FRP Summit
Point
August 19-22, 2021
I had planned
and prepared for the June race at Pittsburg to
be my first race of this season. Unfortunately,
some very debilitating back muscle spasms derailed that plan. This is
the season/year of my milestone 80th year
and I wanted all to go well as I am flirting with “hanging up the race
driving”
Kathy is away as usual
for the summer to the cool north woods of
Wisconsin. I’ve had lots of practice doing race
weekends SOLO. The car has been ready for months now and sports the new
design Electronic Control Unit
(ECU) from Honda Performance Development. Hopefully the failure mode
due to heat (hot days) is now GONE. I
will be meeting up with Mark Walthew at the track. Weather is likely
wet the first day as a tropical storms is just
exiting the Mid-Atlantic. Mark and I turn into spectators when the
track is wet. There is nothing to be learned
or practiced on a rain soaked track.
Old
Joke: How do you learn to race in the rain? You stand in a cold shower
in your three layers of firesuit and
tear up hundred dollar bills.
Yep. Friday we get two
practice sessions in the morning, both are
dampness compromised. Time for sitting and
visiting. There is a qualifying session in the afternoon and the track
is dry. Having not raced for a year, I am of
course RUSTY and slow. First lap out of the paddock, I discover my
brakes are not working as I approach T1 at
120 mph. They respond to pumping up and save my life! I have no
confidence in any braking. I drive very
carefully and start to notice a new problem: my relatively inflexible
right foot is struggling to engage the
accelerator and brake pedal smoothly. I soldier on and brakes are
feeling better. A disappointing 1:22 best lap
gets me 9th on the grid of 13 cars. It could have been worse, I guess.
Post
session, I
notice that my right front wheel is NOT
rotating freely. Seems like the recently installed Wilwood
brake pad clips where causing some binding of my free floating calipers
on the right side only. I reverted to
using cottier pins and the binding went away. Bled the brakes.
There were two
25 minute races on tap for Saturday. Weather
was sunny and hot. Made a conservative start for the morning
Race
1. On
lap 2, I followed a “pack” of 5 to 6 cars into T1 as I
pulled along the inside of Mark. Brian Farrell would spin his ZINK
at the corner apex and come to a stop perpendicular to traffic. I
almost was able to stop in time, but NOT and hit his wheel with
the nose cone causing it to buckle. I didn’t know it at the time,
but Brian did not have reverse gear and was not able to back
away from my car’s crunched nose. After about 15 seconds of
trying to free himself, he essentially just drove over my wounded
fiberglass. The race field was long gone now. I set out to catch Brian
and did so in two laps. I did not catch up
to the pack. With the revised opening for the radiator, coolant temps
quickly rose 30 degrees to 210 but
fortunately it wasn’t quite enough to cause a failure. The crunched
nose cone came off near the end of the race
in T1 and broke into many pieces. I was somewhat surprised at my best
lap time of 1:21 given the aero drag of the car’s nose and the
horsepower robbing temps. And oh, I got hit in the rear tire in T1 as
the race leader came
past on the final lap. Pinball. Started 9th, finished 8th.
Race 2: I
followed Brian into T1 at the start (Yes, I carry a spare nose cone). We
were in the outside lane. At
T1 entry he dove to the inside and I stayed wide planning to go around
the bunched up pack. At
the last instant, Brian darted back to the outside. Surprised
me and didn’t leave me enough room to finish my braking. Judging from
the tire mark on the nose, I obviously touched/hit him a little. I
didn’t feel it. I
went off into the dirt and did a lazy spin. Again,
the pack disappeared never to be seen for this race. I
was slow running in the 1:22’s. Very
disappointing and finished 8th. Although
finishing ahead of me, Mark (#22) was also complaining of being SLOW! Joe
Marcinski said the track had suffered heavy rains for weeks and was a
second or two slower than normal.
My car has “handles” on the sides to help me lift myself out
of the seat (Old age you know). They
are sliding glass door handles from the hardware store and I had carved
the wood grip part with totem figures. Mark
said he overheard two grid ladies talking about the alligator on the
side of my car and wondering if it was “Legal”. Made
me laugh.
Race 3 was Sunday
Morning at 1005 with a temperature of 88 degrees. I
was resolved to avoid contact or trouble this time. I
hung back a little for the first lap or so with Mark moving out 50
yards or so. I
got by Brian early and enjoyed a couple of laps fending him off. I
can still see Mark, but he is increasing his lead. I
am pedaling hard but not closing. Lap
time drops to 1:20.9. Finally,
improvement. After
the race, Brian came over and said he had learned some stuff following
me most the race and had lowered his personal best lap time by half a
second. Hope
he has a short memory. Finished
4th in
class.
Result:
Mark 3, Me 0
Postscript: Ride
home was very unpleasant. Traffic
was horrible practically everywhere adding 1.5 hours to the 3.5 hour
trek. Adding
to the drama was my trailer brakes which would lock up on HARD
application (which were many times in that traffic). To
allow extra stopping time/space, I drove mostly in the right lane so I
had the shoulder to use if needed. I
needed it once.
Now
I can look forward to hours of fiberglass work constructing a
“Frankenstein” nose cone. I just may leave the scars and stiches
exposed.