It all began with this idea of having a go-karting championship at Bangalore a few months back .. After the success there was this weird idea lurking around my mind asto why not have a national meet itself .. Just as I was about to put this idea into a thread , logged on one fine day to figure out that Khaadu had already posted the exactly the same thing .. From this point to what happened to the minute we left for goa is very well known ..
Then came the night of the 25th , when I decided to head over to memo’s house and have a try at fixing the ICE in my car all by ourselves .. We were at it , and around 3 AM got a call from nitrous and iselro that they were already at ulsoor .. Asked to catch a rick as my baleno was all dismantled .. They headed to memo’s house around 4:30 AM and all they did for the next two hours was to sit and watch me and memo working on the ICE setup ..
At 5:30 we got a call from the psycho and amitoj that they had already left and would be driving slow , so it would be easier for us to catch them up .. But by the time we got everything sorted out (tried fixing the entire system but in the end ended up with just the front components , after all the hard work) .. Picked up Jay from metro at about 7:30 AM and thus the journey to goa for TBHP national meet (if u can call it one after the poor turnout) began .. Trying to catch up with the rest the first 150kms went at the wink of an eye , touching speeds of slightly over 140 .. Then I realized that at speeds of 120 the car started to understeer in a straight line .. This was very discomforting and I initially thought it to be because of left front tire which was pretty badly bruised at track day ..
Pulled over to the service lane some 60 kms from chitradurga and swapped the tire with the stepny , inspite of this the car was a handful to drive .. Called up psycho who by now was about 100 kms ahead of us , and decided to the get the wheel balancing and wheel alignment done up at chitradurga .. Took the car into the service shop and found a nice cozy platform right next to the shop and dozed off on it .. Jay managed to click a few pics of me , but luckily his memory card got conked and im saved from the embarrassment .. 2 hrs passed and we headed out from there with nitrous at the wheel , thought that he wanted to take a test drive when I soon heard he wanted to drive all the way .. I was a little too skeptical , for the fact that the car wasn’t handling well at all and also for the fact that the other 3 didn’t know how quick the car was and its handling characteristics .. Took over the wheel in the next 2 kms and still found the car to be understeering dangerously the moment we hit speeds of 120 .. However the vibration on the wheel had come down by a huge margin after the alignment .. At the shop we figured out that nitrous had tightened one of the wheel lug nuts a little to tight and it wouldn’t come off , so we had to end up braking it and thus the rest of the journey went with 3 lug nuts on the front left and nitrous made his best efforts to remind me off it everytime I pushed the gas pedal
..
The journey after that was a little bore , as I didn’t want to exceed speeds of 100 with the occasional rain .. Soon we reached the hubli bypass , called up psycho for directions and headed off onto the ankola road .. Soon we get a call from amitoj who were more than 200 kms ahead of us asking to contact psycho and tell him he was ahead of the e-zen .. Apparently these two didn’t know who was ahead and who was behind and both of the them were trying to push to catch up with the other .. Once we entered the ghats the sight was breathtaking , greenary everywhere .. It was like driving to the gateway of heaven , the twisty roads only reminded me of track day .. Miraculously found that the car was handling superbly in the ghats even at speeds of 120 + .. Pushed the car around a bit just to make up some lost ground due to all the problems and more over wanted to get out of the ghat section before it got dark, something that my family has been used to since ages.. They never preffered to travel in ghats in the dark .. While am at it , nitrous like a stuck taperecorder goes “DON’T” , “3 Lug Nuts” , “Slow” , “Sharp Turn” ahead
.. While I had other things in my mind for eg “FOOD” , “FUEL” , “GOA” , “BEER” nitrous and islero were busy praying to the gods and goddesses if they would reach goa .. While Jay sitting shotgun was a brilliant co we coverd the next 300 kms in no time and this drive had to be the best of my life .. Swooping turns , blind curves , awesome scenary , wish I could do this route again and again.. Within no time we landed at panaji , gave khaadu a call and figured out that psycho and amitoj had reached just 2 hrs back .. Considering that they were ahead of us by atleast 250 kms at one point that was some ground that we made up .. Soon we met up with the gang close to the resort after loosing our way .. Like everyone says , I do suck when it comes to directions ..
We entered goa , headed off towards calangute beach hoping to find the dicor somewhere so that it could lead us to the resort .. The first thing we found is Khaadu the great standing on a rainy night with shorts and a half sleeves I guess with a KF in hand .. WOW , what a greeting that was meant to be .. Soon we followed the dicor and without any warning it disappeared into the horizon , I guess psycho was trying to show us a thing or two about the dicor’s new earned boost .. Soon we check into our rooms , the resort looked fabulous at first sight .. Nitrous , jay and islero shacked up together , while khaadu and myself got into the other .. All of us got back into room number 117 , talking over the journey while psycho , amitoj and khaadu returned with some food a plenty of beer bottles .. As we all started to enjoy the party , we just realized that steeroids train was about to reach and now the hunt for the station began .. Khaadu who was by now very impressed with the baleno just wouldn’t let me get behind the wheel at all .. Found our way to the station.. Picked up papa bear who but almost forgot to get down as his watch still showed the DUBAI TIME .. Got back to the resort only to find all crashed out at around 6 AM .. Steeroid goes high and decided to wake up everyone , that’s when we found psycho lying on the floor totally exhausted .. All of greeted each other , got ready and waited for the breakfast and an eternally long time for one Mr.Psycho to arrive ..
Day 2 yet to come , and promise it wont be such a bore or lengthy either ..
Highlights of Day1
1. Islero says “ I have seen quick cars and cars that SOUND quick , this is the first time im sitting in one “ ..
2. Nitrous at his best , sleeps for about 13hrs of the 16 hrs journey and when he is awake all that I hear is “3 Lug Nuts” , “Slow” , “Sharp Turn” .. All this while sitting shotgun and he refuses to move to the rear seat .. AARRGGGHHH .. Until I conned him and made jay sit up front ..
3. Islero says “ Did u know nitrous just cracked a glass on the Volvo we came just by resting on it ?? ” .. By now im all beginning to pity my glass and praying at the same time as well ..
4. The drive through the ghats was the best drive of our lives , we captured a few videos of the baleno being redlined in every gear .. And all at the resort were more than surprised to see a car with full load luggage and passengers pulling off like that .. Pyscho I owe u for this one ..
5. Khaadu the entertainer kept us entertained and more importantly managed to keep me awake inspite of not having any sleep for the last two days + the strain of driving 700+ kms in rainy conditions as well ..