And the Real Winner Is…

by Murilee Martin

Published: April 25th, 2011

The Index of Effluency, 24 Hours of LeMons racing’s top prize, goes to the team that achieves beyond all expectations in an unspeakably terrible car. That means, most of the time, something like an MGB-GT or Chevy S10. A 1987 Mazda RX-7, a pretty quick and reliable car in most cases, wouldn’t qualify for IOE status… under normal circumstances. In the case of the lunatic Texans of Team Sensory Assault, however, we’ve got a silk purse that’s been turned into a sow’s ear, then shot full of holes, fed through a shredder, and boiled in chlorine triflouride.

After about 10 LeMons races, Sensory Assault had managed to achieve Ununhexium Legend of LeMons status, mostly due to to antics such as their unsafe-n-insane LeMons Line-Lock and their exhaust-heat-operated rib-cooker. That didn’t mean that they did so well in the standings at any of their races, with black flags and busted RX-7 parts keeping them down in the celler of the standings, race after race. Adding a junkyard turbocharger to the car served to make the car even worse, a feat we didn’t believe possible. Their best performance, prior to the North Dallas Hooptie, was something like 39th place. This weekend, however, Sensory Assault managed to get their horrid pink hooptie into ninth place. Will they ever manage to do such a thing again? Probably not. For now, though, IOE glory is theirs. Congratulations, Sensory Assault!

#1987MazdaRX-7 #24HoursOfLeMons #24HoursOfLeMonsDallas #IndexOfEffluency #Mazda #MazdaRX-7 #NorthDallasHooptie #Racing #RX-7 #Texas

Murilee Martin

Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.

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Turbosix.net on Apr 25, 2011

no mention of the onboard air compressor and pneumatically operated air brake? well, in case you weren't there and were wondering what that big ass pink/white board is on the top. that's what it is.

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Jjd241 on Apr 26, 2011

Pepto Pink! Gotta love it. It does show that perseverance pays off some times! Here are my latest street finds from Olympia WA... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0gSFiu8oZE&feature=channel_video_title

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