Can You Have Fun Racing the Same Sports Car For Over 20 Years? Jared Floyd’s J-swap S2000 Shows there’s Always Room For Improvement.

LapMeta Drivers Spotlight: Jared Floyd

Human’s have a natural tendency to get attached to things. Some, more than others. With cars we feel the community is fairly split. You have some that regret selling their first or their favorite over the years. They cling to the one that got away. Others are smart enough to retain their prized possession and still have it stored safely in their garage with the sole intent of never selling it. We often hear the phrase “I will be buried in that car”. 

While on the other side of the spectrum we have people these days flipping cars faster than they can change shoes. In a modern world saturated with social media vloggers and YouTube influencers the idea of upgrading and moving up into something faster and more exotic than the previous car is becoming a common trend. If you’re not “leveling up” then you must not be going faster. 

Although he’s going against the grain, Jared Floyd and his J-swapped S2000 reveal you can still have fun developing, driving, and competing in an older sports car after two decades of ownership.
 

Jared drove his brand new Honda S2000 off the lot in April of 2002. The same car he competes in Global Time Attack with today, nearly 21 years later. Jared tells us that he's “always been a Honda fan. I appreciate the simplicity and engineering of Hondas. My dream car was an NSX. After graduating college and working as an engineer for a few years, I decided to splurge. At the time, used NSX’s were about the same price as a new S2000. I had driven both and liked the smaller and more nimble S2000 and thought it would be a better fit for daily driver, auto-x, and track use.”

Jared got into motorsports back in the 1990’s. “I started autocrossing in college and wanted to get on track.  My first time at a race track was a time trial competition at Lime Rock Park hosted by a local auto-x club. Three cars were totaled that day on track and I decided I really wanted to run more track events but needed proper safety gear (roll bar, harness, etc). Life happened and I continued competing in auto-x in my 1990 Civic Si. Once I bought the S2000, I continued to auto-x but fabricated a roll bar to start running HDPE events and time trials. I really enjoy the competition and the process of optimizing the car setup and driving performance”. Something that many today don’t have an appreciation for. The commitment to developing something over time is a lost art. We live in an on-demand world where words like development and craftsmanship aren’t applicable. 

Today his ’02 S2000 is fitted with J32A V6 from a 2002 Acura TL Type S. Certainly not your ordinary F22C1 under the hood. The swap certainly wasn’t a quick process but the personal sense of accomplishment from completing such a project, is what drove Jared to do it.

A few highlights of his build:

• 255/40-17 Yokohama A052
• Radium Engineering Fuel Surge Tank and Competition Catch Can
• Custom Wire Harness by @trever.mcdermott
• Spherical Bearings in all A-Arms provided by BlackTrax/Kingpin Machine
• Urge Design / Essex AP Racing Front Brakes
• Ohlin Shocks
• APR GT-250 Rear Wing
• Fluidampr S2000 crank pulley from Urge Designs
• P2R CNC Ported Cylinder Heads and intake runners
• Hawk Brake pads
• Custom parts by Sector One Design: Shift knob, vented hood, roll bar, rear lower tie bar, X-Brace, starter spacer, baffled and winged oil pan, alternator mount, CD-5 Dash mount

“I had been racing time trials with NASA NW and was competitive locally, winning two regional championships and setting some track records”, he tells us. “I raced at the NASA National Championships at Sonoma though and realized the top cars were all detuned to maximize power to weight throughout the usable rev range. My Rotrex supercharged 2.2 liter had a very peaky power band so the majority of time the power was significantly less than peak and power to weight wasn’t competitive.”

He ultimately suffered some ring damage that scored up his cylinder walls after that season. Rather than running it back and building another F22 based supercharged engine that might cost him an arm and a leg, he decided to go a different route that would be more competitive and more cost efficient in the long run.

