Steven Chen’s Turbo Terror

from MotorWerks Magazine - Volume 11, Issue 3

Ford Fanatics, a race series for Ford lovers

Steven Chan’s

Words by Enrique McLeggon Images by Yia Lor of Yia Lor Photography, Matt Viramontes of MCV Imagery and Gorilla Tornado

Steven Chan’s career in grassroots motorsport started 15 years ago when he first competing in autocross with a Mazda RX-8 that he previously owned. At the time, he was not all that serious about competing and was just messing around as he really enjoyed driving and autocross was a great outlet for that. He soon after decided to settle down so he got married and later had two kids that he loves dearly, he also focused on elevating his work career meaning that all his carrelated activities came to an end. Even though his life was changed, Steven wouldn’t stop thinking about cars and always dreamt of one day owning a Nissan R35 GT-R and in 2015 he made that dream a reality. After owning it, he realized that he really enjoyed the car and being the responsible person that he is, he decided to test it out on the track. He started off by doing a few HPDE events and as he progressed and got faster, he started to wonder how he would fare against others and so he went on searching for different series to compete in. Steven started off with a local series called Nissan Challenge and was then introduced to Global Time Attack in 2017 via a sponsorship from Ronnie at RD Engineering who had watched his success in Nissan Challenge. Chan managed to walk away with weekend victory at the event as well as reset the Limited Class AWD record at Streets of Willow. The GTA event was intimidating and also intense as it was Steven’s first time competing in an event with such a serious crowd of competitors where everyone wanted to win, not to mention that many of the cars looked quite serious. He wasn’t sure how he would do among this group of competition as well as he didn’t know how well the competition would do either. During his first few sessions of the weekend he was able to lay down a few decent laps but his competitors weren’t too far behind and he knew he had to go faster than 1:20 if he wanted to secure the lead. It was then decided during the last session that he and his team would switch to a fresh set of Nitto NT01 tires, to see if would help and be enough for him to go faster. It worked and he finished first in class as previously mentioned, along with the GTA Limited Class AWD record – 1:19.445. Despite his success however, this journey didn’t come without its challenges. Finding the right direction in terms of the car and honing his skills as a driver, as well as focusing on getting faster was difficult. There’s a lot of information out there available but deciding what works and doesn’t work for him was always a big gamble. Also, during competition the pressure is really and being able to stay calm no matter what happens yet driving hard is rather difficult and is not easily achieved. No matter how well he would prepare himself for a race event, things happen and everything doesn’t always go as planned. The reason he keeps coming back to Time Attack is the challenge the format brings. Not only is he challenged by other competitors but there’s also the challenge

via a sponsorship from Ronnie at RD Engineering who had watched his success in Nissan Challenge. Chan managed to walk away with weekend victory at the event as well as reset the Limited Class AWD record at Streets of Willow. The GTA event was intimidating and also intense as it was Steven’s first time competing in an event with such a serious crowd of competitors where everyone wanted to win, not to mention that many of the cars looked quite serious. He wasn’t sure how he would do among this group of competition as well as he didn’t know how well the competition would do either. During his first few sessions of the weekend he was able to lay down a few decent laps but his competitors weren’t too far behind and he knew he had to go faster than 1:20 if he wanted to secure the lead. It was then decided during the last session that he and his team would switch to a fresh set of Nitto NT01 tires, to see if would help and be enough for him to go faster. It worked and he finished first in class as previously mentioned, along with the GTA Limited

Despite his success however, this journey didn’t come without its challenges. Finding the right direction in terms of the car and honing his skills as a driver, as well as focusing on getting faster was difficult. There’s a lot of information out there available but deciding what works and doesn’t work for him was always a big gamble. Also, during competition the pressure is really and being able to stay calm no matter what happens yet driving hard is rather difficult and is not easily achieved. No matter how well he would prepare himself for a race event, things happen and everything

The reason he keeps coming back to Time Attack is the challenge the format brings. Not only is he challenged by other competitors but there’s also the challenge

to himself as a driver. Trying to be the fastest and win the competition is always the goal, but he always sets a target time for himself. The feeling of beating himself is just as good as the feeling he gets whenever he beats the competition. “It’s continuous challenge and when you think you’ve done your best, there’s always room for more.” To tell the true story behind the car, I have to back track a bit… Steven’s interest in cars started back when he was 16 years old and during that time, the car that he really admired was the Mitsubishi Eclipse GSX, even though he had an underlying love for the Evo IV which unfortunately was not available in America. Due to the fact that he was a student at the time and he didn’t have a budget, the Eclipse was too far out of reach and he opted to buy with a NA Miata instead. A few years have passed and Steven had gone through a few different cars, none of them being turbocharged nor AWD and so that left the desire to own a car where he could experience both. Then came along the R35, which met both criteria. Although the R35 does have its merits, it does have a few drawbacks when you decide to turn it into a race car. The first thing is the weight. The car was really heavy from the factory and while it’s easy to take off an initial weight of 300lbs off the car, removing more weight requires a lot of custom work and is quite costly. Steven has been trying to find the most cost-effective ways to reduce the weight as much as possible, such as using carbon fiber replacements for the headlights, doors etc., but the car still weights 3600lbs wet without driver. The next step is to probably switch to a sequential which means dropping the AWD and convert the car to a tube chassis but that will no doubt take the car to another level in terms of complexity and cost. The other main issue is the factory transaxle. With the fact that a lot of power is then needed to offset the weight of the car, the transmission usually takes a bit hit and the OEM transmission simply would not be able to hold all that power reliably. Steven upgraded to a HKS unit a few years ago but even then he still encountered transmission failures. The 4th gear in the HKS unit failed just before GTA Finals in 2020 and he had to get the transmission rebuilt, but there lied another problem. It wasn’t just about repairing the transmission but also the logistics behind getting it fixed. There are only a handful of transmission builders across the country who can rebuild the R35 GR6 transmission and because of that fact, their work is backlogged. In summary, the logistics involved with getting the transmission repaired has given Steven headaches and as he speaks, the transmission is acting up again, just before GTA Finals, again. He has every intention of making to GTA Finals at Buttonwillow Raceway. For the off-season, car changes will be kept to a minimum. He believes that he needs to get as much seat time as possible, especially since the pandemic has restricted the amount of driving he can do and he feels that his mind and body have fallen out of the zone a bit. He does feel like he’s back on track (pun not intended) in terms of driving ability and he believes that the more constructive seat time he can get the sooner he’ll be back at his best. He knows the car has a lot left in it as well, even more than the driver and it’s for him to extract it.