Back to the drawing, er, writing board

Whoooo, wheee, has it been a long time since a meaningful blog post was written. And as I can’t stand reading blog posts about how or why a blog is inactive, I’ll just jump right in with current events. We will get to the past, race wrap-ups, things like that … eventually. But for now, lest the trend in non-blogging continues, we must simply write what must be written.

The biggest news for the Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys for the upcoming “Goin’ for Broken” Thunderhill race is the change in team dynamics. You may have heard (from other sources, as we’ve been neglectful) that many of our team members also serve duty on the Autosport Labrats team that was originally put together for a ChumpCar race at Portland Raceway. Captain Brent is continuing the Labrat build with a new car which should be ready to debut at Goin’ for Broken. (follow their details at http://www.autosportlabs.org/blog/) Several team members may do double duty driving and wrenching for both teams. If all goes well, it should be easy to do, but come on, this is LeMons, the whole concept of which is how well you can deal with random monkey wrenches. We knew we had to assemble a core backbone for each team in case both cars are in the pit at the same time. So, team captain Sean is putting together a new batting order.

Bret, the perennial family man, will not be able to join us in May; the joys of having a college-age daughter returning home from far across the mountains outweigh the opportunity to swill wine with his friends. C’est la vie. (Kidding, Bret, I’m sure most folks would rather spend a weekend with Kate than with just about anyone else, and who can blame them?) Alan will be back, and we look forward to the return of Monkey Rick from California, who filled in at our last visit to Thunderhill. The newest Monkey on the team is our buddy Drew, a fellow autocrosser who discovered the joy of road racing on that first LabRat ChumpCar team last Halloween. Welcome to the team! Drew got to spend some time getting to know Pujo! this past weekend at the penultimate wrenching party. We’ll write about what’s going on with the car soon.

Another interesting development is the absence (from the strictly Monkey perspective) of supporting women for this race. Neither Drew’s wife, Kim, nor I will be able to attend this race. Much to the disappointment of fans everywhere, this does NOT necessarily mean that Alan and Drew will be dressing up as burlesque dancers or French maids for this race. Sorry. I’m sure the gang will be able to juggle all the myriad things the women usually do at the event, like … like … well, I’m sure there’s something we do besides hold down valuable folding chairs.