i was in the black one, quick enough to not get lapped (i was in the pack w/ the h4 guys all weekend)...

the white Se-R racing w/ us went off in the same corner as the prelude and smashed up his driver side, it is repairable but he packed it in for the weekend..


too bad about adam's ( i think that is his name) prelude, he runs right w/us Se-Rs and we have had some good racing this year


there was also a blue Gt-3 porsche that tore up its front on sat and was trailered home.....definitely a lot of carnage this weekend

 

Propellerhead, which car were you? I wish I would have read this thread before the event, because I've been very eager to meet you and see your car? Did you have the BBY w/stroker and GT35r? If so, I was the GG MR with #7 and r-comps.

It was my first road racing event, and I don't think I will ever be satisfied with any other form of racing for the rest of my life. Autocrossing and drag racing just took a back seat, which is unfortunate, because that was some pretty expensive stuff once you combine the event cost, race tires, race gas, brake maintenance, etc. As hard as I was going (corded my r-comps), I don't think I will be able to do it with any regularity until the MR is no longer a daily driver.

It was also a downer to have our new Evo buddy Evan nail the wall, but it was very fortunate that he was not injured. I had the unfortunate luck of coming around turn 10 really hot on an M3's *** right when it happened, which means I was no more than a few seconds away from being right in the middle of it, since he crossed from left to right across the track right after turn 10. I actually saw the impact with the wall when all the tires went flying...it was scary to say the least...

 

NO, it wasn't, it was a DRIVER'S EDUCATION event.

This is an important distinction

IMHO - shelve the R-tires for now - especially if you still have your stockers. Street tires will give you better feedback and let go more progressively than race tires will. In other words if you are going to screw up you are more likely to get warning if you are on street tires

You corded your R-comps in one weekend? How were they when you started?

He had an instructor, too..

 

It's still called "road racing" in general. I didn't say I was in a race.

I see no reason to shelve the r-comps, because I was able to go much, much faster with much better lines during those 4 sessions. On the street tires, I still did very well and passed just about everyone, but it was not nearly as fun. I am not doubting you on the "better feedbacK" and such, but I was doing quite well and had much more fun when I had the better tires. They were on the verge of going bad when I showed up, so I was happy to get almost 4 full sessions out of them.

Yah, he had an instructor that was also not injured, but I saw no reason to repeat that. Feeling nit-picky today or what?

 

Yep, that was me. I'm sorry I didn't come down to chat with you guys. I get to those events and I look at the schedule and think that I've got alot of down time between runs. But the reality is that between classroom sessions, maintenance and food and potty break that time goes by verrry quickly.

Heh, you got bitten by the bug. It's certainly not a cheap weekend adventure. You'll be able to whittle down some of the cost of tires and brakes as you learn to get your car set up. Plus as your skill level goes up you probably won't be as hard on those parts, especially the brakes.

What kind of tires were you running? I've managed to get three weekends out of my Toyo RA1s so far and it looks like I'll be able to get at least one more event out of them. Also, what camber are you running up front? My car is maxed out at -1.8 degrees. In my case a little more camber would really help with the wear I'm seeing at the shoulder.

BTW, if you're not running the Toyo RA1s then I would highly recommend them. They stick very well and are VERY predictable at the limit. Even when they get too hot they don't get squirrelly.

Yeah, that wreck was a major reality check. I was sitting in the paddock with one of the MachV guys when we saw the puff of dust suddenly rise up from somewhere behind the pit wall near the area of the exit of turn 10. A split second later we saw Evan's car smack into the wall and pitch rear end up. It was a pretty dramatic sight, especially seeing the smoke billowing from the hood vent as his instructor was scrambling to climb out of the window. I'm glad they were both okay and hopefully the instructor's neck will be okay. That car was seriously tweaked.

There's a chance I'll sign up for the next NASA event at Summit in October. I've got some major rethinking to do with my current set up between now and then. The GT35R on the stroker is great from a spool up perspective but it has major issues with compressor surge under partial throttle conditions. Depending on my exit speeds out of turn 10 (>90mph+) I was hitting an indicated 135-140mph by the time I was approaching the first braking marker at turn 1. Apparently I really don't need to run any more than 20psi of boost at the track otherwise bigger brakes are in order.

 

I was just on my Kumho Ecsta V700s that I have used during the whole autocross season since April. I have no suspension mods and have not changed my alignment, so I'm at stock camber. Filip suggested that I should have the eccentric bolts moved all the way so that I have -1.7 camber, since this would provide better grip as well as more even wear on my race tires while not affecting my daily driving wear, but I have been hesitant to change anything on what is my daily driver. After seeing my tire cord on the outside while still having plenty of tread on the inside, I am pretty sure I'll have that camber adjustment done along with an alignment before next season. For now, I'll just slap some winter tires onto the race wheels in preparation for the Colorado winter, then snag some new tires for next season in the Spring. I'll have to decide on a tire that is good for autocross and road racing. I had wanted the Ecsta V710, but if those don't hold up well to road racing, then I might just do the RA-1s.

