Kathy
and I took the trek for my seventh consecutive Runoffs. The driver and the trusty Cheetah are
getting a little long of tooth, but I couldn't miss the gathering of the DSR
faithful. I did have a
"built" motor this time from JJ Justice to make things a bit more
enticing.
Sean,
however, would be staying home, having been uninvited at the last minute by
SCCA. Boy is he pissed at them and
their incompetence. Frank Malone having
just recently moved back to the USA from Germany, would again be my crew. Brian Little, sweating out the impending
arrival of hurricane Isabel, planned to arrive to crew/party on Thursday, if
disaster had not hit his coastal home.
I was ignoring the threat of Isabel.
KB
and I arrived Sunday afternoon and set up in the DSR "compound." With new security management at Mid Ohio not
allowing us to reserve a block of spaces, the compound was infiltrated with
some interlopers, but we were mostly together.
With
Tech consisting of them looking at my helmet, we thought it would be a
breeze. NOT SO. I got some power hungry lady who held us
hostage for 50 minutes while she wrestled with imagined ramifications of my car
having an additional logbook stapled to it.
It was flat ridiculous.
I
approached the first session with much fear and apprehension. My new motor had a rattle somewhere on the
top end. I had talked with the builder,
and he said he had not noticed it when running it on the dyno. It sounded a lot like the rattle made by the
flat slides that I used a couple of years ago.
I decide to go ahead and run and see what happens.
Monday's
practice session would come late in the day that began with rain. We would share the session with S2000's and
the car total would be a crowded 55 or so.
I hate running with S2000's.
They have a big weight advantage and more torque (better corner exit
oomph) and several drivers use DSR's as corner berms. I have been hit many times this year alone. The rain cleared by midday, and I went out driving
carefully as I was bedding in new brakes and tires. About 2 laps into the session, I noticed rain on my visor. Totally unexpected. As I exited T1, I could see cars off in the
keyhole. It was raining hard
there. When I got there, there were unbelievable
10 to 12 cars off. I drove directly,
and carefully to the pits. The session
got black flagged and ended. At least I
was out long enough to bed the brakes and to find out that shifting was working
well for the first time this season.
(Amazing what a new cable will do!)
The best news was that my rattle had gone away and the motor seems to be
running fine despite making an occasional puff of smoke. I was 12th fastest.
Frank
arrived Tuesday morning with dire stories of the impending hurricane back
home. KB and I had become Weather
Channel groupies, but figured that we were better off in Ohio rather than at
our waterfront home. We told ourselves
that we had just done an early evacuation.
Frank would fly back home Tuesday night to evacuate his wife to the
mountains of Virginia. Isabel was
getting weaker, but we stayed glued to TWC.
Tuesday's
qualifier was a DSR only session. It
was time to go faster. My car was
laying down a MASSIVE trail of smoke. I
drove quite tentatively, keeping my eyes on the mirrors and the gauges, but
went a little faster than practice (but was only 17th fastest). Tom Becker, who I covered with oil, reported
that I was also showing flames at the rear of the car. Engine builder came around and said I was
making major smoke. We did a major motor
check out before he discovered that it was missing one bolt from the ignition
side cover. Could this be the
culprit? We really didn't think so, but
there were no other obvious problems.
We put in a new bolt with lots of locktite.
Wednesday's
qualifier had us with the heavyweight S2000's again. I gave them plenty of room and kept an eye on the mirrors to see
if the oil leak was cured. It didn't
return. On lap 3, a S2000 hit my right
rear tire going into T11 causing a spin and I just avoided backing into the
tire wall. Damn. By lap 4 there was carnage in several
places, and the session got black-flagged.
In those few laps at speed, I did improve my time by half a second and
was just beginning to tip toe up to the limit in a couple of corners. I would end up 14th fastest in the session with
a 1:31.5. The faster guys (leaving
aside Jaremko who was blazing fast) were in the 1:28 range. KB and I began the shopping for the Friday
night SR party.
Thursday,
Isabel hit the coast. My neighbors, who
were house/dog watching for us, provided frequent storm reports. Another neighbor's pier had washed into my
back yard. My basement was flooding and
the racecar garage had 15 inches of seawater in it and was being battered by
white caps. The weather in Ohio was
beautiful.
Thursday
afternoon the SpeedTV crew visited my pits to do one of those "up close
and personal" bits. KB had
submitted a story idea to them based upon her working for NASA, the space
agency, not the racecar association, and the possible technology trickle down
to racing. For the TV spot, I sat in by
drivers suit in the car and smiled like an idiot while she chatted with John
Bisignano. Her part was nice, mine
dumb.
The
Thursday qualifier was a DSR only session again. I was running out of time to go faster. Mark Bakhit's (ex Hasty Horn) Stohr had a HUGE fire on the first
lap. He came to a stop along the front
straight with flames leaping high into the air. He had a big oil leak, ignited by the exhaust and got out visibly
shaken but unscathed. Session got black
flagged while SCCA cleaned up. We got
one lap at speed when they casually and prematurely draped the checkered flag
over the flag stand. (We still had
several minutes left of our allotted 20 minutes.) With the sun low in the sky
in the late afternoon, it is nearly impossible to see the flag stand. Several drivers did not see the
checker. As Steve Pommer, Matt DiRenzo
and I came around to the front straight, some death wishing flagger ran out
into the middle of the track with a red flag.
