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June Sprints: not worth it?

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#21
dstevens

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Steve, the reason Tom (or what Tom posted) suggests doing a tank drain is to flush the ethanol street fuel out. Ethanol is an oxygenate and the basic tests won't know that you aren't trying to cheat up the fuel. You should be OK if you come in next to empty and run a few gallons of track gas through. I'm from the school where you drain after the race anyway and know to around the gallon or so how much you have. One man's hoop is another man's day at the track. A big plus 1 on checking out Elkhart Lake. It's part of the experience.

#22
Weekend Warrior

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...... my memory just sucks these days :)


Welcome to "getting older" young man. :)
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#23
Roy Dietsch

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As a second sponsor of the Spec Miata Race... Welcome! ;)

I don't do many races and I petition for my National each year so I can to go to the Sprints. Its the Monaco of club racing. Large fields, great compeition, I usually have the family come and we have a cookout and enjoy the competition. None the less, the race is what you make of it. I wouldn't go unless you change your attitude and approach the event with an open mind and a laid back attitude. Try focusing as much on a beer as Siebkens and cooking a perfect Brat as you are on the race and you will truely enjoy the experiance.

I run pump gas and I'm not going to drain my tank, I'm going to let those who bend/break/warp the rules to worry about traces of their rocket fuel.

To learn the track, just watch a video. You can follow some of the top guys in practice and learn the track pretty quick. I think there a quite a few people that just show up, do a few laps and are quick. I get slower the more laps I take... :P :(

Roy (Datatoys)

#24
Zauskycop

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I run pump gas and I'm not going to drain my tank, I'm going to let those who bend/break/warp the rules to worry about traces of their rocket fuel.

To learn the track, just watch a video. You can follow some of the top guys in practice and learn the track pretty quick. I think there a quite a few people that just show up, do a few laps and are quick. I get slower the more laps I take... :P :(

Roy (Datatoys)


Roy, you can actually get slower? (ducks) :P
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#25
Roy Dietsch

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Roy, you can actually get slower? (ducks) :P



You can mock me when you break 2:48.3 in an $8,000 car...(2006)

I'll have to ask my wife for my balls back and then I'll hand you your ass next weekend...

#26
Zauskycop

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You can mock me when you break 2:48.3 in an $8,000 car...(2006)

I'll have to ask my wife for my balls back and then I'll hand you your ass next weekend...


ROFL!! Looking forward to seeing you. Come on by and have a blender drink!
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#27
pat slattery

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As a second sponsor of the Spec Miata Race... Welcome! ;)

I don't do many races and I petition for my National each year so I can to go to the Sprints. Its the Monaco of club racing. Large fields, great compeition, I usually have the family come and we have a cookout and enjoy the competition. None the less, the race is what you make of it. I wouldn't go unless you change your attitude and approach the event with an open mind and a laid back attitude. Try focusing as much on a beer as Siebkens and cooking a perfect Brat as you are on the race and you will truely enjoy the experiance.

I run pump gas and I'm not going to drain my tank, I'm going to let those who bend/break/warp the rules to worry about traces of their rocket fuel.

To learn the track, just watch a video. You can follow some of the top guys in practice and learn the track pretty quick. I think there a quite a few people that just show up, do a few laps and are quick. I get slower the more laps I take... :P :(

Roy (Datatoys)






Roy, your still a Lucky Kid :)



 

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#28
dmathias

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So... was it worth it?
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#29
Mike Collins

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WOW, all I have to say is WOW what a disappointment! For as touted an event as the June Sprints is I personally feel the Chicago Region, Road America and some of the locals think a little to high of themselves. Don't get me wrong, I had fun, enjoyed the man drama and really had good times visiting with old friends. But the event needs some work. Where do I begin?

Lets begin with Parking. After MANY (un-returned) calls from my office to the Region and the Track about parking I paid $80 for a paved paddock spot and my client paid an additional $50 for the privilege of sharing my space. All of this after REPEATEDLY telling them we are supposed to be in the Mazda Area with Dave Wheeler/Advanced Autosport in the Spec Miata sponsored paddock. Upon my arrival Dave tells me with his sponsorship he paid for the grass parking space that ultimately I shared with even another good friend.

Chicago Region can I have a refund????

Then the Spec Fuel... Let me first say that although it is not permissible to spec the fuel I was a fan UNTIL I showed up and the Road America Management team decided to get greedy and charge $9.25 per gallon for regular BP 93. I protested the Supps and it was not upheld. SURPRISE... Basically now I can appeal and will win the appeal but all of the competitors have spent the money and locals have washed there hands of the mess. Then on top of all of this, a letter from the Chief Steward prior to the event stresses the need to flush your tank, change your filter, ect... All of this because they tested EXACTLY 2, yes two, duo, 1+1 cars for fuel in Spec Miata over all three days!!! So since all of the extra money for fuel did not go to buying a few extra plastic bottles I have to assume that someones wallet just got a little fatter.

Now the race. What a cluster that was! If you wrecked on the first lap please feel free to personally thank both the Chief and Operating Stewart for our run group.

So grid made a mistake, it happens!

