Bowler

Bowler

Part 1 - Part 2

I met Victor in front of his office. He was parking his silver Land Rover Discovery 3 in the underground parking of the building. From the top of the ramp, where I was standing, I could make out a Land Rover Defender 130, in the headlights of the Disco - it began as quite a good day.

My 110 was parked outside and i felt happy to know that there's more than three Landys in such close proximity. Little did I know that, hidden behind a wall, laid silently one of the most impressive pieces of race engineering known to man. As i started walking down the ramp it began to show ... first the Range Rover headlights and grill, then the 20 inch Kuhmo tires and then we met face to face. This is the story of the Bowler Nemesis and it's owner - Victor Fulicea ... Because the story deserved a proper space, we decided not to cut it short or modify it so what you are going to read is the transcript of Victor telling me how it all came to be...

"It all started after World War One when my great-grandparents, who would have loved to have a boy, had a girl. My great-grandfather said "No worries, we'll make her into someone that will make us proud". He was a man who had had a very active life. He ran away from home when he was 16 years old and signed up with the Foreign Legion but told the soldiers (when he was close to becoming of age) that he's not 18 - his parents had held a burial ceremony because they thought he was dead, since he didn't say anything to anyone about leaving.

So anyway, he had this daughter, my grandmother, who did all possible sports in the world - available at that time anyway - she almost got her pilot license but when she had to get the papers the legislation was changed and it required her to be 18 years and she wasn't at the time so she couldn't get it. But the paper didn't matter, it was the experience that made a difference. After that, the motorcycles... the motorcycles were her greatest passion. She raced in Romania and sometimes even beat the boys and her father was extremely proud of her. Once she fell and something happened to one of her hands and my great-grandfather started shouting from the sidelines:

"Come on, if you can, finish the race!"

His friends, on the side were shouting back:

"Stop! Are you insane, you're going to get her killed!".

Communism came to town and all the smiles slowly faded. Everyone did their fair share of jail, my grandmother twice - she was excluded from sports but she sneaked into a shooting range once, so she ended up doing that sport for a while as well. After all this came the cars, and she raced in a few Tour D'Europe and some areas in Northern Africa, driving some cars that were less prepared than the rest but she loved every second of it.

And now, back to our days when, three years ago, I was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease which is incurable and that time is relevant in these cases - depends from person to person. My doctor told me it's high time i put my affairs in order and that'd be about it. In short, I figured i should live my life to the fullest. Thank God I was misdiagnosed, but I only found this out after 2 years of searching through Europe for cures. At some point in these two years, I told my grandmother, half joking of course, that I've always been fascinated by the Paris Dakar rally and that I might have found a truck to use and she said "Yes! Let's do it!" - she had a lot of land, sold it and she helped me pay for this hobby. She was very supportive. At first I got to Paul Round's place, with my best friend who was my copilot in the beginning. He is really into cars, unlike me - I love driving but he loves the works. He knows a lot of stuff about how they work and he's always my wikipedia for auto issues. If he knows he's quick to tell me and if he doesn't he knows exactly who should be asked for the best answer.

We got to Paul Round's place and saw the cars and of course we were mesmerized - we left there and were on our way to Matzker because they do Defenders as well. I had a thing for Land Rovers because of the issue with mechanics - it had to be something that was LR based. In the Manchester International, my copilot Dan saw a Land Rover Owner magazine that had Drew Bowler's Wildcat on the cover and shouted:

"Look, there's the Desert Warrior, just better looking"

We started looking for Bowler. Drew told me he'll keep me posted because they are currently developing the Nemesis and some months later he told me that he sold his rights to QT and this transition took a lot. So I bought a Defender and I imagined how and what should be done. I did indeed build that truck and drove it around.

Long time after talking to Drew I found the Bowler Wildcat, forgotten in a yard in Budapest. The car was Palik's, who is a real name in Hungarian Rally Raid, but he used it only briefly. He broke his arm and abandoned early in the Dakar but he'd already made a name for himself so the guys from Nissan took him on board. And thus he ended up with an extra truck that became useless. They put up an ad that had been left there for some years, but since they didn't really speak English or answer their phones too often and since I found myself with my Defender broken up I was happy to hear of someone looking to sell their Bowler. Of course, the first thing I did was talk to my grandmother and get advice from her. If I am to live my life again, I'd probably ask everyone else for advice before asking her because when it came to rally raids, her answer was always:

"Yes, do it fast, while you're young. You won't live forever and when you'll have kids and such you'll have to slow this thing down..."

She had an excellent point of view and arguments, especially since I feel she's reliving bits of her youth through me. The guys in my team always keep her posted on everything that's going on with the races - she never calls me but he always calls them:

"How is he? What's he done? Is he ok? Is he in a good mood? Is the car ok?"

It's very fun...

So anyway, the Hungarians sell me the car, I pay for it and they say:

"It's ready to race"

... and so we set on a sort of crusade with Marian, our so-called mechanic who had some knowledge in the field of cars, me as the so-called pilot, with very vague knowledge of how to race and Dan as my copilot who had very vague ideas about roadbooks and terratrip systems. We had less than no clue about anything. So we set on the road for the raid in Timisoara. We didn't have a platform, and we set off with the Bowler on the wheels and my Discovery 3, which was filled with tons of stuff. Marian was driving it and, from behind it looked like a ship in stormy weather.

We got there and started the race - mud, speed, fun. Dan was trying to get me to slow down a bit because I was pushing it in the way I imagined I should. We passed a lot of cars and we were very happy. Well until the clutch failed, anyway. We got it off the truck and it was completely obliterated. I don't think the Hungarians were aware of the state it was in when they sold it. When we first drove it, I thought it was slipping but since I had no clue of the car and how it should work, we made up some reasons to explain it. They were all silly, of course, since the car had almost no clutch for a good long while. Even so, we managed to get the second place in the day but had to abandon because we couldn't find a place to change the thing, although we had a new clutch with us - it was the year the Dakar was cancelled.

I got to talking with Technoraid because I found out that they were the best assistance team after Bowler's. They always have about 4 Wildcats in their yard so they know their cars. They were busy with the Dakar and had no time for us but after New Year's and the Dakar cancellation guess what?

 

They had plenty of time and unfortunately absolutely no profit. I asked them to take a look at my car and they agreed so I sent it over for a check-up. They changed almost everything, thus doubling the sum I invested in the car. The Hungarians made some mods which, because they had no clue of the type of vehicle that the Bowler is, they thought would be fine. For instance they took out its engine, which was a masterpiece from JE Engineering and put some random refurbished engine instead. Technoraid changed a lot of things and so we got to talking about races and I was invited to participate in the Dakar Series. At that point I knew I wasn't going to die anymore. At the end of the day the problem was something else, a residual embryonic stomach, which should in general disappear but doesn't in 4 cases out of 1000. So anyway I programmed my operation to have it removed and we decided then and there: We're going to the Dakar Series.

Part 2 of Bowler...