I would be making my eighth consecutive
appearance. Sean and Eric would be
along to play with their Zetek and FSCCA cars in FA. Dan would also attend with his venerable Swift FF.
Kathy and I drove up Saturday, thru the remnants of
hurricane Ivan. The only problems we
encountered were a couple of mudslides that blocked a lane on the Pennsylvania
turnpike. We arrived just in time to make registration. We got some spaces for the group in the
traditional DSR paddock area. The area
was a bit muddy and the grass was beaten down from previous water flows. The guys in the nearby RennWerks space said
there had been a couple of feet of standing water in the spaces earlier in the
week. At least there was no forecast
for significant rain for the week. Sean
and Eric would arrive Sunday and Dan on Tuesday.
Sunday was for visiting around. Many of the big, 34 car, DSR field were
running the practice day on Sunday.
Matt DiRenzo had injured his motor and had sent it off with Woody to
Cleveland for a quick rebuild. The
large DSR/CSR practice sessions were visually spectacular to watch. Lots of very pretty and very fast cars.
My preparation for the Runoffs was minimal. Frank Malone and I had engineered a solution
to the chronic loosening rear suspension pickup point. (It held!)
I had cobbled together a rear diffuser for the Cheetah (which was a big
challenge given the location of the suspension link). I was only moderately hopeful the “prototype” (read crude)
diffuser would work or hold together.
My engine was new/fresh last season.
It really could have used a freshening.
Hasty lent me one of his built R1’s to take along just in case. I did have new tires.
There were 15 new competitors in DSR with new cars
and fast motors and 13 of the aerodynamically superior Stohr cars. My goal going in was to finish in the top
20. The weather was beautiful (warm and
sunny) all week. Very untypical for Mid
Ohio.
Monday’s practice session was a pleasant
surprise. I was consistently turning
laps in the 1:29 range. My best lap
last year was in the race and was only a 1:30.1 with qualifying laps in the
1:31- 1:32 area. The track surface on
the concrete strips had been redone and perhaps had more grip, or perhaps the
diffuser was working. Anyway, I ended
up 15th fastest. The front
running Stohrs, Spead and Maloy were destroying the lap record. I was just beginning to remember my shift
sequences and braking points. Things
were looking up. Kathy returned from
her shopping expedition to Columbus with P.F. Chang take-out and we had a very
pleasant picnic.
Tuesday’s qualifier had us out with the S2000 cars
and the HUGE 55 car group caused problems.
It was impossible to get a clean lap and there were many cars off
course. One S2000 hit me in the
keyhole, Tom Becker (paddock next door neighbor) and a couple of others. Tom testified at the steward hearing. I have never been to the Runoffs without
being leaned on by a S2000. The session
ended early when a couple of cars got together blocking T13. I went a bit faster, but sunk to 20th
fastest. My new ebay laptop refused to
recognize its serial port, so I was unable to download data. . Kathy again returned with a picnic for us
all. Good food, weather, and
company. It doesn’t get much
better.
Wednesday’s qualifying had us with the S2000s again,
but this time they started us in order of previous qualifying times. This significantly reduced the traffic
problems. I went a bit faster again
(0.2 seconds) but dropped to 22nd fastest. This is not the way it should be! During the session got hit in the helmet with a big (judging from
the impact) rock. After the session was
over, found another rock had pieced the stainless steel screen in front of my
radiator. It was about 1 inch in diameter,
but didn’t thankfully put a hole in the radiator. I was beginning to figure out how to do T1
Thursday’s qualifying had the DSRs alone. It would be the best opportunity to improve
although it was mid-afternoon and relatively hot at 86 degrees. I ran a couple of careful laps to get the
tires and brakes up to temperature. As
I approached T1, a flagger was jumping up and down with the “oil” flag. Someone had holed their motor and left a
wide strip of oil/water on line all the way thru the keyhole. They obviously had a dry sump, since the
volume of dropped fluids was HUGE. I,
as most of the others, came to the pits.
There would be no fast laps possible.
Sean watched his Icard for a while until the lap times started to come
down (a few guys were still circulating).
I went out for a couple more laps, but the racing line was still
unusable. My time was 0.4 seconds
slower than the previous session and I dropped to 25th fastest. I should have made my second lap a
flyer. Oh well. Kathy and I had dinner at Brant’s Bistro on
4Th Street in Mansfield. It
is first rate.
Thursday night bought the annual SportsRacer
party. It was held under the canopy of
the RennWerks tractor-trailer. Kathy
had done the bulk of the shopping for the party along with Nancy Urso. The POAFs from Florida (despite pending
hurricane Jeanne) arrived with grill and keg of premium (Great Lakes)
beer. Racer Parts Wholesale, Radical
South, Stohr Racing cars, RennWerks, SportsRacer,net Forum, and Yamaha (via
Hasty) provided a large assortment of door prizes. Everyone who attended the party got something. Racers, via ballots distributed by Bob Urso,
voted Pat Prince as the DSR Sportsman of the year. (Person who contributed the most to the class over the
year.) He made a nice speech. The annual DSR Manufacturer of the Year
trophy was awarded to Lee Stohr. Nice
acceptance speech, also. About 150
people attended party and the beer got consumed quickly, but there was a backup
supply.
