We recently purchased this ex-SPEED World Challenge Focus. Some of you may recognize it.
HISTORY
This is what we know about the cars history. As you can see it was sponsored by FOCALJET for a while. Here's a thread that documented the involvement.
We assume it was built by 3R Racing in Colorado for the Speed World Challenge in maybe 2005 or 2006. Robb Holland drove it at Infineon Raceway in 2006 but we haven't found any other races. It may have had FILA decals before the FOCALJET ones. In mid 2007 it was sold to PDMC Motorsport, a race team associated with Oakland University in SE Michigan. The team had plans to run the final three rounds of the Speed World Challenge at Mosport, Road Atlanta and Laguna Seca. It was to be piloted by Jeff Nowicki who happens to live round the corner though we have never met him. It did run at Mosport and qualified 23rd and finished 17th. It also won the B&M Holeshot Award; whatever that is. It is unclear whether it ran at Road Atlanta or Leguna Seca. We suspect not. After this, from word on the street, the program ran into some legal issues and the car sat for awhile. it was then purchased by a local car collector for his young son to race but that never happened so late in 2013 it was sold to another local car enthusiast who passed it on to a friend of ours who then sold it to us. So it's been passed around a lot but seems not to have been abused, too much.
CURRENT CONDITION
As the car sits it does not run. It seems as if it has been pillaged of a few of it's parts but not what you might expect. It is missing axles, the throttle body is not bolted on but the wires are connected. Apparently it had no intake manifold when it emerged into the local community but one of the previously mentioned owners put a Cosworth unit on. that is why the throttle body is and intake are not connected. They don't fit. It is missing a window net too and all the fluids. It does turn over but pisses out fuel from the fuel filter. The battery is fully charged and seems to hold it. The ECU (PECTEL) seems to have a tune in it too.
COOL STUFF
Make no mistake, this is a proper race car. I can't imagine what it cost to build but maybe more than a house. We didn't pay house money for it though. Here's a quick run down of some of its highlights:
- Gutted interior
- Cage
- Lexan windows
- CF tailgate
- Composite splitter
- Fuel cell, Air jacks
- Motec dash and data logger
- Composite rear wing (used to be on the tailgate)
- BRAID Fullrace A wheels
- AP brakes
- Custom exhaust manifold
- Cosworth intake manifold
- Composite dash
- Pedal box
- Proflex dampers
- Custom wiring harness
- Brake bias adjuster
- Racetech seat
- Pectel ECU
- Quaife gearset
- Quaife LSD
- Side exit exhaust
- Composite hood
- 12.8:1 compression ratio
PLANS
So what shall we do with this beast? Well, we feel the car deserves to run again, hopefully flat out. So we’d like to get it driving once more. It’s going to need some axles, fluids, intake and probably a tune to achieve that goal. It's uncanny how close to the BRAID blue the car is right now. If we are successful restoring it to a running, viable race car then maybe we’ll run a few autocrosses and track days with it this year. That would be nice. What would be really nice would be to see it race on the track again. It is a race car after all. Apparently it should be legal for SCCA STU class if we tweak a few things. The intake manifold will need to be stock but we have one of those on the way. Not sure what else we need to do. Oh, and we'll have to find a driver. Mr. Nowicki, are you reading this? There is even the possibility of running it in a hill climb or tarmac rally sprint, in Michigan! If there are suitable car shows in the area we might take it there, but of course we'd have to trailer it. Woodward Dream Cruise would be fun for instance. Maybe the Ford dealer in Royal Oak would host it. Any other suggestions would be welcome.
So what do you think? Subscribe to one of these build threads and let us know. Look out for updates and to answer all our dumb questions. There will be plenty.
Detroit SCCA DI Rally Grassroots Motorsport Focaljet XceedSpeed
