El Taxi Perdido's Blog

Our departure for the 2011 La Carrera Panamericana is only a few weeks away. We’re all very excited and a little nervous. The poor Taxi had it’s roof cut off to facilitate a brand new cage (Thank you Jim Groom!) so now she’s got some more scars. Hopefully Conrad knows how to weld her lid back on and we’ll be ready to race 10/22 in Huatulco Mexico.

Stay tuned for updates and adventure!

I’ve just spent the last hour reading other people’s La Carrera blogs and looking at pix. A bit of La Carrera withdrawals I guess.
It really was an amazing adventure. One we’re sure to again, but for now I just want to “thank you” to so many people so here goes:
To Gerie, Bill and Nancy for support, advice and transport. To Norman Racing, Alfa Parts, Glenn Oliveria and Eric Kendall for advice and prep help. To Kathleen Cannon for plugging us in Cams. To Tasha and Xiomara for help in keeping me removed but connected to Swirl while gone. To John Ryersen and James Philips for great designs and t-shirts. To my family, Ed, Jenn and the boys for watching Lucy and supporting the Giants! To my favorite aunt and uncle in the entire world, Irma and Siegfried Kohler for driving from Salama Guatemala to Tuxla Mexico to help us get ready and see us off at the starting line. To all our old and new friends in Mexico for la carrera – the Bobs (Jett and Paltrow), Taz and Rudy, Linda and Stuart, Heliere and El Buick, Mike Emery, Alex, Christopher and Carlos, Tommy and all the Mats guys always willing to help us out. To the Vikings in the Volvo, the cute couple David and hot girlfriend in the Porsche, Angelica and Doug in the Olds, Wolfgang and Jochen in the Mustang. To Phil D and to Andy and Reuben from KTR thanks for the pipe, tools and help! Randy and Gentry from Bringatrailer.com for joining our adventure and adding to it. To everyone who read and commented on the blog and last but certainly not least – to Conrad, Christine and Bill. What a crew!!! At every service stop Bill had the wheels up in no time and Christine had windows washed, food served and clean bathrooms scoped out. What a team!!! Sure, there was the occasional frazzled nerve or curt response but then again, you try living out of the back of a mini van for twelve days and having to lug a work shop worth of stuff including good old USA toilet paper!
Seriously, I am grateful for their friendship and support. We did an amazing thing – 8th overall – besting all of the Group A, B AND C cars! And a fair number of the Mayor cars. Like our beloved El Taxi, we were the little team with the big heart. Thank you for wishing us well your support was horsepower!

This is an edited video showing El Buick (my favorite car of the event) taking off and then cutting to us going around a fast left only to encounter the road full of future Outback Steak House Manager Specials.

We’re now back in beautiful San Miguel de Allende. We spend the night here and then fly home tomorrow. I’m still exhausted and will post more later but for now here are some photos from yesterday and today including;
The arrival of our great friends Bob Jett and Bob Paltrow in their gorgeous Alfa Spider Veloce, Doug Mockett and Angelica Fuentes (an amazing team and wonderful competitors), a pix of me with Joe Ramierez (former McClaren F1 team manager and La Carrera veteran), Conrad and I out front of our hotel, Conrad loading up the Taxi on the trailer and finally an video of Conrad fooling around with El Taxi one more time before being loaded up.

We just concluded the 2010 La Carrera Panamerica. Unofficially, First in Class and 8th or 9th overall. I say Unofficially because our car is now being weighed and having its engine capacity weighed to make sure we didn’t cheat. Which, of course, we did not.
What an adventure! Driving duties fell to me today and I got to drive the famous, La Buffa stage in both directions. It was great. And a bit scary but no where near as scary as almost hitting a huge cow at 90mph! I’m hoping that was caught on video. I’ll post later.
Now we rest. We just got into our rooms in the beautiful Santa Rita hotel in Zacatecas. The city is a 625 year old mining town hanging off the side of La Buffa mountain. Interestingly enough, the brother of the president of Mexico is staying here to ( he also just completed the race) so security is tight. Not sure if I feel safer or like a target.
Enjoy a few pix from our arrival in Zacatecas.
I’ll post more after the official results are announced tonight.

The awards fiesta just ended and we won First in Class by a whopping 2 seconds. Taz and Rudy in the 510 were hauling but we were a little quicker overall.
Todays highlights included a near fist fight at the starting arch as a crowd mobbed the official time keeper an 8 lap race around a NASCAR oval in Auguascalintes. Conrad drove extremely well all day and we’re still in our “bring it home” mode. Meaning that we’re taking it easy and nursing the car so that it finishes the race.
Here a cool pix of us being chased by Los Federales. And one of our friend Randy signing autographs at today’s service stop.

We finished second in class for Day 5. Edged out by our friend Taz in the Datsun 510 and a penalty we received for bring early to a stage. First time in my life I’m early and I’m penalized for it! Well, that’s the way it goes. It’s not just how fast you complete a speed stage but how accurately you transit from one stage to the next many kilometers away. You must calculate your “in” time to the next stage and roll across the imaginary line to hand the Control officials your time card and transponder at the precise moment. This is how they attempt to keep 128 cars flowing across the route from stage to stage. And it’s a valiant attempt. What a logistical nightmare but they basically make it work and most of the time so do we.
In a few hours we start Day 6 from Guadalajara to Aguascalientes. We’re still ahead in our class by a good margin but it’s ours to lose so we’re focused on going fast but keeping the car healthy and not getting anymore time penalties. Wish us luck and for more coverage of the event and great photos, also check out www

Well the good news is that the car is running great but the bad news is that timing and scoring for the event isn’t. At last nights awards ceremony we didn’t make the podium. Now before you go thinking I’m a sore loser, you have to remember that I’d just raced down Mil Combreas sitting shotgun as Conrad drove faster that he’s ever gone – so, we thought we’d be first or second in class again. Well after doing so not so subtle digging, I found tue timing steward and inquired as to the days results. He promised me he’d look into it and he did. So, while we didn’t a trophy, are times were corrected and this morning when we received the official results, we were First in class and 9th overall! That’s how we started the day, with that great news and it helped me feel inspired and I think i drove well. Conrad also got a special treat as he rode shotgun with Jochen Mass or, JOch as we’re now calling him (just kidding Herr Mass). The first section of the day was at the Morelia race track so we pulled a switcheroo and Conrad got to tell someone else how to drive for a change – a former F1 driver no less. It was a treat for him and I even enjoyed having Jochen’s friend and navigator, Wolfgang in my car for a stint.
We’re now at the beautiful La Quinta Hotel in Guadalajara and will be leaving soon for the awards dinner.
Oh yeah! and we have two new crew members who arrived today. My friends Randy and Gentry from bringatrailer.com are here to follow our exploits and take in the action.
PS: the photo is of the Opel Diplomat that burned on day 3 parked on it’s trailer across the street from a fantastic church in Morelia. One of many.