With our race being on Saturday, we spent Friday
watching races (Sean got punted on lap 1 in T8 but soldiered along with nose
and wing$ dragging for 14th in FA; Eric did well with a 15th
finish). I talked with the Hoosier
engineers. My set of new race tires was
the very soft R25s and I asked if they would be appropriate. Hoosier said they would be faster, but not
to use them if the temperature on race day was more than 75 degrees. It was gonna be close, but the weather did
promise to be a bit cooler. I went
ahead and got them mounted. Getting
them mounted was an adventure since one of them refused to hold air. They tried goop, reversing the tire on the
rim and trimming away the rubber bits left from the mold. Nothing worked. Finally they selected another tire from their trailer and it sealed
immediately. Interesting. Perhaps I have been bad-mouthing my wheels
wrongly for years. Kathy and I had
dinner at Sweeney’s Two on Route 42 (Lexington Ave.) in Mansfield. It was excellent.
RaceDay. It
was coolish (65 degrees), overcast and spitting raindrops all morning. I was feeling very good about my tire
choice, but was beginning to mentally prepare for mounting the dreaded rain
tires. With the top 10 cars qualified
with a second of each other, it could get very UGLY in the rain. Fortunately, the raindrops went away. It was Kathy’s birthday and she wanted me to
win the race as her present.
Fortunately for me, I had procured a backup gift.
Race. At the
back of the pack, things were ragged. I
got passed by a couple of cars before the green fell as the car in front of me
failed to pickup the pace. The first
turn was negotiated without a problem, but as I arrived at the top of “madness”
there was a gaggle of cars sideways, etc near the apex. I had to nearly stop before threading thru
on the inside. Got a slight bump on
the rear. No harm. I was immediately locked in a group of like
speed cars including Tom Roberson, Al Beasley, Sr., Mike Sirianni, Richard
Colburn and Dave Watson. There was some
shuffling of positions. My car seemed to
be handling less well than in qualifying.
Grip was lacking. Wrong
tires? Hell, drive on. Having forgot to put the right connectors on
the beacon, I was not able to see lap time.
Got past Colburn and Beasley and got passed by Sirianni. Sirianni went off, passed me again, and went
off again. Got past Robertson as he
went off. Watson got past as we began
to deal with some slower cars. It took
a couple of laps, but I repassed.
Two more times lapped cars caused some
shuffling. Watson was glued to my
tail. My brake pedal went very LONG
starting about lap 4. I had to start
braking earlier in the keyhole and T7.
Car was unstable in the T10 complex.
Watson would close up in T11 and get his front wheel beside me entering
T13. I was faster in T13 and could hold
him off. He didn’t have the motor to
challenge on the back straight. I was
pedaling as fast as I could to keep him behind me. I looked up at the scoreboard and saw 13 laps completed; looked
up again seemingly a few seconds later and saw 18 laps done. This race was flying. Mark Hoover got past me on the last lap.
Damn. My 14th finish was a
surprise considering my 25th starting position. Had the car’s handling felt better, I could
have judged the race to be a success.
When I saw my laps times after the race, I felt I had seriously under
performed.
I had run DOZENS of laps at 1:29 in the many
practice/qual sessions while is heavy traffic.
I thought I would easily get another second or so in the race with
softer and fresh tires.
My race times were very disappointing. My best lap was 1:30.24 and my average was
1:31. My unexpected slow times ate at
me all the 10-hour drive home. Was the
track somehow slower? No, the leaders
set new records. Was I suddenly
inept? Maybe.
I discovered when unloading the car from the trailer
that the right front upright/bearing/spindle was VERY loose with more than an
inch of free play. I was within a lap
or so of losing the wheel again. (This happened at the Runoffs a couple of
years ago and again at Sebring this season.)
All parts at that corner were replaced again after Sebring. As the bearing/wheel loosens, the brake
rotor presses the pad away from the rotor and the brake pedal travel gets
“long.” This was happening after 4 or
so laps into the race (not good for confidence going into T7 or the keyhole)
but I didn’t have much time to think WHY.
I just allowed a bit more margin for braking. The car handled like a PIG in T11 and was annoying vague in T13
and T1. It was quite scary at T10b
under full throttle where the car gets a little air-borne over the rise.
Frank and I had managed to fix the loosening rear
suspension (random toe-in) that I had suffered at Savannah and VIR this
year. I have gotten lots of practice
driving an ill handling car this season, BUT it has to stop before I kill
myself! Kathy keeps saying it is time
for a new car. YES.