Visayas motorsports looking good

Atty. Jerome G. Neri
The Scrutineer

I WAS in Bacolod for a drag race and autocross event. Bacolod is now establishing itself as the motorsports capital of the Visayas. In the past, in order for a race to be run, equipment had to be rented from Manila for timing and scoring. In the last race, the Bacolod Motorsports Club already has its own equipment. This means that races will now be easier and cheaper to organize. This is a huge leap forward for motorsports in the Visayas.

The race was organized in two weeks. It was a dry run for a bigger race event planned to coincide with the Bacolod Mascara Festival this October. Interestingly, the cars are now getting quicker and quicker. The quickest car in the race was an all-carbon fiber turbocharged 900 horsepower Honda Integra owned by Mark Yanson of Bacolod. The car posted a best elapsed time of 10.7 seconds at 149 mph. While that is already a very quick pass, I could tell that the car is capable of even going a lot quicker if they can solve traction issues, as it was having wheel spin the entire one-fourth mile. The slowest car that qualified for Quick 8 posted a 12.4-second elapsed time. In past races there were still cars in the low 13s and high 12s that would make it to the Quick 8.

The Bacolod Honda crowd is also upgrading or modernizing their racecars. It’s the first time I have been to a race where there were more K-series-powered cars than very old B-series engines.

Apart from hosting races, Bacolod Motorsports informed me that they will also be having some track day events where drivers and tuners can test their cars. This is very good news for everyone who races. In the past it was only during the races that we get to test our cars, now that Bacolod has its own timing and scoring system, having track/test days will enable the competitors to further develop their cars. Things are really looking good for motorsports in the Visayas.

TOUR DE CEBU. Oct. 3 to 5 will be the second running of the Tour de Cebu. This is a Time Speed Distance (TSD) car rally that will cover a distance of 1,000 kilometers going through Cebu and Negros Islands. This is open to historic sports cars manufactured on or before Dec. 31, 1973.

A TSD rally is not about speed but about accuracy. The rally is composed of many stages where the driver must navigate through each stage at an assigned average speed. There are penalty points for arriving early and arriving late. The driver who has the least penalty points wins.

VIOS CUP PRACTICE. Team Toyota Cebu City traveled to Clark International Speedway a few weeks ago for practice and training for the next rounds of the Vios Cup races. The test session was very productive for our drivers as all of them improved and had a better understanding of the car plus more experience in braking from high speed.

The team was helped by multiple karting champion and former GT 300 race driver Stefano Marcelo. Stefano was able to give feedback on the setup of the cars and taught the drivers of the team new techniques in taking the corners. We now know that the Vios racecars of Team Toyota Cebu are well sorted.

I am very confident that our drivers Jette Calderon, Shaun Velasco, Lord Seno, Robert Pangilinan and Joseph Rojo will be very competitive on the next race as they made massive improvements from the training session and were already posting competitive lap times.