Let’s start in the bad end. Just a couple of hours ago the whole thing seemed to be a disappointment.

We went off early to get a good position in the gigantic queue of vehicles waiting to participate in the race. Since there are so many breakdowns and failures among the participants there’s no idea to have a fixed starting order. Instead everybody just waits in line for their turn.

The first race for the Skilži showed some improvements: 650 km/l. This is a more than 20% increase, but still nothing extraordinary in the race as a whole. Immediately as the vehicle came back to the paddock we made some minor improvements and put it back in the line again.

Baldos II had an early start as well. We had been testing it all night – running the ICE to charge the battery, unloading the battery, running it again and recharging etc. This to make sure that the vehicle could handle all the repeated starts and stops that signifies a real race, and where we by some reason always suffer wear-outs. Because of the testing, the ICE did fine during the whole measurement. Instead something else failed.

We haven’t really understood why, but after 6,5 out of 7 laps the electrical motor broke down. Erika tried desperately to start it, but failed, and Baldos II had to be carried back to the paddock. A great disappointment, especially since we didn’t know if there would be time for another attempt.

At this stage everything looked bad. Then it got better.

While waiting in line we did some small adjustments to Skilži. We improved the wheel suspension by aligning the wheels (improving the toe-in, so to speak) and preheated the engine just before takeoff. Although we know that a common engine drains a lot more during a cold start than during a warm, the results were extraordinary: 1201 km/l. Almost double the previous result after just a few adjustments. Imagine the amount of ideas for improvements that suddenly popped into the minds of the team members.

And what’s even better – Baldos II finally, after five unsuccessful attempts (three in 2009 and two in the last few days), made it to the finish line! Once we started the vehicle after the second attempt, it ran like a Dalecarlian grandfather’s clock. So we just put it in line again and rolled out to the track, and it just kept going. The look seen in our faces at that moment was sheer joy. The result of 137 km/l wasn’t that good at all, but we had broken the curse of the red pearl, and we are still the #1 vehicle allowed for street use that we claim to be.

We’re right now waiting for the award ceremony. We will put up some photos in a while.

.