Tag Archives: cars

Italian Day for the Cars

I’m heading back into the summer for an event that I have taken some specific topics from but for which the larger event has not yet been the subject of a post.  We are back in Redmond for Exotics@RTC again and, specifically, for the Italian Day.  This is always a popular day as it means quite the selection of the more spectacular examples of the Italian car industry.

I will always like to see some rare cars, even if I am not a connoisseur and I certainly am not able to identify which ones are particularly special.  However, I am more than able to decide which ones I like the look of.  Of course, when they are given pride of place at the center of the event, I am not going to fail to understand that there may be some significance to them!

Obviously, the sportier cars are very common at this event but there are others there too which are unusual and Italian.  Some of these are the sort of car I might have seen a lot of as a kid in the 70s and 80s when they were just a usual vehicle in the UK – Italian brands were sold extensively in the UK, even if their design for warm Italian climate meant they dissolved in a UK winter!  Here is a selection of some of the lovely vehicles that were in display for this year’s Italian Day.

Sticky Surface

I’ve posted a few times about my experience with the drag racing at Pacific Raceway.  One of the things that I particularly was fascinated by was the surface of the strip itself.  I mentioned before the machines that they used for conditioning this surface to ensure that there was maximum traction between the tires and ground.  Periodically, the staff would come on to the track to take samples and measurements to understand exactly how it was performing.  What photos don’t show you, but video can, is just how anything on the surface would stick.  Only when you heard people walking along the track could you get the sound of their shoes sticking to the ground.  Here is a video to explain what I mean.

What Makes One Dino Get Prime Spot Over Another?

This is a perfect example of my ignorance regarding some of the things I see.  The Italian Day at Exotics@RTC was on and this meant a bunch of Ferraris of varying vintages.  In the prime spot at the center of the event was a Ferrari Dino.  I may not know much about Ferraris, but I do know that the Dino was a famous car.  There were actually a few of them scattered around.  I don’t know whether prime spots were based on when they arrived or whether one of these is more important than another.  Is one more authentic or was it just luck?  Maybe some of you know.

Tire Ripples

I had seen images from drag racing which showed how the tires get distorted as the immense amounts of torque are transferred through them.  A tire is at its most effective when it isn’t sliding but is in static contact with the ground.  You might recognize this from your own experience.  If you push something across a surface, the resistance reduces once the item starts moving.  The same thing happens with tires.  To get the best out of them spinning is not good.  With the tire gripping the surface but the axle rotating, the sidewall is the area that has to compensate which it does by distorting and then unloading as it drives the vehicle forwards.  I wanted to try and catch this so took a bunch of shots focused on trying to catch this moment.

Cars With Fins

When it comes to classic American cars, I know next to nothing.  I didn’t grow up with them and I haven’t studied them since so put me in amongst a bunch of these cars as was the case for the Exotics@RTC Classics event and I will just focus on what I think looks cool.  These cars could be the rarest of items or the thing you could see at any local car meet and I wouldn’t be any the wiser.  The only clue to me that they could be a significant vehicle would be that a huge crowd of people was hanging around them.

The Classics Day certainly did bring out any number of cool looking old vehicles.  To be honest, some of them don’t even look that great to my eye but they are of an era and show where car design was at that time.  They might be chunky and huge but that was what cars were like back then.  Others have some more interesting styling features like the fins I mention in the title to this post.  That is something that I would previously have found rather crass but, as the time has passed, it is now more of a cool styling cue.

I know quite a few people that are petrol heads that will recognize these vehicles and possibly their years.  The only way I would identify them was if the name was written on the side – which it usually is – or if the owner has a sheet in the window with details of the vehicle and its history.  That will be plenty for me anyway.  Hope some of these chunky or swoopy shapes appeal to you.

Two Old Esprits

My soft spot for the Lotus Esprit has shown itself with various posts over the years with historic shots or more recent images of preserved examples.  Most of these have been of the later versions of the Esprit when the styling was slightly more curved, and the bigger engines were installed such as the Turbo SE or the V8.  The Classics Day at Exotics@RTC provided two of the original versions of the Esprit.  They were parked in the prime spots in Redmond Town Center and garnered plenty of attention.

