15/06/2026
Rainy with a chance of skidz. And yes, there was a lot of sliding around in the rainfall. 7th June, 2026, the Castrol Fit participated in the 2nd Autocross Event of the year hosted by Trinbago Grassroots Autosports. It was a day filled with heavy precipitation. I managed to take first place while running the car with zero weight reduction and the daily road tires. With an event that has a greater focus on a vehicle's handling and driver technique, rather than all out horsepower, the Fit was in its comfort zone. However, this was not the usual day of racing... This post will get fairly long, so if you aren't interested in knowing about the upgrades and how it affected the car, you don't need to read on.
Special thanks to Castrol Trinidad & Tobago, FT Farfan Ltd. and CRC Industries Trinidad & Tobago for sponsoring me and the Fit. I can race confidentially knowing all investments made to the Fit are protected by their products.
So how were the suspension upgrades?:
This was the first time the car ever saw modifications (apart from installing tires). Up to this point, the Fit has been on its highly worn out shock and springs (approx 250,000km). The shocks were literally at the point of making knocking noises. I was fortunate enough to find some original Honda Modulo X shock and springs from the RS model Honda Fit. You can look it up, but Modulo is basically Honda's in-house performance division that offers a range of upgrades (cosmetic and performance). While the springs are still designed primarily with comfort in mind, it does offer improvements in ride stability/corning. Not only that, but the rear suspension also came with an OEM Sway bar. Lastly, the car now has bigger front brakes (Honda Civic 16c size) and rear disc brakes (compared to drum brakes from before).
With these upgrades, I was curious to see how much more I could get out of the car. Sadly, because my race class did all of its laps in the heavy rain/very wet track, I couldn't get a clear idea of how much improvement was made from the upgrades. Comparing my lap times to other classes really isn't an apples to apples comparison. This means I can't really tell you how much faster the car is. What I can say, however, is that the car is way more composed. I have a lot less body roll going through the corners, so it doesn't look like it wants you to pet its underside. What's more important also is the rate at which the car leans. The improved shocks also slows down the rate at which the car leans when corning, thus preventing the car from literally skipping when it used to 'throw over' to the side and slam against the bump stops, causing the car to actually hop which changes directions quickly. The rear sway bar also creates a little extra slide in the rear, allowing me to rotate the car through the corners, helping me to line up for corner exit. Lastly, I can't really say the bigger brakes helped me because the brakes were constantly cooled by driving through the rain. However, I can say that on my way to the race track in the morning, while slowing down relatively briskly from 100km/h for a traffic light, the brakes held a consistent braking force. Before with the smaller brakes, I would instinctively add more braking force to the pedal to compensate for the heat added to the small rotors. So, were the upgrades beneficial? I would definitely say yes. Sadly, I couldn't measure the increase due to the rainfall. Hopefully next event I can give a better conclusion.
