What can I say... it has been a pretty busy week for me, as for the first time in my entire life I'm actually getting involved in a motor sporting event! A few years ago I never even once thought I would work with a race crew before, and yet here I am sitting here talking about my experience lol...

Well, to be honest I wasn't really involved in preparing all the cars for the race (I had another kind of job to do for the team unfortunately) but I did help out a bit when they needed me. Wow... I'm just really tired to write about everything in this post, but I just wanted to say that the experience being on the race track is just immense. If there is one advice I could give, is that a motorsport life is not easy! The fact that the cars have to be prepare, test, repair, adjustments, and all those other things all within a few hours is just crazy. Not to say that its impossible to do those kind of things, but something to remind me that I really really have a lot to learn before I could be one of them.

The race itself was pretty good, as the team I am with managed to get 1st and 2nd place in the Asian Touring Car Series (albeit, it was 2 different drivers in 2 different races) and 3rd place in the Asia GT4 championship. Not bad considering for a small team with most of my instructors (yes, you read that right) from TOC being the race mechanics for the team lol. Anyway, that is all for now as I am really really need to get some rest after these past week haha. I might write a full story on the event someday, but until then just look around if you can find any interesting articles on the AFOS event.

Missed the Monaco F1 race for this? Yeah, but I guess I can't blame anyone for that...

Okay, so if anyone read any of my tweets on Twitter, Facebook, or Myspace then you might be wondering what I was going on about then right? Well, if my recent tweet is anything to go by, then you would have probably clicked on the link and wondered... TOC OTTO Camp?

Well if you were wondering, its nothing much really. Its just some sort of introduction to the automotive world and the college for those who are interested. (anyone can go and visit I think) But what is different from all the other previous OTTO camp was that this time the workshop that I'm working with is involved. Just yesterday night they sent the Aston Martin V8 Vantage GT4 to my college for a demonstration, and well, today they (as in my boss and sifu) even had a
conference (or talk, not sure what is it that you call it) with everyone in TOC, and said that I was the first person in TOC to actually be working with them. My sifu also told me today that I'm currently working at one of the most expensive workshop that any TOC students had ever worked with!

Damn, I'm not sure what to say though. Maybe I'm lucky or maybe I'm unfortunate but I'm just... speechless! I mean, I'm probably the only student in TOC (well, as far as I know at least) who is working with a racing team (S&D Motorsports is what my workshop is associated with) and get to work on high end sports cars on my first on-job training. Who else has gotten the opportunity to do this? LOL, but anyway even as good as it sounds I just with I had a normal workshop like everyone else. I don't know, not saying that I don't appreciate working with this workshop (I really do) but I just don't get it. Why me? Why not anyone else? Its not like I have a good past experience (I never worked before in my life prior to this) nor do I have good results to show for it. Seriously, I feel like my classmates deserve to get this place more than I do. All I can do is just f*** things up! *sigh*

TOC, the workshop, my family, my friends, and probably just about anyone I knew has high expectations for me. Why oh f**king why does it HAVE TO BE ME!!? What the f*** did I do to deserve this? As with anything in life I guess, all I can say is whatever and just move on. I don't care. If I let anyone down its not my problem, you people are just expecting too much from a person like me. I cannot deliver any results nor am I gonna make anyone proud, all I can say is just accept it as it is. I would rather die than having to put up with all this pressure...

Anyhow, sorry for posting that crap. I just want to clear some things up with you people. I know that I might be repeating some stuff here (as usual) but bear with me, I'm just trying to let my feelings and thoughts go on this post just to make myself feel a "little" better. But if anyone is interested, please do go to the OTTO camp. I might be involved, I might not but at least you can get to enjoy being there and learn something!

Aston Martin in TOC OTTO Camp
The Otomotif College

Just when I thought my life would get any worse, I've just seen the light at the end of the tunnel. Been thinking lately about whether becoming a mechanic was a good idea and that going to college was a mistake and that I should have become a NEET or something cause somehow I just don't feel right about working. Kept doing the wrong things, making mistakes, breaking stuff, etc. I though I would just give up and do something else...

But after today, my mind has kinda changed slightly. Of course I still do feel a bit sad (I'm emokid, what do you expect?) after all the troubles that I caused in the 4 weeks that I've been working at the workshop so far, and after doing something terrible the day before (not work related) I just wish that I could stop doing everything and just lock myself up in my room and think about all the things that I've done. So what happened today that got me motivated you say? Something car/work related of course... *cough*

After working on the Nissan Skyline GT-R R32 for so many weeks the car finally got running after everything was done. Then today after some tweaks and stuff the car was able to drive on the road again. Couldn't believe how amazing it is that the car was from being abandoned by the previous workshop owner, to being completed with the people that I'm working with now. But most of all, not only to get the car in a working and running condition was an accomplishment, but to get to ride shotgun in a shakedown was just something else. I guess you can say it was "the fruit of our labor" (even though I didn't really do much lol).

Another surprise was that I get to ride in the Nissan Silvia S15 as well! But I got to say, after being inside both of these cars and being driven at the scruff of the neck my perspective of tuning and cars in general has changed. Boy oh boy what a feeling it was to feel the surge of power coming from each of these car... definitely a lot more exhilarating than my crappy i10! But of course, it didn't happen if I didn't work for 14 hours either... (went to work at 9am, came back home at 11pm)

But really, I do hope this will give me some motivation on doing my training, and work and study hard to achieve my far-fetched goal...

Oh, and the link to the picture above:
sdobbins.com's flickr