Das Race: My '97 M3/4/5

[Jake]

Is it just me, or is the audio on the second video borked?

Yeah, it got funky toward the end. All you miss is the *thunk* of an E36 hitting an E30.

[Jake]

Dang! At least you guys were both ok and it looks like the impact happened under mostly braking. I guess "if you ain't rubbin you ain't racing" doesn't apply here in the real world :lol:

It's probably a good thing I never got into actual track racing, I doubt I would be as patient as you need to be when coming up on someone who is slower than me. I'm always still amazed how more accidents don't happen with as many cars as they put on a track at the same time.

Yeah, definitely. I need to look at my data tonight and see how fast I was going when I hit him. I was braking heavily but to bend a frame rail takes some serious effort.

Our qualifying sessions both days were very full - about 90 cars out there at once. We had so many late race entries that the Cobettos had to split the race groups into three (Lightning, Thunder, Typhoon) where there are normally two - but the schedule didn't allow for three qualifying groups. So it was a bit of a melee the first couple of laps until everything sorted out.

Re: patience - clearly I learned that I need to be moreso. What sucks is that I remember coming down the straight, seeing that train of SE30s, and making the conscious choice to keep my right foot down instead of tucking in behind them. Had I backed off for a turn or two, I could have taken them in a few spots farther along the track and still kept my lead on Mark. Ugh.

Deren took my car to the body shop today to have the frame rail pulled back. I brought him a core support on Monday and am picking up a Cosmos Black nose panel this Saturday to drop off. So, Humpty Dumpty will be back together again soon and the plan is to pick her up a week from Sunday. That will leave me most of a week to check over the car (even though Deren is going to do it, too) and get ready for Summit Point on the 10th of June.

[ScottyB]

i love post-Hizzyfest writeups...mostly because i couldn't be there

that's awesome news about the power coming back (and a great lesson in "under the curve" being so important compared to peak, judging by your 7hp deficit but better overall performance) and your dropped times and charge all the way up to 2nd briefly. total proof you are a front runner now with the car's development now matching your own.

sucks hard about boinking that SE30. it sounds like you went through a lot of personal grief dealing with the decision and at the end of the day, its a tough lesson but probably one of the best you'll ever get and hopefully a good perspective in the event that someone ever puts a dent on you as well. i'm glad to hear the other driver was chill about it. that poor driver's side corner of your car has been through hell and back this past year, huh? i take it the frame rail is non-structural (in the sense its ahead of the strut and not affecting geometry) and they can just brute-force it back to straight?

i hope its patched up so you can give it hell at Slummit, you are getting too fast to ease up now :thumbup:

ps that dog is adorable

[Jake]

i love post-Hizzyfest writeups...mostly because i couldn't be there

that's awesome news about the power coming back (and a great lesson in "under the curve" being so important compared to peak, judging by your 7hp deficit but better overall performance) and your dropped times and charge all the way up to 2nd briefly. total proof you are a front runner now with the car's development now matching your own.

sucks hard about boinking that SE30. it sounds like you went through a lot of personal grief dealing with the decision and at the end of the day, its a tough lesson but probably one of the best you'll ever get and hopefully a good perspective in the event that someone ever puts a dent on you as well. i'm glad to hear the other driver was chill about it. that poor driver's side corner of your car has been through hell and back this past year, huh?

i hope its patched up so you can give it hell at Slummit, you are getting too fast to ease up now :thumbup:

ps that dog is adorable

Thanks Scotty! Yeah, Chris came up to me and was like "we gotta get your car on the dyno, bud, or you're running light... you pulled on me there!" after the Sunday race. His tune changed after I told him it was dynoed two days prior and I had been running heavy because of my prior weird power curve fucking up the GTS calculator (there is no way it's fair to be 2,800 lbs at 213 whp, should be another 100-150 I think). He's been good to me as far as helping me get faster though, so I know the comment was all in good fun - he and Scott really want more of us up at the front with them (they are in the 2:08 range) to ensure more epic battles. We will see!

Technically the Summit Point tree boinking was in November 2015 but yeah, the front end of this car has had it pretty good. Deren said the body shop he sends crashed racecars to can make them look better than they did pre-wreck, so I have high hopes.

I'm also picking up two clean driver's side doors on Saturday. They are white, but if sprayed Cosmos Black (by someone other than myself) would be an easy way to make that side of the car look nice again.

