11 replies to this topic

[Dan Tiley]

It was another fun weekend for the SARRC Series at Road Atlanta, with some extremely peculiar weather all weekend.  It was one of the weekends where you keep your rains poised and ready, because you never knew if you were going to need them or not.  Great seeing all the usual suspects, and once again, the SM racing gave the closest battles for the lead for both Saturday and Sunday's races.  You know that's the case when the workers all come off track still talking about it when the day is over.  

 

Our weekend went like this:

Saturday

We took the pole for Saturday with Cliff Brown and Keith Andrews in the next two spots.  I got the early lead with Cliff pushing for a couple laps to get a gap on 3rd.  From there on, he and I swapped the lead back and forth multiple times, coming out from under the bridge, 'round T12, and into T1 side by side no less than 3 times.  In the end, Cliff had my number and broke away a couple of car lengths.  I missed a shift trying to find 6th or maybe 7th gear to catch back up, and he disappeared into the sunset.  Awesome drive man.... Congrats!

 

Sunday

I was on pole again for Sunday's race, which was even more entertaining than Saturday.  Everyone started on dry setups, and we took the green to just a very light sprinkle (T5 just a little slick in the paint).  Shea Hughes was the class the field, and made it exciting early on, giving Cliff a BIG push past me on the backstraight on Lap 2.  On Lap 3 Shea went 4 off in T7 which let me back into 2nd behind Cliff.  A lap later, I got to enjoy the push from 10 car lengths back which put me right on Cliff's bumper going into 10a.  For the next go 'round the backstraight I got the push again, and we blew by Cliff like he tossed out an anchor.  One lap later, Cliff gets the push back past me.  Finally on the next lap Shea got a great run on Cliff in T12, makes the pass stick in T1 and proceeds to pull away.  We all settled in there a bit for a lap or two, when all of a sudden the light sprinkle turned to serious rain as we were going thru T1.  Shea immediately goes straight off track left in T2, and Cliff catches the wet paint in T5 putting him into a tank slapper, handing the lead over to me.  That same lap, Shea makes an incredible recovery, was able to get back on track, run me down from about 8 seconds or more back and pass me handily down the backstraight.  Never seen anything like it!  (Check out the 18:25 mark in the video).  From there I was able to hang on Shea's bumper.... and we raindanced for the final 3 or 4 laps.  I finally got a run in T5 and made the final pass for the lead with 1 to go.  Shea went 4 off one more time in T7 which sealed the deal for me to pick up my first win at Road Atlanta.  

 

Here's some video from Sunday's race.  Great drives by both Cliff and Shea all weekend.  Huge thanks to Cliff Brown for all of the pointers on Saturday.  It helped a bunch, but you still whoop my a$$ on T5 every time.   Excuse my excitement at the end of the race in the video.... I had all but resigned to 3rd place at the halfway mark so I was pretty happy to pull off an unlikely win:

 

 

 

BTW... Congratulations to Keith Andrews on his double ECR wins, and Cliff Brown on winning both Pro-IT races and the Saturday SARRC.  See y'all at the next one!

[Danny Steyn]

Closing speeds on the back straight are very interesting. WOW. Never seen anything like it. Appears that one car is very unlike the other cars. Anyone there care to comment?

 

Also Dan, are you concerned your tranny is going to jump out of 5th gear, or is it purely an nervous tic????

[Dan Tiley]

 Also Dan, are you concerned your tranny is going to jump out of 5th gear, or is it purely an nervous tic????

 

I think it's a lack of short term memory, and I'm checking to see what gear the car is in.  I've always done it... no idea why.  Never even noticed it until I started recording video of myself!  I tried to consciously stop it and I missed 4 shifts in one race.  I'm thinking of adding a red button to my shifter so that it at least looks like my hand is there for reason!

[JBlaisdell]

Wasn't this the same car that was suspiciously fast at Roebling last month...

 

"Lucy got some spaning to do..."

[Adax]

Great read and great driving Dan. I think you wrote more between the lines than in them. Had fun last weekend, unfortunately I never saw much of you during the races.

[Keith Andrews]

Great weekend!  I learned a lot all weekend especially in the rain and I got a bunch of track time.  I liked the option to run the first 45 minutes of the ECR as one race (Pro-IT or CCPS)or do the entire 1.5 hours for the full ECR race.  

 

Thanks to the gang at OPM for keeping me pointed in the right direction all weekend. 

 

Congrats to Cliff and Dan, it was great to see you guys duke it out.  

 

Dan, you forgot to mention I had the lead for 50 feet in Sunday's race start 

[Waterboy]

Were you getting cramps in your arms in turn 7

[Jim Drago]

 Closing speeds on the back straight are very interesting. WOW. Never seen anything like it. Appears that one car is very unlike the other cars. Anyone there care to comment?

You saw and were fully aware of the 44 car at Sundays Atlanta Majors this year where he had even more closing speed than Shea's 33, you just chose not to comment.   

It seems like the performance of Shea's 33 car is "outside of the box" compared to two very fast cars of Dan and Cliff. I heard some of the same rumblings after Savannah . That being said, it is still innocent until proven guilty.

If I were driving Shea's 33 car, I would feel fairly certain that someone would have already talked to me about it. The second time I would expect my car to be torn down if I came back just as fast, just the way the game seems to work. I have no idea on what this car is or isn't, but if I was concerned I would talk to the individual once, protest the second time. I think he should now be aware that people have him on their radar, if the car is compliant, he has no worries.  If the car isn't compliant, I think fair warning has been given and the driver should check/correct it.
 
Jim

[Caveman-kwebb99]

You have never seen anything like that? Really? You saw full well the 44 car at Sundays Atlanta Majors where he had even more closing speed than Shea's 33, you just chose not to comment.   

It seems like the performance of Shea's 33 car is "outside of the box" compared to two very fast cars of Dan and Cliff. I heard some of the same rumblings after Savannah . That being said, it is still innocent until proven guilty.

If I were driving Shea's 33 car, I would feel fairly certain that someone would have already talked to me about it. The second time I would expect my car to be torn down if I came back just as fast, just the way the game seems to work. I have no idea on what this car is or isn't, but if I was concerned I would talk to the individual once, protest the second time. I think he should now be aware that people have him on their radar, if the car is compliant, he has no worries.  If the car isn't compliant, I think fair warning has been given and the driver should check/correct it.
 
Jim

 

I think that 44 car your talking about was the very same one i shoved down the straght away corner to corner on Saturday, and then on sunday it was all of a sudden fast.

[Strongbad]

Does anyone have a link for the results from the weekend?

 

Thanks.

 

Joseph

[Dan Tiley]

Does anyone have a link for the results from the weekend?

 

Thanks.

 

Joseph

 

Saturday SARRC (Top 10):

 

 

Sunday SARRC (Top 10):

 

Keith Andrews won the Saturday ECR & Sunday CCPS

Cliff Brown won both Pro/IT's

Can't tell from MyLaps who won the Saturday CCPS due to mixed races

[Strongbad]

Thanks, Dan and congrats on Sunday's win!

 

Joseph