Sure, the work had been hard. Sure, it had taken a whole lot of time. Sure, most of it had to be done after hours.
But for one, the advantage of being one's own boss was that one could fill in their own hours. Which in turn meant one could juggle around the hours of the day to end up with more time to spend on personal projects. The advantage of having someone on the payroll, even if only part-time, meant that they could take an amount of work off one's paws to also leave more time to work on personal projects.
Either which way, it had worked out for the blue-skinned and blue-haired red vixen Monique Winters, proprietor of the Fox Body Garage just outside of the town of Birch Brook in Minnaluna. She could make up her own hours pretty much the way she pleased; within reason of course. And she had some of the daily work taken off her paws by her friend Doto van der Vyver, the tan-spotted serval woman who had been working part-time in the garage now for a few months, and who was getting more and more familiar with the kind of work she had to do. Mainly cleaning, answering the phone, planning in appointments and the like, but she had shown interest in the actual mechanical work as well, and Monique had been happy to teach her a bit.
The personal project provided several good opportunities for teaching. Having been asked to remove one car from an old barn several months ago, and finding the barn actually held two more cars of which one was a vintage race car with local history, Monique had decided to make that car, a 1951 Hudson Hornet, her own. She already owned a race car which she ran in local races from time to time, a 1976 Ford Mustang II; but the much more vintage Hudson was just too good not to use. And having sat in a barn for the better part of three decades at least, it did need a good amount of work to, firstly, make it drivable again, and from there, make it competitive again. A good amount of work that allowed Monique to show her friend Doto many a rope of how mechanical work in a garage was carried out.
Of course, with Monique's all too clear intention of actually racing the car competitively on the local track, Doto had refused to do much of the work, as she was inexperienced and did not want to make any mistakes that could end up seeing her vixen friend getting hurt. That was fair. And Monique appreciated that as well, doing most if not all of the work herself, but doing a lot of it slower than she usually would and taking it in small steps to show Doto how it should be done.
There was a bit of a deadline. Once the summer season ended and the temperatures went back to normal and bearable so the tropic's schedule could be ended, several events returned to the calendar. At the Fairy Pond Park race track a few miles southeast of Birch Brook, the fall season was set off with several amateur races. Monique really wanted the Hudson to be ready for those so she could take it out onto the track, put it through its paces and show just how competitive it was, and why it had a reputation of being one of the best race cars of its time.
It was a lot of work. It also was a lot of improvement. Leaving the engine as it was, Monique only rebuilt it to make it run smoothly again - and she added hardened valves and valve seats so it could run on modern gasoline without any problems. But she did not enhance it; no crazy high-flow four-barrel carburetor, no crazy high-flow ported intake manifold, no crazy turbo or supercharger induction, not even any crazy tubular exhaust headers; she kept the original exhaust manifolds in place and only updated the rest of the exhaust system to stainless steel pipes and mufflers. Modern tires, yes. Modern alloy or composite rims, no. Modern disc brakes, yes. Modern slotted or drilled brake rotors or ceramic pads, no.
The bright orange vixen had painted her Mustang race car herself, and had done all the lettering and logos on it herself. For the Hudson, she went a step further. It was taken down to bare metal, made as smooth as a baby's bottom, given several coats of acid-etch and sealing primer, a coat or two of the light lilac paint that was the company color - and then it was wrapped, with a design Monique had made herself, inspired by the racing livery the car used to have, the liveries some of the original Hudson Hornet race cars used to have, and the livery she had given her Mustang.
The result was a light lilac Hudson Hornet, with a white oval on the doors in which was Monique's number, 42, in balloony orange numbers, the double "Twin H-Power" lettering across both sides of the hood, the Fox Body Garage logo over the front fenders, a number of small vintage logos of certain car part manufacturers at the bottom front corners of the front fenders, and the original name of the Fairy Ring Dirt Track over the swooping rear fenders, along with their logo of a humanoid fairy - who of course was fully naked, too. And the car was sitting on period-correct steel rims with replica dirt track race tires that even had a white line on their sidewall. On the inside, a modern race cage built to current safety standards, modern racing seats both driver and passenger with modern harness belts - but the original custom dashboard with the original gauges and the original steering wheel that had been installed by the previous owner.
And it had gotten done in time. The car was finished and ready for testing in the first week of September. True to her word, Monique had invited the elderly Woodmouse woman, Mrs. Tenderson, who had so much history and so many wins on that track, to ride with her in the car while she took it for several laps around the track. Easy at first, to get a feel for the car and how it reacted to the inputs with all the new and improved parts it had received, but gradually harder and harder, until she was flying full tilt around the track in a bid to improve the laptimes she had set with her Ford Mustang race car. Much to the joy of the old woodmouse woman, who sat in the passenger seat with both paws holding on to the harness and giggling like a schoolgirl, constantly egging Monque on to go even faster.
Shaving a few seconds off her personal best laptimes, Monique had decided the car was worthy enough to be entered into the first race of the season, several days later. Doto was invited to be in the pits - even if the serval woman still pointedly refused to do any work on the car any time Monique might pull into the pits during the race as she still was afraid to mess anything up and possibly get Monique hurt. Of course, Mrs. Tenderson was invited into the pits as well. The frail old lady who actually was a former race car driver would have gone anyway, but Monique thought it no more than courteous to give her a special pitlane pass.
It was just a friendly race. A warm-up for the season to come. No points, no standings for a championship, just a friendly get-together to get back into the swing of things after the heat and tropic's schedule of the summer.
