On Saturday, March 19 we attended the Tokyo Calling event hosted by Breakfast Club Rally. Z Car Garage participated with a group of client cars and enjoyed a wonderful day of driving through the foothills of Sonoma, Ca. The event also featured 200 Japanese classics and 90’s-era wonders to appreciate during the morning social gathering and rest stops. Enjoy our report with mega-photo gallery and video!

 

Breakfast Club Rally

 

The Breakfast Club Rally (BCR) started almost 2 years ago, now running its 27th rally event. What started out as a small group enjoying weekend drives blossomed into a full-on Cars and Coffee (still unofficial) meet just before rally participants head out according to run group (rally map available to pre-registrants only). The monthly BCR is always free/open to all makes and I highly recommend it for anyone looking to enjoy the beautiful Northern California roads and scenery. You can see my previous BCR reports HERE!

 

The BCR: Tokyo Calling event was a little different: this was an all-Japanese, mostly-vintage rally and we did not want to miss it. I assembled a group of Z Car Garage clients to participate and we left the shop at 5:45am to make the 7am starting point in Sonoma. Our cars:

 

Rob and Nick drove Mrs. Butters, our Series 1 shop 240z. This Series 1 S30 features a 3.2L with triple-Mikuni induction, Z Car Garage Big-Brakes, Z Car Garage CV Axles, ZCG Heat Shield, 6-speed transmission and full KW suspension (releasing soon).

 

Dirk’s 1973 Datsun 240z is back on the road with a fresh engine,  Z Car Garage Big-Brakes (for small wheels) and Z Car Garage CV Axles and Silvia 6-speed transmission. Full report coming to zcarblog.com

 

Linda’s 1972 Official OMS Pace Car Duplicate. Fifty were originally produced by Nissan Motors to commemorate the DATSUN 240Z being selected by the Ontario Motor Speedway to Pace the 1972 “U.S.A.C. California 500 Championship”. ZCG made it a runner, full report soon!

 

Felix’s 1996 Nissan 300ZX Twin Turbo representing Z32s!

 

We had 4 Nissan R32 Skyline GT-Rs! Above, from L to R with more photos in the gallery below: Mike’s R32 (TE37 wheels), Lee’s R32 (BBS wheels), Pall’s AH3 R32 and Miles’ R32 on Ray’s wheels. Andreas’ R30 Skyline was also present!

 

The Bring a Trailer Datsun 240Z was driven by Robert of BaT!

 

Our guest Jonathan Buhler (Sr. Specialist Corporate Communications at Nissan) piloted “Mr. C”, our stock, one-owner Series 1 Z.

Leading the caravan to Sonoma was yours truly in this 1965 Nissan Silvia. Huge thanks to our client Rick K for giving us the opportunity to enjoy this gorgeous (and rare) specimen. Full update on this Datsun Roadster-based gem soon!

Tokyo is Calling before the Rally!

 

Our crew arrived at the rally start in Sonoma and it was already filled with fabulous J-Tin. BCR hosted a “social gathering” from 7-9am (usually 1 hr) so we could take in all the glorious cars. The vibe was tremendous, despite a 5-minute drizzle and cloudy sky.

I am always on the lookout for Nissans and Datsuns:

 

First up, this 1967 Datsun 2000, owned by Ian S. One of the most sought after Datsuns, these “half-year” models were introduced mid-1967 offering a 5-speed transmission and 150hp twin-Mikuni carb’d 2L engine…hot stuff for the era. This is SRL #601 (out of ~1000 cars) and it was fully restored years ago by Les Cannaday in San Diego. Ian is meticulous about maintaining this car, but it is no garage queen. The (655) Off-white paint with red interior is one of my favorites. Yes, it even sports a factory Nissan hardtop with all the stainless trim!

 

I counted 6 roadsters. Pat S. owns this 1970 Datsun 2000. He had it dyno tuned at Z Car Garage, full report soon!

  

Alex’s Datsun 510 Wagon (LS-powered!), 520 and 620 trucks:

  

So many cool cars please check the gallery for more photos! Next, let’s check out some non-Nissan/Datsun action…

Honda

Honda was well-represented from Kei cars to late model DC2 Integras and S2000s. A few NSXs, CRXs and EF hatches rounded out the display:

  

Will’s clean EF hatch:

Toyota

 

Supra (A60 and A80) and even first gen MR2s, a lone Celica and AE86s!

Trucks and Vans

 

Mitsubishi and Toyota 4×4 vans galore! Let’s not forget everyone’s favorite little red firetruck: Todd Lapin’s Daihatsu Hijet

 

This was the wildest truck….2JZ-powered and S550 IRS:

Rally On!

