Our SAAB 99 Ice Racer back in 2000

[RacinBob]

Chuck P is my racing buddy for 35 years. I met him when he raced me in a SAAB 99E when I was Running a ‘80 VW Rabbit in SSB. we both shared a VW Rabbit when we won ITB in the longest day of Nelson Ledges, and I have driven his 944 in Firehawk races as well and in Nelson Races.Chuck loves SAABS.

The other thing was we ran Ice racing in a SAAB 99 that I found in town. It was owned by a local Postman and it was sitting apparently unmoved in the driveway. I showed up at the door and we offered him $150 and it was ours. It would not start. We put it on his trailer and took it to his house in Chicago. The problem it turns out was about a gallon of water in the gas tank. Drained it refilled it and it ran like a beast.

Not really competitive but a lot of fun with few problems. You could hit something and the other car moved and you didn’t. The only problem was that the differential carrier was like made of glass. I flat sided somebody once and hit wheel to wheel. about 1 hour later, the differential broke. Lesson learned.

Two events while we were racing that car. One was we went into the bar by the lake at about 11:00 AM that was the race headquarters and I saw on TV the space shuttle. Not good when they are showing the Space Shuttle on TV when it is 11 Am on Sunday. It crashed over Texas. I was coming home from another race and I am driving 200 miles home, listening to the Daytona 500 and Earnhardt crashes on the last lap. I heard about the death east of Rochester MN on I-90.

This picture is from 2001 from my first digital camera Cannon S100. I did a lot of racing those years, The one thing I’ve learned is race when you can because you will have less and less time as you get older.

[RallyDarkstrike]

Ah, a Saab from the era of Saabs I really like....there need to be more classic Saabs around

[davesaddiction]

@racinbob Moved to Best of OPPO.

[RacinBob]

@davesaddiction Thanks, a post saved from extinction!