"Tour Auto 2023"

[Frogelan]

I went to the presentation of this event today.

It starts at dawn tomorrow with Paris-Beaune via Dijon-Prenois circuit, followed by Beaune--Clermont Ferrand (La Bresse circuit), then Clermont-Valence via Charade (Clermont Ferrand) circuit, the Valence-Le Castellet (circuit), Le Castellet-Cannes.

It is not really Elan territory as the organisers take rather a dim view of cheeky Lotus Elans giving the big boys a hard time but I saw 5 Elans for the record (photos to follow)...the other obvious issue is both the cost of the entry and the obligation to sign up to at least some of the organisers other (expensive) events...

N° 121: H. de Beauregard and J-P Armandet (1963 S1 in Regularity Class 2)
N° 217: J and C von Finckenstein (1964 26R in Grid 4)
N° 226: P Soury and M-P Soury (1965 26R)
N° 227: Michaela Etcheverry and Charlotte Lacoste (1964 26R)
N° 236: P Collançon and Cathy Dubuisson (1966 26R)

I also saw two Europas and an Elite...

I'm not sure if I will be ex-communicated if I do this but I can also add some photos of other cars if anyone is interested.

[Frogelan]

Photos...

[Frogelan]

[Frogelan]

[Elan 1600]

Not so sure about Elans not being welcome. They've won on multiple occasions, 3 times with Hans Hugenholtz.

[elansprint71]

They do surprisingly well, considering what they are up against.
Not everything that says 26/R is a 26/R, for example nothing LHD.

[Frogelan]

The Tour Auto results are available for everyone to read (I was not following this "on the road"): https://www.peterauto.fr/en/events/tour-auto/

Two Elans did very well: Soury/Soury finished 5th overall (1st in GTS10,15th in Index of Performance) and the Von Finckenstein/ Von Finckenstein car was lying 6th until it lost 32 minutes on the final day and ended up 44th.

The cars in front were 2 E-types, one Shelby Cobra and an Alfa Romeo 105 GTA.

There is some quite spirited driving shown on You Tube with one of the unnamed "VIPs" successfully rolling a BMW course car 4 times...and an Alfa Romeo GTA taking a short cut into a ravine. I hope the crew were extracted without injury it certainly seemed dramatic! (the You Tuber does not give this information).

If you check out the organiser's website it is possible to find a list of imposed constraints imposed on the Elan (this year several Elans and dozens of other cars were turned away)

[Elan 1600]

Tour Auto constraints on the Elan can be seen here:

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/9bioun952iuc ... n.pdf?dl=0

[Elan 1600]

A short video of an Elan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6eMrq5oUyew&t=410s

[elandoc]

Tour Auto constraints on the Elan can be seen here:

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/9bioun952iuc ... n.pdf?dl=0

Bugger that, they've taken all the fun out! I take it Appendix K is the benchmark here?

[Frogelan]

Two race organisers I can think of have brought in their own homologation interpretations which in some cases contradict the spirit of App K and essentially try to rewrite period homologation.

For example, it is hard to comprehend the need for MSD rev limiters.

But such organisers are of course within their rights to master such choices or even (for peter's sake!) to discourage Elan owners.

To be balanced, they are also addressing the outrageous issues on some of the other cars and there are plenty of other events.

[h20hamelan]

likely, inferior rubber is of no concern.
but, its not original

"In addition to the above, it was suggested to me by a Girling brake engineer, that the carbon black rubber compound has been found to contain carsonagenic material and has been banned from World wide use.

The result is a inferior product has replaced it with less strength and longevity.

Apparently Girling are really concerned about this, as all their brake seals used to contain the same carbon black which has been replaced with the only poor alternative, this being built in obsolescence with a possible early failure result."

from

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