The rally started at 9am and I was tasked with leading our group. There was no cell phone reception but I was armed with a turn-by-turn rallye printout. I managed to hustle the little Silvia through the vineyards and foothills to our half way point of Calistoga…RHD and rarity aside this thing was a blast to drive.

  

One of the perks of BCR events is their team of professional photographers at various stages capturing epic rolling and detail shots so people can focus on enjoying the drive. I encourage you to visit each of these photographer’s photo albums to see shots of your rides :Alex Nibyt, Gregory Veizades, Blaine Olguin, and Vijay Sankar.

 

Arriving at Calistoga was another opportunity to see cars I missed at the starting point. The sky cleared and it was sunny. Folks took a snack/coffee break here in the quaint town. I was just admiring each vintage ride cruise by…like this FD RX-7 with Greddy AeroHatch!

 

Caught up with our friend and fellow racer Glenn Chiou who chose to drive his FD RX-7 with co-pilot Ricky Silverio of Japanese Nostalgic Car magazine. Spotted our client Mark  in his Z32TT as well:

 

It was JDM overload at this halfway resting point…Ricky helped me spot a Lancer EVO 2!

 

After chatting with folks we resumed the rallye. This final stage was mostly forested ending with a cruise through vineyards. Jonathan managed to drive a “D” hubcap off the Mr. C 240z…he heroically recovered it mountain side…a picture captured the proud moment!

 

The rally concluded at renown Sonoma Raceway. Total mileage for our San Jose crew thus far was 220miles. BCR arranged parking for participants in the paddock right next to the cafe for lunch, as their clever motto is #DoneByNoon. Even better: we were treated to live drifting and road-course action. It was a superb venue to enjoy cool cars and great company.

 

I could not resist to get a Z Car Garage client group photo:

 

Here is a video we captured from the day, enjoy!

 

Thanks BCR!

 

Many thanks to the organizers, we had a blast and I urge you to register for their next event, especially if you are in the South Bay area like me and want to see what driving bliss lies North.  Here are a few thoughts from Rob re-capping the Tokyo Calling event:

“With the shop so busy it good to be out to enjoy Bay Area car events like DrivingWhileAwesome (DWA) Cars & Coffee and now BCR. I had a blast. Great organization of the event and some of friendliest people. Exceeded my expectations. Jonathan Buhler from Nissan came out to enjoy the rallye with us. We put him behind the wheel of Mr. C, our one-owner Series 1 Z.  It was fun to have both Safari Gold cars together. I loved the vibe at all of the rally stops and seeing the non-Nissans….super cool. MR2s, Subarus, CRXs, just so much good stuff, Happy I went and will make it out to another BCR event.”

The Drive Home

Our adventure was not over as we had to travel another 90 miles South to the shop. We caravanned back, traveling through the iconic Golden Gate Bridge and through San Francisco. I’m sure traffic had a field day with our group of Datsuns/Nissans:

 

 

At the shop, Jonathan took Mrs. Butters for a test drive and he had a great time before catching his flight back to Nashville. Below (right) is the GO Green RB25DET-powered 240Z that inspired Jonathan to build one of his own…we had to grab a shot with the model I made 🙂

    

Rick’s Silvia is safe and sound after completing the 300+ mile road trip. Thank you to all of the Z Car Garage clients that made the journey with us. Huge thanks to BCR for extending their hospitality to our crew, everyone was thrilled. Here’s to the next rally and always, always #DoitInADatsun!

  

More pics in the gallery!

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Dear Zcarblog readers, it’s been a busy year and we are catching up on blog posts, so please enjoy our belated race report from October.

WE LOVE RACING! On October 2-3, Classic Sports Racing Group (CSRG) hosted the Charity Challenge at Sonoma Raceway. Z Car Garage had a blast racing and supporting several client’s Datsun 510 race cars running in B-Sedan Group 9 (John Morton Cup). This vintage racing event was totally free for spectators, thanks to CSRG for putting on another great event!

Z Car Garage Supports Five Datsun 510s!

 

It is our pleasure to bring more enthusiasts into the world of vintage racing. Our services do include full race support and car-preparation to help make client’s race days seamless and worry-free so they can focus on driving. One of our specialties is dyno tuning. Before a race weekend we confirm that your car is running well and make necessary adjustments while on the chassis dyno. Here is Rob dyno tuning Larry Oka’s B-Sedan:

 

Video of two Datsun 510 B-Sedans (Rob and Tom) and Kelvin in the second video on the dyno. Enjoy the sweet L-series music!