[WRXtranceformed]

Man, I thought I had some expensive hobbies....this one has to get the pocketbook REAL hard :lol:

[Jake]

Man, I thought I had some expensive hobbies....this one has to get the pocketbook REAL hard :lol:

At least I get credit card points? :roll: :lol:

[WRXtranceformed]

Man, I thought I had some expensive hobbies....this one has to get the pocketbook REAL hard :lol:

At least I get credit card points? :roll: :lol:

:lol: :lol:

[rherold9]

while I fought with the Miata's exhaust hangers. It's delightfully clean in there now.

Seriously, they are fucking terrible. Never struggled so much getting a muffler off in my life.

Also, need to get caught about on this Hyperfest stuff. Nice to see your car is repairable.

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[JustinG]

while I fought with the Miata's exhaust hangers. It's delightfully clean in there now.

Seriously, they are fucking terrible. Never struggled so much getting a muffler off in my life.

Copious amounts of WD40 and pry bars = exhaust hanger domination

[rherold9]

Copious amounts of WD40 and pry bars = exhaust hanger domination

Tried PB Blaster. Pulled out the soap and still struggled. Pulled out the damn hammer nail end to pull and stretch and that did it after a battle of pushing. Two people would've made it a breeze by holding the muffler in place. The way they designed the muffler hangers is a PITA. So basically if you get two front off like I did the muffler moves so much it's hard to pull the muffler and also keep the hanger from moving/stretching. Also when you try to push the muffler off one side the other side does not give enough for you to pull it off. You have to basically get the one hanger pushed up to almost parallel to the ground before it slips off the damn muffler. I don't know if Jake had the same issue but yeah.

My Mazda3 and buddies 3 weren't as bad :finger:

Anyways, Jake. Nice driving. The confidence (for me at least) is 100% the key to get faster and also makes it easier to make big mistakes :dunno:

Too bad to that e30. At least you owned up to it. Glad to see the helmet isn't squeezing your head too much. This is my take from video but it's farther back than your drivers seat. That red one must've been right in front of that light blue one. I didn't see it until you looked over and punted it. Not sure if he saw you or not due to the other car. It is your fault for the accident for sure though. Looks like you were going to be able to stick that inside line or no? If you were I think you could've stayed even with that blue car and been fine. I just don't think the red e30 saw you until it was too late. I could totally be wrong though.

[Jake]

Too bad to that e30. At least you owned up to it. Glad to see the helmet isn't squeezing your head too much. This is my take from video but it's farther back than your drivers seat. That red one must've been right in front of that light blue one. I didn't see it until you looked over and punted it. Not sure if he saw you or not due to the other car. It is your fault for the accident for sure though. Looks like you were going to be able to stick that inside line or no? If you were I think you could've stayed even with that blue car and been fine. I just don't think the red e30 saw you until it was too late. I could totally be wrong though.

Yeah, the red and blue were nose to tail, and the red was farther to the left which is why I didn't see him there. If I had, I would not have been so aggressive. I think I would have been able to take the inside line, but it would have required all of those SE30s to take it wide-ish so we could go two abreast. Totally possible if all of them were paying attention, but they were in their own battle and I didn't respect that.

Deren got the front end all ripped off and it's off to the body shop (Independent Car Collision) next door. More to come, I guess.

[WRXtranceformed]

Probably a dumb question because part of racing is being on the track with tons of other cars, but do other cars generally slow you down a lot? How much faster could you be around a track if you had the track to yourself and didn't have to worry about other vehicles? Do you ever get a chance to have a track to yourself like for time qualifying or something?

[rherold9]

I'll let Jake handle the specifics because I have no idea on that.

Overall, from reading articles, blogs, and talking to people, a lot of racing people say half the battle of racing is planning passing. You don't always try to pass people immediately but you also don't want to take too long. Making the most ideal places/times of passing can make you faster by a lot. Managing traffic seems to be pretty important.

[ScottyB]

How much faster could you be around a track if you had the track to yourself and didn't have to worry about other vehicles?

i'm utterly unqualified to answer this but from my minimal experience driving on track in a super-weak car...if you bone one corner up it screws up your corner speed for like the next 5 corners as a result. bad traffic in one corner would essentially make the lap a throw-away in a time trial situation, in a race it would probably give the guy behind you a 1 or 2 second gift.

