Battle of the D Prepared
I've been having problems with the supra transmission. To get it fixed
would take at least 2 months and a couple grand. The competition in my
class really wasn't that great last year. I had one friend who wrecked his
corvette in the first race so he was out the rest of the season. So I
decide that if I race my Honda (which is a ton cheaper to fix/race) I could be
in my cousin's class and the need to be faster would be more intoxicating.
There was a drivers school in April that I took the Honda up
for. My best run was a 1:42 as I had just installed new brake pads and was
having issues with stopping. After the event I drove to my mothers house
in Chicago and took the wheels off and examined the brakes. There is a c
clip type of thing that the pads used for a wear indicator, it didn't seem to
want to go through the caliper. so the pads were not touching the rotor at
all, hence no stopping. so I bent the clip back enough to clear the
caliper and put the pads back in, we have brakes again.
In my quest to be in John's class I needed to do some things
to the car. In dealing with a fresh car I could narrow in on the mods that
would help the greatest in autox. So I started with Tokico Illumina
Suspension Kits, AEM cold air intake, I've had an axle back exhaust for over a
year but never installed it since it needed bigger piping. A friend of
mine (the reverend Al) gave me his old DC sports Header so I had to find a
matching mid pipe and high flow cat. I also went to an old instructor I
had with the supra, Keith, who works at autotire and also is heavily into autox.
So I asked his advice on if I wanted 14's with r-compounds or 15's with street
tires. He persuaded me to invest in a new set of Konig Helium's with
Falken Azenis Sport tires. He assured me that
the Azenis would perform as well as the kd's do on the supra.
I was severely sick the wed/thurs/fri before the main event,
and still had to install the stuff on my car. Slowly and painstakingly it
happened. I was left with the harness, exhaust and mounting the tires and
getting an alignment on Friday. the tires/alignment took a little longer
than I expected and when I got back home I still had to do the harness and
exhaust. as I started doing the exhaust I realized the new header didn't
have a O2 bung hole. So I decided to hold off on the exhaust and do
the harness. by the time I was finished with that it was time to leave.
so I had to race with the stock exhaust.
We decided to trailer the car with our new 4runner. It
was nice not to worry about driving the car you were going to be racing.
But, it was certainly slower than driving the race car. we finally got
there at 1:30a.m. we got the tent up and beds put together and was trying to
sleep by 2. It was SOO COLD and we were sleeping on the ground with just a
sleeping bag. I didn't get much sleep and by 6:50 I was up taking the car
off the trailer.
I registered and got the car teched and waiting patiently for
the first practice session. I was originally going to run with practice
group 5 but went with 4 instead. While we were waiting in grid I noticed
Ross Fosbender in the car behind me. He was my first ever instructor at
gingerman in my supra. Ross also had a white supra that he wrapped around
a tree at Blackhawk. He seems to have a strong foothold in Midwestern
council and black hawk. I figured it wouldn't be long before he passed me.
On the first lap around, Ross didn't get right behind me until turn 6. I
knew I'd let him go on the straight away. so when we rounded turn 7 I gave
him the point and let him go. Then I tried to hammer it so I could stay
right behind him and watch his line. Through turn 1, 2, 3a I am right
behind him and everything seems ok but then going into turn 3b I see Ross's rear
end coming around so I slowed down and sure enough he does a 360 and is still
going. and follows up with a 180. but he stayed on the track.
I pass him and hammer the rest of the laps and overall it was good I didn't get
passed nor did anyone pass me. The car felt strong (for a Honda) and
everything seemed to do well. but when I pulled back into the paddock my
brakes were bellowing smoke. hmmm and then I noticed my brake peddle was
going to the floor again. hmm maybe its just cause they were hot. So
I let them cool off till the next practice session.
The next practice session john told me to run behind him.
I'm like "I'm not sure I can hang with group 3" he said yeah lets go. so I
did. As we were driving to the grid I noticed my brakes had not come back.
they were slowly stopping me at the floor, just like when I was at the drivers
school. Man was I nervous, but in the back of my head I knew that I
trailered the car here so I don't need to drive the car back home. And I
couldn't let john get that far ahead of me. so I followed thinking if
anything I'll go a lap and see how the do. well first lap I was doing
somewhat well. john wasn't that far in front of me. but by turn 7 i
had a mustang on my tail so I politely let him by and then managed to stay on
his rear the rest of the time. Again when the practice session was over I
pulled into the paddock and the brakes were bellowing smoke. I had no clue
what to do. I just let them cool down and looked at the brake fluid which
was black and nasty. However I had just bled them last week. Its
nearing lunch time so we have some time to go over the car. I bought some
motul brake fluid and bleed the brakes thoroughly, swapping all the old fluid
out for the new. then went for a test drive and also to get our tent which
was blowing over from all the wind and the brakes were no better. so I
broke down the camp and went back to our paddock and decided to take the wheels
off and look at the pads. well the wear indicator that I bent the last
time was again next to the caliper so I took the pad out and broke the indicator
completely off. I did the same to the other side and went for a test
drive. Nothing seemed to help.
The first timed run was called and I go out to grid.
The brake pedal is still at the floor and I am tired and nervous. My
previous timed runs in the school were 1:42 and john averages 1:34. I had
to come up with 8 seconds to be were I wanted. And I had no brakes.
I get the green light so I hammer it. Nothing monumentous happened during
that lap, it felt good. the brakes seemed to stop me enough along with me
throwing it hard into the corners seemed to rub off enough speed. The
results of that run was a 1:35. WOW I made up 7 of the 8 seconds.
rock and roll. Here is video (right
click, save as) of me from corner 4 through 5.
I started talking to my cousin and he was telling me his line
through turn 3 and it was opposite what I was doing so on the next timed run I
decided to try his path. well I turned out to run a 1:37. so that
didn't seem to help me. Here is Video of lap 2 (right
click, save as)
The last run of the day, I was exhausted. I was going
to give john's line through 3 another try and try not to scrub off as much speed
in turn 7 for the straight away. As I was waiting in grid, listening to
john rev the crap out of his car (yes a neon with no muffler is very VERY loud)
my head and eyes were getting so heavy. I noticed that being strapped in
with the harness my upper body couldn't move and wearing the helmet my head
could only fall so far. it was almost a comfortable position to take a
nap. Only if it wasn't for that annoying neon. Finally got the green
light and everything seemed to work out. I ended up with a 1:36. So
I just need a little more track time and I think I can be more of a threat.
As for john's times, he ended up beating the track record for
our class. he ran a 1:32 putting him in first place for this event.
2nd place went to a guy in a '90 crx with a supercharger who ran a 1:34.
Then I took third place with a 1:35. My first event in the Honda and I
took 3rd place out of nine people. not to shabby young padwaw