THE MS3 STORY

- Turning a Daily Into a Track Car -

It all started working two jobs through summer to save up about 10k in cash to buy a new car after my 1990 Honda CRX bent a rod. I really wanted a WRX hatchback but didn't quite have enough money. A cheaper base model Impreza I was going buy got sold out from underneath me and I stumbled upon the Mazdaspeed3. I fell in love with the practicality with the space of the hatchback and the sportiness of the peppy four-cylinder turbo.

It started out with the basics: intake, exhaust, wheels and tires. I just wanted to be as low and as loud as possible. The car looked good and I had a blast driving it around, making friends and getting into trouble.

I continued upgrading parts, but started getting misfires left and right. I tried to keep driving it as long as possible, but it got to a point where I was changing spark plugs every couple hundred miles. I bought a $500 Saturn from a friend and the Speed got parked.

I get hooked on racing.

After driving the Saturn until the wheels fell off, I bought a protege5 and a buddy of mine got me to go to a local autocross with him. I was immediately in love, but 90ish horsepower of the protege was not going to cut it; I needed to race in the Mazdaspeed3.

I couldn't afford to replace the motor so I decided to do everything else to transform it into a race car until I could save up for it. It started cheap with removing absolutely everything I could.

The Speed starts to look the part.

I got racing seats, harnesses, and started adding vents to the car. I put my design skills to use and designed a full livery for the car from scratch, had it printed and wrapped it myself. The car looked better than I could have imagined and could've even been mistaken for a real race car. A race car isn't worth much though if it doesn't run.

I took a gamble a bought a "jdm motor" for a great deal; however, when I swapped it in, it was still burning oil. I figured Mazdaspeed3 turbos love burning oil, so it was time for an upgrade and that should fix the problem.

I installed a bigger turbo and during the first test drive I had a oil line failure that caught on fire. Luckily, with help from the fire department and my neighbors, we were able to put the fire out.

We weren't gonna give up.

I was devastated from the damage the car had taken but got overwhelming support from my friends, family and Corksport who had sent me new parts to help replace the ones that were destroyed. At this point I was so close to racing this car that nothing was going to stop me.

I got the car cleaned up and running again and finally made it to my first autocross! The car wasn't perfect but I needed to get out there. I got a full season under my belt with the Mazdaspeed and even placed 3rd in the Susquehanna SCCA Points Championship. We got the car setup well and still I'm upgrading the car whenever I can. I have more autocross and track events planned for this year and have focused on even more training and seat-time. I'd like to start competing in SCCA Solo and National events as well as Time Trials and Hill Climbs as soon as I can get a full cage into the car.

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