 

 

We also provided testing support for Tom, Kelvin, Ed and Larry at Sonoma. A “test day” offers our clients piece-of-mind and a great way to kick off the actual race weekend. While testing we had an engine failure in Tom’s car and a transmission issue in Ed’s car. Thanks to the ZCG crew were able to resolve both with a spare engine and transmission.

 

Time to Race!

Z Car Garage clients racing for the weekend included:

#7 Kelvin Tse

 

#92 Larry Oka

Owned by Larry Oka and driven by Jesse B.

 

#72 Tom Dockery

Tom Dockery in his  Ex-Norm Balzer 510.

We are proud of Tom as he finished 10th in 21-car field and grabbed a personal best, clicking off a 1:58 at Sonoma! Here is in-car video of him putting in work for Sunday’s race:

 

#71 Ed M

 

#7 Rob Fuller

ZCG owner Rob Fuller, Bay Area Datsun Dealers tribute car

  

Rob shares his highlights from the race weekend:

“We had a great group and on the first qualifying run I was able to be quickest out there. Started the Sat afternoon races on pole and Tom/Kelvin were mid-pack with Ed in back. I had a beautiful start but by the 4th lap my throttle cable failed. I was about 1.5s ahead of the pack and got my personal best lap time at Sears. Even though I was bummed at the DNF, I got the best seat in the house and watched my boys Tom, Kelvin and Ed go through the field and have a fun race.”

 

“Josh and Parker from the PNW duked it out, and on the last lap Josh took the win. I know my 510 wasn’t able to finish the race but at least a Datsun won! Saturday’s position determines your position for the next races so I started last in both sunday am and afternoon sessions. First race was 5 laps and I went from 21st to 3rd place. Second race was 7 laps and I went from 21st to 2nd. Thank you to Z Car Garage for the repair and prep to keep my Datsun 510 on the track the rest of weekend. Happy to get Podium, Hard Charger, and the fastest lap of the race. Was great way to end the weekend after the DNF on Saturday. Thanks to CSRG for another amazing event. Do it in a Datsun 510.”

 

Here is in-car video of Rob threading through the field, enjoy!

 

You can see more of Rob’s race videos from the CSRG event (and other race) on his YouTube Channel. Give the guy a thumbs up and subscribe while you are there!

 

A weekend of great racing and good times

 

This was our first race event with our new Intech aluminum trailer. It was a game changer, allowing ZCG to have a home base in the paddock for our clients to relax and for us to perform crew duties. Speaking of crew, we are grateful to our team including the Corwin’s (Josh, Keith and Bonnie thank you for keeping us safe all weekend), Meghan and Nick. Nick brought his beautiful Datsun 510 wagon that also put in work as a support vehicle:

 

There were cool cars everywhere in the paddock:

 

Big thanks to Meghan for taking photos and video around the paddock. Here is a highlight reel of what it’s like at a vintage race…you should join us next time!

 

Always happy to see friends and newcomers at these events. Greg H from SCCS was there running a Formula Ford…his first time out he placed 5th out of 4o cars! Now that he’s had a taste of Datsun racing Greg is now interested in a B-sedan of his own!

 

Datsun Car Corral!

 

CSRG is awesome. Participants were spoiled with FREE parking in the paddock area and full access to the race for the weekend. Our friend and client Linda Williams of ZONC drove her 1972 Datsun 240Z OMS Pace car! Full report on this historically-significant S30 coming to zcarblog shortly.

 

Our friends from the PNW were in attendance…great camaraderie and even better racing partners:

 

Rob with RacecraftNW owner and pal Jim Froula. Yes, the Bluebird Coupe we dubbed Sorabird is now back with Racecraft after being with our client Alex Mcdowell for many fun racing seasons.

 

We hope you enjoyed our race report from the October 2 CSRG Charity Challenge at Sonoma. Thanks agin to CSRG, the ZCG crew and our clients for a really fun event. The 2022 racing season looks amazing, please join us we will announce the event schedule soon. DO IT IN A DATSUN!
More pictures in the gallery below:

 

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On July 10-12, the Classic Sport Racing Group (CSRG) hosted the David Love Vintage Races. Our favorite feature race was the Group 8 class with 20 sedans battling at Sonoma Raceway. It was a great weekend filled with competition, camaraderie and plenty of Alfas, BMWs and Datsuns sharing the track. Enjoy our report with in-car footage and photos from contributors Kurt Boden, Trent Barr, Nick Dockery and ZCG Crew Nick F and Josh C.

Z Car Garage Supports Three Datsun 510s!

 

2020 has been a strange year and we were fortunate to be racing again at Sears Point in the David Love event. Z Car Garage both participated and provided support for several Datsun 510 race cars.

