19 replies to this topic

[Juan Pineda]

Post here. Been waiting all week for a glimpse of the weekend. I know there was some good action. Spill it!

[Ron Alan]

You and me both Juan! Really lacking this year...whats wrong with all you new fast guys??

[Juan Pineda]

Doesn't have to be just from the pointy end of the grid. There's great racing throughout the field!

[NV Racer]

I did not have time to put my camera in. I was dealing with a loose steering rack after qualifying. Then promptly lost the motor 3 laps from the end in the 1st race of the weekend.

Dennis

[Todd Tagget]

that sucks Dennis!!! hey what part of town do you live in ? We should have drinks one of these days..

[Ron Alan]

Geez Juan...why would you like Dennis's post? I think we need a "sad" button along with the "like"

No that feeling Dennis...sorry brother!

[Viet-Tam Luu]

Here's mine, starting from the back of the Group 5 race: http://www.youtube.c...yaJ-qF4w#t=180s

The 1st lap off was... yeah, kinda stupid. Impatience got the better of me and I arrived somewhere I didn't expect to be, going way faster than I expected to be going when I got there. After making my way from around 50th to 5th by around the halfway point, I spun off T6, flatspotted my front tires and then what felt like the flatspot from heck turned out to be my FR tire delaminating (https://plus.google....732930370272258). Since this was the last race of the weekend and only the 2nd session I was able to make (wasted Friday trying to figure out a front diff problem that eventually resolved itself) I wasn't going to give up easily, so I backed way off the pace and held position until the end of the race.

This is the Evo 8 I've owned since 2003 and started with in autocross and then track days. (And yes, if I had to do it over, I would have driven a Miata.) I crashed it at Sears Point in 2006, then got busy with LeMons and then Spec Miata and then Improved Touring S. The Evo was rebuilt structurally shortly after the crash but it sat in storage until I finally got around to finishing the new engine this past April, and then it took the rest of this season to get all the "last few details" done to make it STU-worthy.

The car is a bit of a handful but it's got huge potential. Back in '06 my best Laguna time was about 1:46 and in my first session back in the car (same suspension, slightly stickier tires, similar power/weight) I ran a low 1:42 without even trying. I expect to be well into the 1:30s after some more practice and setup (the only setup I had time to do was to straighten the toe--and even that was off-center in front).

[Viet-Tam Luu]

Interesting: "hell" gets autocorrected to "hale" by this forum software. How quaint!

[Jamz14]

Yes, *hale% is banned, but crap is cool. Some sort of white magic crap where he who can't be named,...........can't be named thingy.

[Alberto]

Tam, So that's what hapened. I was a few cars behind you and that dust cloud you pushed up was blinding. Didn't know what to do going into it as I couldn't see squat and didn't want to get rear ended. Wound up slowing way down to a stop almost and moving way over to the wall. Thankfully you didn't come back across the track.

[Juan Pineda]

Geez Juan...why would you like Dennis's post? I think we need a "sad" button along with the "like"

We do need a sad button. But only one button to acknowledge.

Thanks for the reports and video! Tam, man that car is fast!

-Juan

[DionJ]

Umm Tam, now I'm even more scared!

[Ron Alan]

Umm Tam, now I'm even more scared!

You are being way to nice Dion! Sorry Tam but that was really sketchy driving...no other way to put it. Granted my opinion doesn't hold much water but I have watched 1000's of SM video and I stayed at a holiday inn express

[Sacslider]

I don't think I would have posted that video......

[Viet-Tam Luu]

You are being way to nice Dion! Sorry Tam but that was really sketchy driving...no other way to put it. Granted my opinion doesn't hold much water but I have watched 1000's of SM video and I stayed at a holiday inn express

Fair enough... Though I'd be interested to hear what you mean by "sketchy".

As I said, it was my 2nd session in the car after 6 years away from it. Ideally I would have had a test day or two to get used to it... or at least run the Qualifying and Race sessions on Friday. None of those things happened. Starting from the back with that kind of speed/power differential also made life more interesting that I would have liked.

What the video doesn't always show is I was getting point-bys on most of the riskier-looking passes that I would not have otherwise attempted.

Compared to my Miata, my first impression of the Evo was that it felt... numb. The first practice session felt like I was not so much driving, but sitting in a car controlling a Playstation. I felt oddly disconnected from the car. I didn't have a feel for what it was going to do, how it was going to behave. That started going away a bit during the race but the fact is I just need more seat time in the car to familiarize myself with it.

Maybe you meant I was driving beyond my abilities given what I said above? Quite possibly. A race doesn't lend itself well to driving 7/10ths which is what I "should" have been doing.

[Viet-Tam Luu]

I don't think I would have posted that video......

:shrug: You know and I know that I'm capable of better driving than that. I didn't post it to show off, just to say "this is what happened". I wasn't at my best--for all kinds of reasons--and the video shows exactly that.

[Ron Alan]

Sketchy...nice way of saying poor/bad. 7/10's would have been just fine with all those Miata's...and by the end you may have felt comfortable to go 8 or 9 tenths. But you can consider yourself lucky IMO the car could out handle your driving ability that day. It came back in one piece by no help from you. By your own admission you were not ready...so all i'm saying is why put yourself, your car and a bunch of other drivers at more risk than necessary? You had 3 or 4 times the HP of any other car out there and you call that a race?

I'm glad you were getting point bye's...I guess I would just expect better discipline and decision making from a veteran racer. I'm sure your next outing will be better

[CARacer]

I've posted two short vids so far. Hopefully I can post more later - those two races on Saturday were crazy fun.


Speaking of driving into dust clouds, in my ITA video you can see me try to avoid the cloud before turn 4. What you can barely see is the spun car straddling the curb and that #31 missed it by centimeters.

[Juan Pineda]

CARacer, love the side mirrors for the camera!

[CARacer]

They did turn out nice for the camera, but that was a bonus. I just put them in for my use while driving.