A little over a year ago I found out that I would be a dad for the first time. This was scary in itself. Immediately I started to think how am I going to be able to afford this treasured hobby of mine. I kept on thinking, gone are the days when I would blow my whole pay check on cars parts. I now had to think about taking care of a person now, a little version of me. So I declared to all my friends that I would have to retire from being an enthusiast. It was a sad for me but I knew that it had to be done.  So I sold my two project cars and bought an SUV.   

Working in the industry is an awesome privilege that I have. I get to see all the behind the scenes developments of our product and test it out before we release it to the public. This is where this whole retirement thing gets hard. A couple of months ago I got a call from a customer who was having drivability issues with his turbocharged V8 Mustang. So I started asking Jhame the head of our R&D department questions about our kit. Jhame immediately said why don’t you take our car out for a spin and tell me what you think. I was thinking to myself this can’t be good but for the sake of trying to figure out this issue for my customer I’ll do it. I jumped into the Mustang and the first thing that I notice transmission had really short throws. It reminded me of my 240sx with the B&M short shifter.  The good folks at Tremec were gracious enough to fit our V8 Mustang with their 6-speed TR6060 transmission. With the traction control off I pull into the street and took off. I let the car get up to operating temperature.  I make it to the first stop sign and really give the Mustang some serious throttle. This was a short burst, not even a 1/8 of a mile. Man that short run had my heart was pounding fast and my right leg was trembling. The sound of the BOV blowing off and the sound of the turbo spooling up are addicting. Not to mention that this car is putting down 450hp to the ground. And to be quite frank I’m not even a Mustang guy. But I fell in love with this car after that driving experience. And the Mustang topped my personal best turbo system list (previously OUR Nissan Sentra Spec V had the top honors in my book). At this point I remember how much of a natural high one can get just by driving a turbocharged vehicle. Boost is a highly addictive drug. 

When I got back to the shop my mind started to immediately thinking about how can I be like Michael Jordan and come out of retirement. I even started looking on various websites searching for another project car. The search still continues but I think that I’m going to have to wait until 2010 when the Nissan S16 is released.

I guess I’ll keep my fingers crossed cause being an automotive enthusiast is in your blood forever and there is no retiring.

The Unit… out!