$500 E30 + WRC =???? 3rd place

[AE_Racer]

http://cache.gawkerassets.com/assets/images/12/2010/03/500x_caswell_wrc_mexico_top.jpg
Bill Caswell, an unemployed Chicago racing freak, entered the Mexico round of the World Rally Championship in a 1991 BMW 318i that he found on Craigslist. The car cost $500. One year ago, Caswell decided that he wanted to go rallying with Rally America. Two months later, he crashed a car and blew up an engine five minutes into his first event. Four events later, he found a loophole in the FIA rules that let him enter a twenty-year-old car in the same event as guys like Ken Block and former F1 driver Kimi Raikkonen.

How A $500 Craigslist Car Beat $400K Rally Racers - Rallying - Jalopnik (http://jalopnik.com/5497042/how-a-500-craigslist-car-beat-400k-rally-racers)

Now THIS, is awesome.

[NINJASPY]

Awesome... I read the whole thing, but no mention of the "loop hole" in the fia rules.

[ThatGuy]

Absolutely incredible. :rawk:

[CrimsonRockett]

Very bad ass.

Reminds me of that Top Gear episode where they bought a stock BMW and tried to do the 24 hour race.

[az_240]

Awesomeness! I love it! Great read.

[mattsauto95]

Read this earlier. It was awesome.

[tanks13]

amazing this shit was dope

[s13silvia123]

Very bad ass.

Reminds me of that Top Gear episode where they bought a stock BMW and tried to do the 24 hour race.

then they found out it runs diesel LOL

[Gnnr]

Awesome! What class was he running in?

[jzepol1985]

wow
so awesome

[SimpleS14]

wow...that is an awesome story!!

[AE_Racer]

After more research i've gathered he wasn't actually competing in a WRC class, part of the Rally America series instead, which ran alongside WRC in the Mexico event. Still an awesome story though. More pics I found from SnoDrift in MI

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4057/4319373497_84df0f7008_o.jpg
http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4032/4319361775_5b6efac3c6_o.jpg

[AE_Racer]

And story from the co-driver of the E30.

Pirating WRC Corona Rally Mexico Rally America | World Rally Sport (http://www.worldrallysport.com/content/pirating-wrc-corona-rally-mexico-rally-america)

[HyperTek]

interesting.. as cool as it may be, hope the WRC doesnt turn into a bunch of ratty shit looking cars tho lol

I wonder how much of this story is "glorified"
people been rally racing E30s for decades, this one is just standing out because it was ran same week as a wrc event so people tie it in.

[WanganRunner]

I hate stories like this (not really) because they make me overconfident.

The owner of this E30 is obviously a deity among men when it comes to mechanical aptitude, with his ability to quickly diagnose/fix just about anything on the fly with minimal tools, build a competitive car from nothing, etc.

Stories like this are like "Courage Wolf" for wrenching. They make me think "Hell, this guy can run against Team Citroen in a beater he's patching with RTV and tape, so I can totally get that MX73 trans swap done out in my garage". It momentarily relieves me of the reality that I'm a total fucking boob, a reality that will promptly re-assert itself when I drop a transmission onto my chest by accident and end up in the ER.

But yeah, this guy's a rockstar. Go him.

[chitownguy]

Haha this story is so cool. Even if he didn't compete against WRC cars, I'm pretty sure his competition was old WRC cars and well built sponsored rally cars. So to finish third in some janky BMW is still awesome.

[Bubbles]

So, do you win any money?

[Mister.E]

this is guy is on a whole other level. truly epic

the gas tank patch had me cracking up.

[Gnnr]

After more research i've gathered he wasn't actually competing in a WRC class, part of the Rally America series instead, which ran alongside WRC in the Mexico event. Still an awesome story though. More pics I found from SnoDrift in MI

Ahh, I understand now. So the loophole is that he could run in the Mexico event and get points for Rally America which he needed since he missed out on some races due to the crash. Is that right? Still Awesome! :D

[allmotorking]

Rally America had a deal w/ the Mexican national rally series organizers to allow entrants from the RA series to run in their series alongside the WRC event. Bill was put in the open class running against newer FIA spec Mitsubishi evo's and Peugeot 206's because the car had an s14 (e30 m3) motor swap.

We are sponsoring the Jalopnik $500 Craigslist Rally Car T-shirt Design Contest (http://jalopnik.com/5504224/the-500-craigslist-rally-car-contest-want-to-win-an-xbox) to get Bill Caswell back into his rally car for the rest of the Rally America season. Winner will receive an xbox360 and a copy of forza 3 from us. The XBox will be wrapped in the winning T-shirt design using a special adhesive vinyl as well.

Here are the logos to use for this contest. Good luck and we'll be holding that Xbox360 for you 'til then.

Download Live Sockets Logo Here. (http://www.apartment107.com/assets/article/2602/logos.rar)