Nationals Winning Challenge Car Makes Its Way To France

[Dave L @ FFR]

Here’s a great story about the depth and reach of the Factory Five community from Challenge Series Racer Tim K. Back in 2008, Tim brought a friend of his, Nicholas, visiting from France, to a Factory Five Challenge Series event at Thunderhill Raceway in northern California. Nicholas had a blast at the event and the dark blue and white Factory Five Challenge Car made a strong impression on the visiting French man.



A few year’s later, Nicholas found a way to purchase that car which turned out to be the Factory Five-NASA Challenge Series Nationals winning Challenge Car from the 2007 champion, Dave Standridge! The car now is garaged (if you can call this a garage) at Chateau de Vinzelles which is located in the beautiful Beaujolais wine region of France.



Nicholas has the car at a 13th century residence while he is working on restoring his house a few miles away and took advantage of this great photo oppertunity. And don’t worry; Nicholas is still driving the Challenge Car around as Tim reports that on a recent visit, they took it out which caused “jaws dropping, fingers pointing, and thundering echos made grape harvesters stand up and search for the sound from entire valleys away. Not a common sight as you can imagine.”



Almost 70 years after American troops liberated France, how cool is it to see a Factory Five parked in this spot! Thanks for the great story Tim and congratulations to Nicholas! Hope to hear more great stories of you driving the Challenge Car around France. Thanks to Karen Salvaggio for forwarding this story to us.