By J.R. Breen
Contributing Writer
Many expatriates play sports on weekends such as golf, soccer and even hockey, but one group is involved in something more dangerous and exhilarating.
David Mcintyre, Rishikesh Ramachandran and Michael Gorham are motor-sport enthusiasts, members of the Waegukin Racing Team (``waegukin'' meaning foreigner), which is part of Speed Festival, a motor-racing series that's been organized by the Korea Motor Sport Association (KMSA) since 2003.
"There is a lot of trading of paint, trading of bumpers and trading of everything," said Mcintyre from Britain, general manager of South Korea and South East Asia for Bentley Motors Ltd.
"It is a real community of enthusiasts," said Ramachandran, an Indian market research consultant based in Seoul. "The idea is that you can take your everyday car and with some slight modification you can race it."
The drivers buy their cars secondhand for around six million won. They keep the interior of the car as it is and modify it only by adding a roll cage, racing suspension and a fire extinguisher -- something that, luckily, the team has never had to use.
The racing team was formed for an endurance race last year, somewhat by accident.
Mcintyre, Ramachandran and Gorham created stickers for their endurance team, and "After that, we were announced as `Mcintyre - WRT, Gorham - WRT'; naturally (we) became an official team," Ramachandran said.
The team had hoped to begin practices sooner, but poor weather has held them back, so they are looking to start this weekend.
The first race of the season is set for early next month.
The team races in a tournament called Speed Festival; they are the only foreigners on the circuit. The festival has two divisions that race separately, the Hyundai Click and the Kia Forte.
WRT, who use the compact, 1.6-liter engine Click, race once a month during the April-to-November season. They also do a four-hour endurance race in the summer.
Although the cars are essentially road cars, this does not stop the sport from being full contact.
"If somebody is driving slowly in front of you, the only solution you have is to find a safe corner and shunt him -- there is a lot of contact," said Ramachandran, who has rolled his car once before.
"There are usually 10 retirements and one write-off each race," Mcintyre said. "I rolled my car three times, but that is a worst case scenario."