370Z Wins At "Total 24 Hours of Spa"

DJ-of-E

I never heard of Spa 24 hours. What kind of setup are on these cars? (yes I know, race car, but there are different specifications).

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ZCarMan

I was poking around and found a page that talks about the two 370Zs run by RJN Motorsport at the Ring last month. It provides some info on the cars make up:

http://www.dailysportscar.com/viewAr...282E91B2CFA8E0

It was good to see meanwhile that RJN had not one but two 370Zs at the Ring this year, their regular SP10 (GT4) car joined by a more highly developed SP8 version, this a 4 litre car with bigger brakes and wheels, a large rear wing and front splitter completing a very aggressive stance.

Both cars were finished in the iconic Falken livery, the team running on Falken rubber this year and learning fast about their new tyre partner.

“We’ve done a lot of work with the tyres in the VLN races leading up to the 24 Hours,” said RJN Team Principal Bob Neville. “There’s always more you can do though and we were working hard to find the right balance in both the free practice sessions and qualifying too. We found a good compromise for both cars for the race though.”

It didn’t exactly prove to be lacking in qualifying either, Alex Buncombe taking pole in SP10 and the SP8 car qualifying well up too in a class which also included the factory run Aston Zagatos and the super quick Lexus LFAs.

Both cars translated that good form well into the early stages of the race too, on a drying track the wily RJN team had opted for cut slicks on both 370Zs and both ran easily inside the overall top 30.

24 hour racing though is a cruel game and before dark both Nissans had hit trouble, the SP10 car with gearbox issues and the SP8 hitting trouble with its diff.

After that, and an off following contact for Tanaka San in the night it was fightback mode for both cars, and a spirited display that owed as much to the will to finish as it did to any realistic chance of a podium.

Despite that the SP8 car finished an excellent 4th in class, a bittersweet result after the car had held a podium slot through the night.

It might have been a major effort to bring the cars home but both Michael Krumm and Guy Smith hung on right to the end, despite both being due to fly to a test session for the FIA GT1 Nissan GTR team the following day – “The car was great, really strong and fun to drive,”

For Bob Neville it was a mixture of pride in finishing one of the most demanding races on the planet, and frustration that the cars could have finished much higher up the order.

“Of course you always want to do better, but that’s because we know they can do better. Adapting one of these cars is not a simple task, You start with a very capable road car but then you need to stiffen the chassis with a roll cage and save weight too.

The RJN race cars are based on one of the most popular versions of the Zed in both Japan and the USA, the Version Nismo. They can thus take advantage of a number of detail differences between our road car and the NISMO car.

A small rear wing rather than a spoiler, a very slightly longer front end and aero improved lower sills plus a homologated 3.8 litre engine.

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Jon

Mt Tam I am

I loved reading this one. I'm glad to hear our car wins races.

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Nissan Motorsports 34R Oil Cooler. Stillen CBE. Hotchkis Sport Sway Bars. KW Variant 3 Coilover System. Stillen Gen3 CAI. Michelin Pilot Super Sport. Stillen Brake Ducts. Carbotech™ XP10/XP8 Pads. Z1 Front Rotors. Z1 Stainless Brake Lines. Two degrees of camber

vivid2012

congrats for that.

ZCarMan

Me too. I hadn't seen much about the 370Z competing and winning so this was a good article to share. Hopefully this is just the beginning of more wins!

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Jon