A Brief Introduction // Racecars + Data

The d5 Racing 2005 Saab 9-2X Aero race car was purchased for $1,500.

It flooded up to the dash in Hurricane Harvey in August of 2017. The owner had it towed home and stripped the interior out to prevent mold.

The car sat.

We bought the car to take to the track. For those unfamiliar, it’s really a Subaru WRX Wagon.

2.0L turbo flat four, all-wheel drive, 5 speed manual. 230hp, 2,875 lbs, 57% front, 43% rear weight bias.

It was a pile of work, but we got it to Circuit of the Americas in Austin, TX for a track weekend. It had a COBB Stage 2+ tune, Crucial Racing downpipe, and a COBB/Stoptech ST-40/ST-22 big brake package (with Stoptech SR34 full race brake pad compound).

On a fresh set of 225/45-17 BFGoodrich Rival S (200 TW) tires, we managed a best lap time of 2:48.

This was our first time on Circuit of the Americas and we got our doors blown off. And this was just an Edge Addicts HPDE (High Performance Driving Event), any sort of competitive situation would have been much worse. At least we had a good time with friends and drove the car back on the trailer at the end of the weekend.

Driver skill aside, the car was just really slow. The brakes were very good, and the tires were very good for a 200TW spec, but the low power was a real issue. Our top speed on the back straight was 117 mph. For anyone that knows COTA (Circuit of the Americas), that’s incredibly low. It meant we spent the whole weekend pulled over off the racing line, pointing faster cars by. That’s no fun.

At this point, the smart thing to do would be to sell the car and start with a better platform.

But where’s the fun in that?