[Gordonovski]

If anything good came of this weekend, it's this picture. Probably the most badass your racecar has ever looked.


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[Jake]

Probably a dumb question because part of racing is being on the track with tons of other cars, but do other cars generally slow you down a lot? How much faster could you be around a track if you had the track to yourself and didn't have to worry about other vehicles? Do you ever get a chance to have a track to yourself like for time qualifying or something?

You can definitely be a bit faster around the track without traffic ahead of you. Time Trial attempts to get this right, and usually does. Cars get gridded from theoretical fastest to theoretical slowest (and then actual fast --> slow based on first session lap times) so in theory, you should never pass anyone and have clean track. In practice, you'll get someone who goes a lot faster after their first session or two, so you do end up with a few passes. But, largely, it works.

W2W race groups all have qualifying, which should be like a Time Trial session. It's exactly the same approach. It also mostly works out.

Once you get into the actual race, though, it can be anyone's game. GTS2 got lucky at Hyperfest, and we were the first wave within our race (NASA runs multiple waves of cars - different groups - within each race) so we had clear track ahead of us. This meant we got the first green flag, then Spec E46 got a second green, then Spec E30 got a third. It worked well and we generally didn't have any issues as we started up front.

On a normal weekend, though, GTS2 is part of the "Thunder" race, which has GTS3/4/5, American Iron, Camaro/Mustang Challenge, and ST3. All of those cars are either faster overall (GTS3-5, STx) or faster in straight lines (V8 Murica stuff) but run slower lap times overall. We usually end up as one of the middle waves, and then it can be harder to go as fast as qualifying if you don't qualify well in the first place - the frontrunner guys in the wave behind you can catch up, and then you're in this mixed GTS2/CMC disaster.

Long answer but hopefully it explains it enough! The short answer is if you keep your right foot down hard enough, you should be able to run about as fast in the race as you do in qualifying, which should provide fairly ideal conditions for a hot lap.

[Ken]

Once you get into the actual race, though, it can be anyone's game. GTS2 got lucky at Hyperfest, and we were the first wave within our race (NASA runs multiple waves of cars - different groups - within each race) so we had clear track ahead of us. This meant we got the first green flag, then Spec E46 got a second green, then Spec E30 got a third. It worked well and we generally didn't have any issues as we started up front.

On a normal weekend, though, GTS2 is part of the "Thunder" race, which has GTS3/4/5, American Iron, Camaro/Mustang Challenge, and ST3. All of those cars are either faster overall (GTS3-5, STx) or faster in straight lines (V8 Murica stuff) but run slower lap times overall. We usually end up as one of the middle waves, and then it can be harder to go as fast as qualifying if you don't qualify well in the first place - the frontrunner guys in the wave behind you can catch up, and then you're in this mixed GTS2/CMC disaster.

Had no idea that was the case - i'm surprised, thankfully, that there aren't more accidents than i read about here. It totally makes sense from a logistical point of view, but wow.

[Jake]

We all take separate green flags (usually there are three waves) and there's about a 10-15 second gap between the back of one wave and front of the next - hence the job of pace car driver. It largely works out with little mixed-group racing.

[D_Eclipse9916]

Once you get into the actual race, though, it can be anyone's game. GTS2 got lucky at Hyperfest, and we were the first wave within our race (NASA runs multiple waves of cars - different groups - within each race) so we had clear track ahead of us. This meant we got the first green flag, then Spec E46 got a second green, then Spec E30 got a third. It worked well and we generally didn't have any issues as we started up front.

On a normal weekend, though, GTS2 is part of the "Thunder" race, which has GTS3/4/5, American Iron, Camaro/Mustang Challenge, and ST3. All of those cars are either faster overall (GTS3-5, STx) or faster in straight lines (V8 Murica stuff) but run slower lap times overall. We usually end up as one of the middle waves, and then it can be harder to go as fast as qualifying if you don't qualify well in the first place - the frontrunner guys in the wave behind you can catch up, and then you're in this mixed GTS2/CMC disaster.

Had no idea that was the case - i'm surprised, thankfully, that there aren't more accidents than i read about here. It totally makes sense from a logistical point of view, but wow.

The worst is out of class racing...
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[JustinG]

The worst is out of class racing...
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I remember that, and the numerous "Comments" made about that particular car/driver over the weekend.