“I thought an NA motor with more torque would better fit the hp to weight formula. InlinePRO makes engine mounts and a flywheel adapter for the stock trans so that part was easy. Everything else was custom. Wiring harness, coolant plumbing, oil plumbing, intake, exhaust, etc. But the engines are cheap. Mine is a junkyard $360 engine. Everything else adds up in a hurry but is a one-time purchase.  If I nuke the engine, it's very cheap to replace. My engine is all internally stock. I'm running ASP headers and homemade stainless exhaust. The heads are P2R CNC ported with stock cams and Supertech springs/retainers. I use a 2009 Acura TL AWD SH intake manifold which is magnesium and has a larger T-body inlet and I designed a 3D printed aluminum T-body adapter to mount a Hybrid Racing K-series T-body.  I'm also running S2000 injectors, crank pulley, and alternator.  The car now makes 285 whp on a dynojet and is tuned on an AEM Infinity ECU”. There wasn’t really an instructional manual for Jared to follow, but it was a labor of love that involved fabricating and innovating a lot of components himself. Having the opportunity to design things the way you want it to be, can be very rewarding, it just takes time and dedication.

When it comes to handling Jared admits the S2000 chassis leaves something to be desired. His motor swap wasn’t the only key ingredient in dropping his lap times. “Upgrading the suspension was the most important modification I made”, he tells us. “S2000's are a bit diabolical at the limit with the stock suspension. I'm running custom built Ohlins that started life as rear motorcycle coilovers. I revalved them and machined new upper and lower mounts.  The car is still very lively, but much less likely to snap on you... usually.” 

When it comes to developing the other half of the equation, Jared turned to a data acquisition system. “I purchased a Racepak G2X in ~2008 (still using it) and it changed everything. Both the immediate lap time feedback and predictive lap time and pouring over data provided significant gains in lap time from optimizing car setup and driving line/technique. They say that engineers aren’t boring people; they just get excited about boring things. I'm guilty of this as I spend lots of time staring at squiggly lines. I really enjoy analyzing the data to find tenths here and there.” As most of us know, discovering where those tenths are hiding and how to actually shed them from a lap is more difficult than it looks. It takes development, practice, and time.

Jared points to the competition and the camaraderie that the track community offers as to what brings him back every year. “It's great to have close competition with your friends. Everyone is very supportive and helpful and we all want to see each other improve. Some of my favorite memories were losing by tenths of a second. That's much more fun than winning by 6 seconds. The PNW time attack community is growing and the driver progress is staggering.  A few years ago, it was very rare to have drivers lapping the Ridge Motorsports Park under 1:50.  Now all the fast drivers & cars are in the mid 1:40's”. 

In over 20 years of competition with his S2000, Jared has won 5 championships between Auto-x and time trial events. He also holds several track records including at the Maryhill Hill Climb. A few of the recent accomplishments since completing the V6 Swap:

• 1st Place Season Championship 2022 OnGrid PNW Shootout Time Attack, Touring Class
• 1st Place 2022 OnGrid PNW Shootout Round 5 Time Attack, Ridge Motorsports Park - Touring Class
• 3rd Place 2022 OnGrid PNW Shootout Round 4 Time Attack, Oregon Raceway Park CW
• 4th Place 2022 Global Time Attack July Ridge Motorsports Park - Street Class
• 1st Place 2022 OnGrid PNW Shootout Round 3 Time Attack, Portland International Raceway - Touring Class
• 1st Place 2022 OnGrid PNW Shootout Round 2 Time Attack, Ridge Motorsports Park - Touring Class
• 2nd Place 2021 OnGrid Ridge Wars Time Attack, Ridge Motorsports Park - Modified Class
• 2nd Place 2021 Global Time Attack July Ridge Motorsports Park - Street
• 1st Place 2021 Global Time Attack April Ridge Motorsports Park - Street

Moving forward Jared does have a GR Supra build in progress. But unlike many other enthusiasts of today’s era, Jared will be holding onto his S2000 for the time being. He admits that “there are still a lot of other mods I'd like to develop / fabricate for the S2000 including more advanced aero”. With regards to his motorsports goals he plans to continue competing at local time attack events with his sights set on one day winning a National Time Attack Championship. He also wants to try his hand at some wheel to wheel competition. We look forward to following along with Jared’s future endeavors on track and his upcoming developments to S2000 and Supra.

Check out his onboard video from The Ridge Motorsports Park on LapMeta HERE.

Follow Jared and Sector One Design on Instagram at: @sectoronedesign