Engine good, alignment and flaggers bad. Scott’s lost his mojo.
Saturday Qual my engine was still missing a bit at WOT and high rpm. Enough such that it wouldn’t accelerate to RL in 4th. Given that I’d worked this issue hard since Mid-O, I was pretty disappointed. Jim Levie suggested that I replace the master relay, but I dismissed that as silly. The symptom only occured at WOT. If I backed off the throttle a little the engine ran fine. The master relay doesn’t know about WOT.
Silly or not, I replaced the master relay just before Qual. And the problem went away. Sigh . This makes no sense to me. So the next time I have a high rpm miss I’m going to rotate tires.
Saturday Qual I had a scare at turn 12. I came zooming thru 12 utterly committed, only to find a green VW about 30m beyond Control going dead slow and right on line. I had a helova time jugging variables such that I was able to tighten the turn up a little bit and avoid him. I was pissed that Control hadn’t thrown an excited yellow and a white.
I talked to the Control flaggers later and it came down to them moving slow.
After practice I checked my rtab eccentrics because one of them (right toe) had moved on me at Mid-O. To my dismay, it had moved again. I fought the bastard back into place and tightened the sob just as tight as I possibly could. The socket I was using deformed I put so much torque on it.
My qual time was incredibly bad, I was clumsy, imprecise, didn’t trust the car, couldn’t hear it whisper, and generally just sucked something awful. My times all weekend would be so bad that I was pretty embarrassed. I’ve run 1:46’s at RA. It shouldn’t now be a struggle to break 1:50.
After qual I checked my right toe and found that it had moved on me again. “A 1/4” of rear toe out is just what I need to restore my confidence", I thought. I found myself regretting going to the weld-on toe/camber kit.
Racing with GTS3-5 instead of Miatas and Thunder Roadsters turned out to be lots of fun. The GTS3-5 guys come up on you fast, but they are predicatable and their performance advantage helps get them by quickly and efficiently.
Into the turn 1 wall at 100mph. Saturday’s race. I spent Saturday’s race duking it out in the rear with anyone else who also sucked. Each time I was on the verge of putting a slap down on someone, I’d have miserable luck with traffic and it would cost me a half dozen car lengths. The E36’s could read my mind so I was able to get them by me just prior to a turn like we’d practiced together for years. But the Porsche 911’s couldn’t read my mind and they’d hesitate. It would take them a couple seconds to work their courage up and then go for the pass, but by then the window of opportunity for getting both of us thru the turn unimpeded was past and we’d go thru 2 wide and both be hosed.
With 2 laps to go in the race I was either dead last or close enough that it didn’t matter. Some 944 dumped his oil near the braking zone of one and spun in it. Then he managed to collect himself and drove off the track at the end of the straight away. He parked his car at the wall.
Scott McKay’s brother was taking video of turn 1 so caught the 944, and also caught the 3 other cars that almost lost it in the oil as traffic streamed thru over the next ~40seconds. Then I come flying thru 12 and note the standing yellow. Not waving-yellow-holy-shit-there’s-oil-in-a-120mph-braking-zone, but standing yellow. Not even a debris flag.
So I noted the yellow, looked for the incident and spotted the 944 way down the straightway against the wall as if he went straight off. Yellow now understood, I roared ahead.
A couple seconds later I was on the brakes setting up for the turn in to 1, and the car started getting out from under me. It was wiggling all over hell, not really slowing any, and to my horror, heading right for that 944. Mortified that I was going to slam into him I fought to get the car turned just a little bit right so my vector wouldn’t be right at the guy.
My right front caught some traction and suddenly I was flying at the right-side wall at what was most certainly >100mph. I was so f**cked. WHAM! I hit the right side wall hard as hell and then rebounding, spun thru turn exit and into the grass beyond.
I sat there and thought…“I can’t believe I just destroyed my car. 2 crashes in 2 races. That’s it for me this year because it’s going to easily take me that long to build another.” I figured that I’d hit that cement wall so damned hard the front 24" of my car have to be stove in.
I attempted to start the car and to my surprise it ran. I figured I’d try to get the car over to the right side of the track because that would let me back down into pit exit and with me behind cover they wouldn’t have to have a yellow out on account of me. But I by the time I found a gap in traffic the race was over.
Figuring I might get yelled at if I drove the wrong way down pit exit I headed for the infield access road at turn 5. The gate was closed but I waved down some spectators and they opened it for me. I was amazed that my oil pressure and coolant pressure lights seem to be telling me that they were intact.
Full of dread and disappointment, I headed back for the paddock.
As I drove back to my parking place I noticed that I didn’t see any facial expressions along the lines of “holy shit Ranger’s stove in the whole front of his car”. That seemed odd. Certainly if one of you stove in the front of your car I’d be sure to greet you with the appropriate grimace of horror and pity.
I pulled in next to Jon Stroup and Jim Levie and they’ll were all smiles, to the extent that they noticed my fking smashed car at all. I dragged myself out of my car, girded myself for the worst, and looked at my smashed front end. Which, wasn’t. Ok, the big heavy aluminum bumper was a little stove in at the shock, and that perfect rubber trim spray paint job I’d done last week was a clear casualty, but otherwise it was pretty good. Unfking believeable. I hit a cement wall at 100mph and I’m going to fix it with more trim spray paint.
The next day I attached the tow strap to my truck’s hitch and pulled the bumper out. It pretty much looks good as new. Well, unless you’re really into perfect trim.
My video crapped out on me in Saturday’s race. Pls post some clips that show what flags were at Control when turn 1 got oiled down. I think that they were just holding yellow. I talked to them later and they said that turn 1 did not tell them that there was oil at 1. But I’ve heard another report that says the Control was told and was holding yellow and debris.
IMO they should have been jumping up and down waving yellow and debris. Oil in a 120mph braking zone is serious shit. “Standing yellow”, in my book means “don’t pass and look for the incident”. “Waving yellow” to me means "there’s something bad, get your speed down. Likewise for a debris flag. If the flagger was genuinely anxious, I figure he’d wave the thing at me.
Maybe Control was wrong and turn 1 told them about the oil. Maybe I was wrong and they were waving Yellow and Debris. I’ll know when the videos go up.
Sunday’s Qual was more of the same. I was slow, but the racing was still fun. At the end of the race I exclaimed, “hey, I’ve just finished my first race in 2 months where I didn’t crash into anything”.
