from the era, also covering the 2000 miles from the south to the north. The race is now a little different from the original. The cars run unlimited sections for 5 to 10 miles at a time then driven to the start of the next unlimited section at highway speeds. There are 2000 miles to covering 7 days of racing. How cool is that?

2006 is the first year that they are allowing unlimited entry cars, i.e. cars that were made some time after 1960. Rachel has decided to enter her car and has gone through all the race car preparations. She has been gracious enough to allow me to share the driving, co-driving and support for her team. There are three of us in our Team Rachel, Cade and myself, and at the moment we are one night into our trip to the start of the race. We haven’t even started the race proper and already it’s an experience. We are currently in San Miguel de Allende, a very cool old town in the heart of Mexico, where a huge charity dinner has been organized around the arrival of La Carrera Panamericana. The tomorrow the cars are exhibited in the center of town before we hit the road again to get the car to the start, Veracruz.

Getting into San Miguel was a total nightmare. The drive down into Mexico was done in convoy with some directions put together that bore little or no resemblance to the Mexico we found on the ground. The biggest problem was a failure of an escort meeting us outside of the town. The result of which was that we drove the truck and trailer through the center of town. The streets started narrow, got narrower, steeper and cobbled. The trucks brakes started to cook. It was about that time that we found a bus going in the opposite direction….

The car exhibit in the middle of town made us feel like the heroes we know we really are. Kids asked for our signature, crowds swarmed all over the car. I love this trip. We’ve already started to get to know a bunch of the other drivers. There’s a couple driving an old Volvo on their honeymoon. They are one of the more brave teams on this run as they are driving their competition car all the way down rather than trailering it with the goal of testing their marriage to breaking point before it even gets started. Also Coop is here as a co-driver. Dave, feel free to fly in here and join us.

(Picture courtesy of Coop)