On the straight and narrow path
LUEBOYZ Racing and their Honda Civic, nicknamed ‘the Banana’, copped the Sexiest Car tag at the recent Jamaica Race Drivers Club’s Award held at the Jamaica Pegasus hotel in New Kingston.
LueBoyz Racing were on show at the Rubis Energy/Seaboard Marine Caribbean Invasion at Dover Raceway in St Ann on May 25 and 26.
“We’ve been working on this project since 2010 and were just waiting for the rule structure to come around and make us competitive,” Craig Lue, former drag racer, told Auto.
Lue made his mark as a drag racer, and those familiar with the sport may have recognised that the vehicle was the record-breaking ‘Banana’ converted to circuit duty. An icon in its heyday, the Banana retired as the fastest front-wheel drive drag car on the island running a 10.0-second quarter-mile at 149mph. It has only been recently pushed to second on that list.
After a lifetime of going straight, the vehicle has been repurposed to tackle the corners by Lue’s extensive racing knowledge.
“The chassis was here. We really didn’t have much of a problem converting it to circuit racing, but it was a whole new ballgame,” he said.
Gone is the 1800cc B-series motor, replaced by a 2.4-litre K-series built in conjunction with Florida-based Machines Gone Wild and tuned by Lance Ho-Lung. The package makes 280 wheel horsepower. The other half of the package was the driver. Behind was another familar face, Noel Golding Jr, who used to drive a Suzuki in the early days of Dover.
“I don’t doubt my skills. If I have to get behind the wheel and drive I can, but I get more pleasure from building and watching my work. That’s why someone else is driving,” said Lue.
According to Lue’s brother Dwight, Golding was the ideal choice.
Thrust into the middle of the very competitive Modified Production 3 (MP3), Golding claimed a second-place finish for the car on its debut, but teething problems during the remaining races halted any further podiums.
“The car was built in eight weeks and turned its first competitive wheel on race day, so we expect to get faster. Our aim is class leader Andre Anderson,” he said.