Here is a video with sights and sounds from the paddock, samples of in-car footage of Rob Fuller, Tom Dockery, Glenn Chiou and Mike Anderson:

 

#7 Rob Fuller

ZCG owner Rob Fuller, Bay Area Datsun Dealers tribute car

    

Rob Fuller has not been in the Bay Area Datsun Dealers 510 since last year’s John Morton Cup. This car was purchased from Larry Oka as an IT car, slowly transforming into a B-Sedan. We sorted out the front suspension and this time the rear was attacked. From Rob:

“We installed the weight jacker set to adjust springs for ride height and a DP Racing sway bar that has the same design as the BRE car. Since the shop was slammed and customers come first, we enlisted our friend and fellow racer Troy Ermish to dial in the rear setup. Josh did final prep on the car and we were ready to go. The car did awesome with the back end of he car making all the difference in the world: instead of hopping around uncontrollably I was able to feed it throttle and negotiate the car in/out of corners. We went from middle to front of pack with Troy and the fast friends from RacecraftNW. Good times.”

 

You can see footage of Rob in the second race here:

Here is a great video with multiple angles showing Rob battling with Steve Walker (BMW 2002):

 

#7 Kelvin

 

Let’s talk about our clients. Three weeks before the CSRG event we got a call from Kelvin and he was testing his 510 that he just got from a local shop. It was sputtering and running poorly and by chance Larry Oka was also testing and referred Kelvin to us. We got him on the dyno and the engine failed. With a quick call to Rebello the engine was sorted, installed back in the the 510 and we handled all the prep work to be ready for the race weekend.

 

Kelvin had a successful race experience, finally:

“Kelvin has dealt with some issues on the car and this was the first time he had a good time with it. We were really happy for him. That’s why do this: we want more people at the race track driving, not fixing. It doesn’t allow to you to build confidence as a driver. You need to have a car that is reliable and works well so you can focus on you as a driver. Kelvin was super pumped. On test day I drove both Kelvin and Tom’s cars and they are fantastic examples of what a B-sedan can be. All they need to do is knock those numbers down”

 

Stay tuned for a full report on Kelvin’s 510. His friend Ed M was so impressed with our work that he wants ZCG to prep his sedan as well. Look for full report soon!

 

#72 Tom Dockery

Tom Dockery drove his  Ex-Norm Balzer 510. This car made its debut in May 2019  and we are excited to share its full story and profile Tom’s journey into racing soon.

   Tom’s 510 has an FIA engine so it revs really high making it peaky and hard to drive. Per Tom’s suggestion, a shorter gearset would put him in the powerband and sure enough…always listen to your driver! Tom really got faster and it was great seeing him out there. Car has been flawless.

 

510 Friends!

Many notable Datsun 510 racers were in the group, all sharing the competitive spirit.

#33 Glenn Chiou

Glenn drove the Ex-Finn/Harris U2.5L Trans-Am ’68 510. This car made its debut in May at the SVRA event at Laguna Seca. Glenn did an admirable job (as always) getting this historically significant 510 back on the racetrack!

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Glenn was fast. He charged all the way to the front of the pack, only seconds within Jim Froula and Rob. In-car from Glenn:

 

It is also worth noting that Glenn is one of the few “privateer” racers in the field. He sets up his own race car in his garage and his crew are friends Erich and Lloyd. We want to congratulate Glenn on the birth of his son! Kudos for racing and being a father!

#38 Troy Ermish

Troy is a phenomenal driver. He helped set up our 510 rear suspension too:) Watching Troy wheel his blue 510 his a thing of madness, finesse, skill and beauty. He took 1st place!

 

#52 Jim Froula

Race car driver and restoration specialist Jim Froula of Racecraft in the Ex- Harry Stewart Datsun 510. Jim was kind to let us pit with his gang. He’s also a fierce competitor.

  

David Love race results can be seen below:

 

A Memorable Racing Event

 

It was so wonderful to share this experience with our friends and CSRG family. We look forward to another B-sedan event and special shoutout to Troy Ermish, ZCG crew including Nick F, the Corwins Josh and Keith. Running all of the cars above would not be possible without them. Rob is excited for future events:

“Of all the vintage racing I’ve done and been around, the B-Sedan group is where it’s at. It’s competitive, fun and you always have someone to race with. We will attempt to do this again August 8-9 at Laguna Seca. Glenn and I are gathering ~25 cars!. Look for B-sedan to become one of the featured groups with CSRG, SVRA and even HMSA/RMMR!”

 

More pictures in the gallery below!
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