I got sent to impound and suffered a lecture, but nothing more. SCCA singled out Matt and disallowed his
qualifying time and said they were going to boot him from the Runoffs. Oh yes, my oil leak had returned. Matt protested the pending action, and several
of us filled out witness reports. Matt
won his protest (sorta) and was allowed to stay, but his time was disallowed
and he got a "bad boy" driver's point on his license. Go Figure.
As
I was facing up to an engine swap to my stocker, JJ discovered that the same
bolt was missing again. The bolt hole
was likely stripped. Since the hole was
not accessible to tap, we applied thread making goop and lots sealants. Much apprehension for race day. In my maybe two laps at speed, I did lower
my time to 1:31.5 and was 10th fastest for the session, but was with a second
of six others.
Thursday
night and Friday morning bought Isabel rains.
Friday, I watched a few races, and KB and I went off gather party
stuff. The Florida "pigs"
arrived Thursday with the grill, tents and beer. Bob and Nancy Urso arrived with party stuff. Things were looking up. Brian Little arrived also. I put on new Hoosier R35 tires for the race
and worried some.
The
Friday night party was a big success, despite some annoying wind and a few
raindrops. Partygoers should be thanked
for generous contributions to the party milk jug. Brian Little was awarded a "Lifetime Achievement"
trophy for over 30 years of SR devotion, and I was voted the DSR sportsman of
the year. Bruce Sunseri got the DSR
Manufacturer of the year trophy. The
Sportsracer.net Forum provided some door prizes and well as several provided by
Racer's Parts Wholesale. Party ended
about 10 PM when the keg went dry.
Saturday,
KB and I cleaned up after the party and she went off for her last day of "gathering." I watched a few races and hung out. At this point, the day is pretty much a
blur. I did make a shield to prevent
the possible dreaded oil leak from spraying on the exhaust. I also did some wheel
maintenance/repair. Seems that most of
my three-piece wheels leak some/alot.
Annoying.
Sunday,
we had to get to the track very early since our warm-up session when off at
8AM. It was still a little foggy and
damp from the dew at that hour. I did a
couple of 80% laps to see if the oil leak fix was working. Paddock neighbor, Steve Pommer (Marty
Nygard's homebuilt) discovered fading oil pressure and decided not to
race. Dick Knoblauch and Bruce Sunseri
had swapped motors and were raring to go.
The Merloy boys, many strong, had been thrashing on the car all week on
the Al Beasley, Jr. entry. Despite
having all the resources in the world (tractor trailer, spare car, shock dyno,
etc....), they were still searching for GRIP.
Building a fast racecar is obviously a difficult task.
Jim
Boehm provided some excitement on the pace lap when he spun in T9. He later surmised that he had a broken CV
joint. Pole man, Jaremko brought the
field slowly to the starter and everyone was closely bunched together. I got a good start, passing a couple of
cars. There was no appreciable contact
for the first lap, but Boehm would spin again causing the double yellow to come
out. At lap 5, we were back to
racing. I was on the tail of the Paul
Shinsky and Ellen Ferguson battle. At
this point, my clutch started to SLIP coming out of slow corners. Big RPM but no drive. Damn.
I discovered that the problem was reduced if I didn't downshift too
far. I looked down at my lap time
display and saw I had turned a 1:29 lap and was pleasantly surprised. I got balked in the carousel coming upon two
lappers and Steve Jondal and Mike Sirianni got past me. With the early day sun, I could actually see
the turn in point for T1, and doing that corner much better. Damned slipping clutch. I was turning fairly consistent 1:30
laps. On the next to last lap, I got by
Jondal in T13. On the last lap, I got a
good drive out of the keyhole, and took Sirianni and finished 11th. I just missed my Runoffs goal of a top 10
finish. Jaremko, of course, ran away
with the race and Stohr's took the top four spots. A Stohrsome! Mark Bakhit
deserves a special perseverance award.
He and his crew spent as couple of stress-filled days getting his badly
fire damaged Stohr back into action.
They fashioned new right rear bodywork using aluminum bits and a huge
amount of yellow duct tape. He would
bag the third podium spot. Quite
impressive. There might be something to
the concept of using duct tape for bodyworks.
Mark is a pilot for an airfreight company and the company airfreighted
his car, trailer, and tow truck to Mid Ohio from Arizona (and back). Neat.
I
didn't put a wheel off all Runoffs (except for being punted once), so I must
conclude that there is considerable room for improvement. Next year.
Runoffs are a highly inefficient race event. I bought 10 gallons of gas and came home with two of the
gallons. We didn't get many laps (and I
even took an extra one) for the 8 days invested. There has gotta be a better way.
Regardless, I still had lots of fun and enjoyed the visiting
around. Next year, I will need a faster
car, fewer problems and more skill.
On
the way home, we stopped a bought gas cans, gas, ice and some supplies. We would be facing a huge cleanup and many
days without power. More fun.