https://www.pistonheads.com/news/ph-...w-driven/40214

sorry guys 🇬🇧 only but available On screen next season via streaming

 

Good stuff!

Thanks for the link.

Fun racing to watch.

F56 looks great in challenge spec.


It'll be cool to try and watch streaming --- I've only ever viewed yootoob viddies in the past tense and I really enjoy the Cooper & S classes because they still run the older cars.

 

https://www.pistonheads.com/news/mot...competes/40375

Silverstone from the drivers seat

 

More good stuff!

Thanks.

Enjoyed the written article detailing the event, plus the video really shows the competitive ferocity involved...

...and,
GOOD GOD ALMIGHTY!
I love the way that gearbox sounds!!!

 

I want one!
Car, gear box, the whole works!

I know this has been said before, but why not in the States? I know, BMW thinks there would be no interest and they want to push the BMW brand (hence no JCW TCR car)

 

I have been watching the "MINI JCW Challenge" for a couple of years. The races are very competitive and the drivers are very aggressive. The cars have no electronic handling help and are fairly difficult to master. Beware of oversteer.

 

Be great fun in that spec!



I wish it could be done in the USA too --- it perhaps could even create a little spark and help stimulate some sales.

Here's the 2019 brochure which is neat to look at:
https://www.minichallenge.co.uk/wp-c...LENGE-2019.pdf

What I think is really exciting is how affordable the Cooper and Cooper S classes are and it's wonderful that the older cars are supported and given a platform!

Here's a pretty fun viddie to watch from the June 15th Cooper S class at Oulton Park ​​​​...

...nice pass @ 4:29 for P2,
then tradin' paint @ around 4:54 for P1!

 

I find it funny how little advertising is done by some car manufactures for their cars and not just for their SUVs and trucks. Then there are other manufactures who advertise their cars like crazy. Auto racing has always been a great sales pitch for cars. Honda even includes their Indy race car in some of their ads. But, MINI rarely advertises, so I guess, why race. Still, I wish they did race here.

Hey, thanks for the YouTube link. And a “real”, you gotta shift it and heel and toe it gear box. I have been looking for some of these races and watching these may improve my searches. It would be nice, if someone comes across a good race, to link it here. Just a thought.

 

Working with Scorpion, how would you guys like the factory challenge exhaust?

 

Hmmmm - tempting. But for me, probably out of the question. One of the tracks I frequent has an 86 dB sound limit. It doesn’t take much to go over that. That said, I did find that at speed on the track the turbo sucks a lot of noise out of the exhaust and it is quieter than you might think...

 

Thanks, just checking. We just brought on Scorpion and they have lots of ties to MINI challenge, great guys with a lot of MINI Racing knowledge as they have been the exhaust provider since back in the early days of the Gen 1.

 

Nice you are doing this, even if some of us may not go in that direction. The options are nice to have.

 

Another nice incar with good audio quality that may be somewhat ear-piercing at times,
but what a good damn glorious sound!


And,
speaking of glorious...

...I love watching Nick Swift drive a classic:

 

Some information some may find interesting, You as a consumer can order parts for your road car directly from MINI Challenge. all you have to do is ask them. I have a full spare parts list and pricing that they sent me when I was looking at the diffuser. That Gearbox BTW, 8,873 pounds plus shipping. they do ship internationally as well. As for North Americans wanting to buy a factory built Challenge JCW car, You can do that too....but theres a catch. they only build a certain number each year and people who are racing, or plan on racing in the series get first dibs every year on the new cars. any unallocated cars after a cutoff date will be sold to anyone who wants to fork out the cash for one.

 

Cool thanks!

I figured that gearbox would be pricey, and it's expensive for sure, but not too bad actually for what a seriously nice piece of kit it is.

Around 11 grand USD.



Here's a pretty good video,
although one of the cons listed is the "unbearable" sound of straight cut gears which I disagree with because I love that whine...

 

You may not like Shmee, but this is a great MINI Challenge race car video.
Note at 5:36 the man says that a clutch is needed to downshift the sequential gear box...


IMHO - a sequential gear box would be a PIA on the street. My wife’s MINI has a sequential option on her CVT and it is useless anywhere but the track. Yup, it has been on LRP (didn’t know about the self destructing CVTs at that time).

 

After watching some of the other videos, it appears that only Shmee has to use the clutch on the downshifts...

These Challenge car are “lively” in the tail end. Wow, I believe they are a handful!

 

;-)

 

my track instructor mentor had straight cut dogleg gears in his LS swapped 350z, we had to scream at each other and that was with headsets. I have driven a open wheel car with sequential straight cut on road atlanta and it was a blast

all motorcycles have sequential, it's not that big a deal on the street, we have paddle shifters in the 335i and the experience is similar without the sound

 

While I haven’t driven one, the MINI automatic with the paddle shifters is supposed to be really good out on the track. I know that one of the race series that Turner Motor Sports races a BMW in uses an automatic instead of a DC box.

My experience with straight cut gears... Sorry the shifting isn’t clutchless, though...

 

My MCS is manual. Did Thermal, CA in a JCW auto. If I was going to track, it would be an auto. No time, for me at least, to shift and stay off of the guardrails.

 

I skip-shift to save shifting tine. There are a lot of places on the tracks I run where I need to shift from 5th to 3rd. I skip past 4th. I get the shift done just after hitting the brakes and just as the takes it’s set for braking hard.

But that hat is one of the good things that I have heard about the auto; one less thing to do.