How our leadership handles those mistakes and takes corrective action is how our club will be judged. Just throw the BLACK FLAG. Road America is a BIG track with VIDEO COVERAGE OF THE ENTIRE TRACK, how hard was it really to look at the monitor and confirm the mistake. Bring everyone in, get it right, fix the mistake, slap Tony on the wrist instead of some obscure formula for a penalty at the end of the race and save a bunch of people their race car.

From my point of view, I made it from P20 to P12 on the first lap because all of the real fast cars in front of me that should of been at the front ran over the slightly faster cars in front of me causing 4 and 5 wide passes that may have never happened if we were in speed order.

I have now been to Road America twice to race, both times there has been a lot of carnage. I am not sure I want to go back, sooner or later odds are it is going to be me.
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#30
Roy Dietsch

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So... was it worth it?

Yes, but only because I'm local... If I traveled, I would be flipping a b!t56!

I share Mike's sentiment.

#31
SaulSpeedwell

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Don't get me wrong, I had fun, enjoyed the man drama and really had good times visiting with old friends.


Weird! Here I was thinking the "man drama" was in the column titled "Reasons to retire from SM"!

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#32
Andrew Charbonneau

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#33
Johnny D

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I don't know, how many videos do we get? :D
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#34
FullThrottle64

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Lets begin with Parking. After MANY (un-returned) calls from my office to the Region and the Track about parking I paid $80 for a paved paddock spot and my client paid an additional $50 for the privilege of sharing my space. All of this after REPEATEDLY telling them we are supposed to be in the Mazda Area with Dave Wheeler/Advanced Autosport in the Spec Miata sponsored paddock. Upon my arrival Dave tells me with his sponsorship he paid for the grass parking space that ultimately I shared with even another good friend.

Chicago Region can I have a refund????


Mike -

If I were you I would seriously ask for a refund. Paddock management at the Sprints is a seriously big headache. I know that this is no excuse, but mistakes do happen when you have so many cars. In 2009, I had paid for a reserved paid paddock space, only to find that a tire manufacturer had set up in it. Of course, I was told to just ask them to get out of my spot (not very likely, particularly given that they are a contingency sponsor for my class).

In the end, I moved in with some friends and eventually got a refund check from the region. It took a while, but they made it good once I made my case to them.

Then the Spec Fuel... Let me first say that although it is not permissible to spec the fuel I was a fan UNTIL I showed up and the Road America Management team decided to get greedy and charge $9.25 per gallon for regular BP 93. I protested the Supps and it was not upheld. SURPRISE... Basically now I can appeal and will win the appeal but all of the competitors have spent the money and locals have washed there hands of the mess.


It's even worse than that - at least for the FE guys. Not only was it "plain old gas" for $9.25, it was the WRONG "plain old gas" for those cars. FEs don't have a closed-loop control like a Miata does, so every car in the field was running incredibly rich - the car in front of me was spewing black smoke and unburned fuel to the point that it was making me sick on grid. [We actually need some ethanol to lean out the mixture.]

Speaking only for myself, I'd like to see some sort of "spec fuel" or equivalent rule system that keeps the high-$$$ fuels and "paddock chemists" out of the mix. We need some guidelines, though, to prevent what happened at the Sprints and "make it easy, make it fun". I've already sent my letter to the CRB; I would request that the SM community weigh in on the spec fuel issue as well. What we need is a few specific things:

1) Price controls of some sort. Perhaps a rule that the spec fuel must be the least expensive available at the track, or the rule is automatically null and void for the event? What happened at the Sprints was gouging, pure and simple. As noted elsewhere, there is a 24-hour pump nearby (close to my house) that sells street-legal Sunoco 260 GT for ~$6/gal. If we had been able to turn the "official" rule off, we could have gone and gotten something else off-track that would have been cheaper, better documented, and better suited for racing. Part of the reason for spec fuel (POG) is to keep costs down - 'nuff said.
2) "Secret" fuels mandated for use are a TERRIBLE idea for any cars that aren't street-based. You can't expect to be able to tune a carburetor or open-loop injection controller without knowing what the fuel is. Some cars can handle whatever you throw at them, but many cannot.
3) Competitors need to know a few things about the fuel to tune, but they don't need to know EVERYTHING. If we know stoichiometric ratio and specific gravity, we can get pretty close to the right mixture ahead of time and avoid burning a piston or fouling plugs. We don't need to know what tracers are in the fuel, nor do we need to know DC - these parameters could still be kept confidential to allow for a reasonable check against "clone" fuels.

Guys, if we, the competitors, don't help drive this process and get our board members to make the rules work for US, we will end up with the Sprints situation everywhere. It seems to me from my conversation with various officials that spec fuel is coming whether we like it or not (and I think that many of us do - at least in theory). We can either sit back and hope we don't end up getting gouged, or we can give input NOW and try to make sure that it's handled in a reasonable manner. A copy of the letter I sent to the CRB can be found here: http://www.apexspeed...ead.php?t=46356 When I wrote this, however, I did not foresee the price-gouging that happened at RA last week. Please, write some letters so we can make it clear what we as competitors want and need.

Marshall Mauney
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#35
Steve Miller

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So, one pleasant side-effect of $9.25/gal gas is that since one has incentive to put in just what you need, when your race car is stolen, it doesn't make it far until it runs out of gas... (It was stolen locally, not near Road America.)

Pink duct tape on the steering wheel, shifter and e-brake lever, though?!? Really?!?




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