But racers were racers. And they would always be racers. So of course there was still a healthy helping of competitiveness going around even in such a friendly event. And some playful ribbing of each other when they all lined up in their starting grid positions. Especially since Monique started in fifth position. Even the elderly woodmouse woman couldn't resist making a teasing remark about that as she leaned on the pitlane wall, dressed in a Fox Body Garage pit crew overall.
"Oh come on now, miss Winters, fifth starting? Really now."
"But, uh... that's not too bad, isn't it?" Doto said, a tad hesitantly.
"Pole position is good, dear," the elderly mouse woman chortled. "If you're not first, you may as well be last."
"Uhm... yes, I guess so..?" Doto said with a light nod, but also a light shrug.
Mrs. Tenderson nodded as well and motioned at the grid of cars.
"Pay attention now, dear, they're about to go! Whoo!"
Indeed, in the small tower by the start/finish line, a marbled fox man held up a flag, and a raccoon man held up a board reading "10 seconds". A moment later, a board reading "5 seconds". Another moment later, the red lights went out and the fox man jerked down the flag. In a roar of engines and small clouds of smoke being thrown up by a number of tires, they were off!
The Fairy Pond Park race track was configured in a clockwise fashion, as the new track had been built around the old, original dirt track and it shared the buildings of the pitlane with the original pitlane of the original track. A stretch of straight, a long, sweeping curve to the right, leading into a shallow chicane. From there, another sweeping turn that narrowed as it went to the right, leading towards the hill where the Fairy Spring welled up and formed a little creek that tumbled down the side of the hill to feed the Fairy Pond. A sweeping right-hander around the side of the pond, a sharper left-hander leading up the hillside, smoothly running over into a long, again sweeping turn to the right leading into a long and shallow chicane over the top of the hill and around the aquifer of the Fairy Spring. A set of sharper S-shaped curves after that, leading down at the other side of the hill and into yet another long and sweeping right-hand turn, which in turn led into a stretch of straight. A short left turn to take the speed out, a right turn of almost ninety degrees leading onto the front straight running right towards the start/finish.
Monique was doing pretty well. By the time the group of cars descended the hill and swept through the final right-hand turn towards the start/finish line, the lilac Hudson had advanced two places, into third. Mrs. Tenderson cheered and waved as the cars sped by the pit lane, Doto merely smiled and hid a chortle behind a paw at the elderly woodmouse woman's schoolgirl-like enthusiasm. Another lap. And another. And another. Monique kept up well, advancing to second position and keeping the others behind her.
It was just a short race. Short enough to not require any pit stops. Doto and Mrs. Tenderson were the only people in the pit lane at Monique's spot. They certainly had an excellent seat there to watch the race unfold. Another lap. Yet another one.
And another one. Monique fell back to third in the first right-hand turn. To fourth, to fifth in the chicane. All the way down to eight by the time they went around the side of the Fairy Pond. Mrs. Tenderson shook her head as she looked at the screen showing the race over the part of the track that was behind the pit lane buildings.
"What's she doing? C'mon miss Winters, you're just circulating now! That's not competing! Go fast! You can go fast, so go fast!"
"I think there might be something wrong actually, missus Tenderson," Doto said with her head a bit canted as she also looked at the screen. "Momo wouldn't drop back so much if something wasn't the matter." A faint smile curled her lips. "I may not know a lot about racing, but I know enough about Momo to know she's very competitive."
"She's not giving the others much competition now, though," Mrs. Tenderson said with a shake of her head. "Like I said, at the moment she's not even racing, she's just circulating."
They both turned their attention back to the track when the first cars started appearing around the final right-hand turn leading onto the front straight. In the group of sixteen cars, Monique was now in tenth position. And it seemed like Doto had been correct; partly down the front straight, the lilac Hudson pulled out of the group and entered the entrance of the pitlane, quite slowly, and with steam billowing from the front of the car.
Approaching her spot in the row of garage boxes, Monique waved a paw at Doto and Mrs. Tenderson to indicate they should get out of the way. Both of them stepped aside, letting the blue-skinned vixen turn the car right into the garage box. The engine was shut off, the driver door opened, and a moment later Monique twisted herself out of the car over the side bars of the race cage.
"What went wrong, Momo?" Doto asked as Monique took off her helmet and shook out her blue hair.
"You cooked her, miss Winters!" Mrs. Tenderson said with a light chortle, waving a paw at the clouds of steam still pouring from the front of the car.
"Yep," Monique nodded with a chortle of her own. "The electric fan failed. I was watching the temp gauge climbing and climbing as we headed for the hill, and going up, it pegged and she puked out her guts. Guess I still have a bit more work to do before this old lady is truly competitive."
"That, uh... it looks and sounds kinda bad?" Doto ventured.
"It looks worse than it is," Mrs. Tenderson smiled, letting go another chortle. "You have some work to do, miss Winters! I would check the wiring of the electric fan if I were you, heehee!"
"Yeah, I think it might have melted," Monique nodded with a light giggle, taking off her gloves and unzipping her overalls. "But hey, better that I find that out now rather than in an actual competition, right?"
"Very true!" Mrs. Tenderson nodded. "Let me know if you need any help getting the teething problems out of this car, miss Winters!"
Monique giggled cheerily.
"I will, missus Tenderson, promise. But for now, we better let her cool down a bit so I can load her onto the trailer."
Not really a very positive result for a first actual race. But it had still been a lot of fun!