As for turn 10 and the straightaway, if unabated, I was exiting right at 90mph (at the moment I unwound the wheel), and was maxing out at 135 at best down the end of the straightaway. Most of the time, I was only hitting 120, because I'd either have to wait for a passing signal, or I'd be stuck behind someone who can't brake as well at the end. I also found myself letting off much earlier than necessary at the end out of fear of hitting turn 1 too fast. I wasn't pulling very hard up around 130-135 either, so it's not like I would have gone that much faster even if I held the throttle open longer.

We kept going to the top of the hill during your sessions in hopes of seeing you get some clean runs down the straightaway. Most of the time, you were having to pass or wait, but we did see a few wide open pulls, which was nice. It did seem that you were louder than you were fast, but it's hard to visualize speed without a reference. If you were only running 20psi for the day, then that would make sense. I'm sure that setup makes a lot more power at 28psi, but not sure you can bother with that psi during a 25-min road course session...

 

How much does it cost to do the drivers ed and have a little fun afterwards?

 

The event cost $299 + $40 for the NASA membership. There is no "a little fun afterwards." All of your track time is part of the HPDE (High Performance Driving Event). If you do well enough, your instructor can sign you off for solo driving, but the same rules still apply. I saw that propellerhead got a "solo" sticker on day 2, and my instructor gave me "solo" approval, too, but that all changed when I corded a race tire. Since I had to go back to street tires, he wanted to ride with me again, since I basically had to re-learn every turn...

 

The only advantage to going solo is losing 150-200 pounds of relatively dead weight. If you manage to hook up with a good instructor it's really worthwhile having a second set of eyes in the car that knows the line and can provide some good feedback. I was fortunate to have Eric Wong as an instructor. We worked together at a track event last year at BeaveRun and I really enjoy his style of coaching.

As far as my car being more noise than go, despite 400whp at Ultimate it certainly is, especially in 5th gear. For some reason whenever I would shift into 5th the fuel mixture was going pig rich to around 10.3-10.4. You could feel the power sapping away as the ECU moved into a certain load and RPM area of the map. I fear that it's going to take some extensive test and tuning time at the track with an AEM tuner who digs and fully understands roadracing to ever get the car running at peak efficiency. <master of the obvious>Drag race tunes created on a dyno just don't cut it at a road track.</master of the obvious> I don't know if I have the patience or the time and money to fully sort it all out.

Really, 300-350 at the wheels is more than enough if you're worth a damn as a driver, especially if you want to play with your track friends. Make a pact and keep all your track buddies in the same hp/weight ratio, you'll have much more fun.

 

I didn't see any track hoes.

 

That's funny

Nice meeting you yesterday btw.

Filip

 

Some pics from Saturday...

 

Yeah, I knew about the 400whp on the dyno, but it really didn't seem like it when you hit 5th, just like you said. Basically, what you were feeling in 5th and seeing on the wideband is what I "observed" from the hill. You were still obviously faster than just about everything else in HPDE2 down the straights, but it didn't seem to be full bore like that setup is capable of doing. YOu fully understand the nuances of track vs dyno tuning, so no need to harp on that. I personally would have no clue what to do at the level of tuning while using an AEM EMS.

That leads me to your next point where you mentioned having the most fun by racing with track friends in the same power range. Of the 4 of us from DcEvo that went together, we all just dyno'd at a recent Dyno Day within 10whp of each other (294, 296, 298, 302) with torque readings within 15 points (269/284), so we were all in the same realm of power, which made it lots of fun. We all tossed in 100oct as well, but I'm probably the only one who turned up the boost and tuned for it with the S-AFC. The other guys were just doing it for knock reduction and overall safety. Even I refrained from turning up the boost more than 1-1.5psi over my pump levels, nor did I take much fuel out on the S-AFC. Our only problem was that 2 of us had r-comps while 2 didn't, although I did go back to street tires for our last session.

Wojo, post up some of that video for us at turns 1/2/3!

 

It was good to meet you too. That pic of your crawling up that MR2's *** is funny. I got 20 minute lecture for doing that to the girl in the silver WRX wagon in our run group. Her instructor, some guy named Ian, was her private coach. He very polite me told me that I needed to back off, especially through turns 5,6,7,8 & 9 because I was intimidating her and potentially scaring away the talented noobs. I suggested that if she was intimdated that perhaps she still belonged in group 1 to build her skills & confidence. Ian explained that group one was only for people who had never been on track and that since this was her 4th or 5th(!) event this summer at Summit Point she belonged in group 2. If that's how group 2 is classified, it might be time to move up to group 3. I rode with Dan Hurwitz for a group 3 session and it was far less crowded and fewer trains since they had open passing. As long as I'm not a rolling road block I'd rather be giving people the point by than be stuck in a 6 to 8 car train.

Hey, what wheel size & rubber are you running front and rear on your car? Same size? It almost looks like the rear is slightly wider?

 

Heh, that's funny. I was doing the same thing to a few people (including Mr. no-point-by black Z06) who couldnt seem to find it in their heart to let me pass. It seemed by Sunday that the people I came up behind were much better at pointing.

Your name is Steve, right? I came up and introduced myself yesterday. It was nice meeting you and Filip this weekend.