Yellow and red are two colors that will definitely get attention for a sports car and there were lots of people checking them out.  The red one had the tartan interior which really tells you the era when this car was produced.  I bet you weren’t seeing that sort of finish in the late 80s!  I had got there early so did okay getting shots without too many people in the way but as the morning wore on and more people showed up, the shots got harder to make.  A little Photoshop effort would be needed.

German Day at Exotics@RTC

My first visit to Exotics@RTC this year was delayed.  Early events were canceled for weather reasons and then, when they got going, I was doing other things and couldn’t go.  The first time I was able to make it was for the German Day.  I have done this day in previous years, and I like the types of vehicles that show up.  Yes, there will be a lot of modern Audis and BMWs but there will also be some far older and more interesting vehicles.  A Porsche tractor was one of these.

I won’t go into great details about any individual vehicles, not least because I am not very knowledgeable about them.  If they are in the center section, my assumption is that it is because they are unusual, rare and expensive but maybe something lesser can sneak in too.  I wouldn’t know the difference.  Here you go with some images of the various vehicles.

Cars in Kings Cross

Our walk along the Regents Canal took us to Kings Cross and, when we got there, plenty of people were out enjoying the sunny Saturday.  This included a bunch of car enthusiasts that had brought a variety of vehicles.  These were not the sort of thing I see at Exotics@RTC.  This was more a focus on enthusiasts for older vehicles that they have restored with much love.  Old vehicles from my childhood were all over the place.  I liked lots of them but the Bond Bug was a particular favorite.  I had quite forgotten about this type of car until I saw it here.

AMG Mercedes Fins and Strakes

I was taking a look at one of the AMG Mercedes cars that was at Exotics@RTC.  This is a road car but it has clearly gone through a lot of aerodynamic development.  The front end of the car is covered in aero treatments with fin and strakes of all sorts.  I have no idea how important this is for driving the car around Seattle but it was really quite something.  I spent a few minutes just looking at them and thinking back to my aero days.

SOVREN Spring Sprints

It wasn’t terribly long ago that I became away of a motor racing circuit not too far from home.  The Pacific Raceway is down near Kent and is about 40 minutes from home if the traffic is moving normally (by which I mean moving and not bogged down with traffic which might seem normal sometimes).  With one of the early events of the year coming up, I decided to pay it a visit.  I was planning on shooting for a friend’s website but they limited media credentials to those that had shot there before due to a shortage of staff.

No matter.  I figured I would go down anyway and shoot from the public viewing areas.  As it happened, this suited the friend as he needed some material for an article on anyone shooting motor racing for the first time.  The event was the SOVREN Spring Sprints.  I got down there at lunchtime on the Saturday after visiting the opening event of Exotics@RTC.  There was nothing happening when I got there and it turned out that there had been a fatal accident during one of the sessions.  After a little waiting around, it was announced that there would be nothing further that day and they would start the following day.

I headed home and came back the following morning.  A few of the competitors had gone home after the Saturday so the field was a bit reduced but there was still plenty to see.  There were very few spectators so it was easy to go wherever I wanted in the public areas.  The best shooting locations are on the south side of the course but that is only accessible with credentials.

The variety of vehicles was great.  Plenty of single seaters but also lots of road cars modified for track racing.  I am not familiar with all of the classes of car racing but I just get to enjoy watching them blasting around the course.  I wandered from place to place to try different shots.  The light was not ideal with backlighting for a large part of the day.  I was messing around with low shutter speeds which, with the speeds they are at and how close you can be to the track, resulted in a lot of blurry images.  You get parallax issues that close as well so deciding which bit of the car is sharp to be an acceptable shot is a bit of a taste issue.

The entry to the track from the paddock area is by a stand so I would often sit on the ground but the entry point as the cars drove in.  It made for a slightly different view of the cars but the backgrounds can get pretty busy.  I also went up in to the stands to get some shots looking down.  The barriers could sometimes be a hindrance but they do have some platforms at ground level to get you close to the track which is handy.

I probably was being too aggressive on the shutter speeds which meant lots of useless shots but, to be fair, it was a day for playing around and, as long as you get some shots out of it, does it matter?  I was getting a little tired in the afternoon and then realized, I wasn’t shooting for anyone else so I was free to leave if I wanted.  Therefore, I decided to head off home.  I took one more pass through the paddock area shooting people working on their cars or just hanging out and then I called it a day.  I will aim to be back for some of the upcoming events, though.