Licensed!
Having decide to skip the regional at Scandia, the DS & Regional at Pueblo was my first chance to finish the
novice license I started at La Junta back in May. About two weeks beforehand, I was already getting nervous.
I had been to Pueblo several times before, and already knew it was by far the fastest track I'd ever been to.
Along with the infamous turn 10 that a lot of folks (n00bs especially) get a bit nervous about, I was hoping
I wouldn't make a complete hash of things!
Friday night, after celebrating Anne Edwards' 50th, the Barclays and I caravaned down to Pueblo together, arriving around
midnight. Naturally, I arrived at the hotel exhausted, but was so excited I couldn't sleep until around 2:00. Alarm
rang at 5:30.
Saturday - School
Although I'd had my 2nd school waived in La Junta, I wanted to get some track time at Pueblo, since I'd never driven
there before. Paying an extra $60 for a full day's track time seemed like a complete no brainer! I ran all the sessions
with the students, except for the final race, so that somebody else could take their first checker.
Pueblo is a 10 turn track, with some really great elevation change and some of the most fun corners I have ever run.
Turn 1 is a long, long, decreasing radius sweeper that exits into two fast lefts. The exit of 3 is
downhill, up to 3rd again, then back up into braking for the mediumish 180* turn 4. Back downhill again, into 3rd,
lift and perhaps touch the brakes for good luck, and then slingshot up and right for 5. 6a
and 6b are nearly flat out right-handers (how good ARE your tires???), after which you trail brake hard for the
1st gear 7. Get a good run out of 7 into 8, which is a healthy lift or brake tap and early turn in right-hander.
Run up to 4th before braking for 9, down to 2nd for
the simple turn 9, dragging the inside tires over the asphalt lip. Accelerate hard for 10, into 3rd, lift slightly,
and turn in aiming for the tires and tower at the apex.
The car washes slightly wide, and you straighten out as you hit the apex so there's not as much lateral load as
you go across the drag strip launch area.
It was a much more beneficial school than in La Junta, since I got to run on track with some other relatively quick
cars, and get some practice running in traffic. I did one practice start from the back as well, to try and improve
on my abysmal performance from La Junta.
First session out, I managed to do some 1:37 times. My goal for the weekend was to at least match what Bob Schader
had done in the car just puttering around when he'd rented the car, which was 1:35's. I was able to get into the 35's
the second session of the day, so I felt pretty good about that.
After that session, the fronts were pretty much gone,
so despite what I felt was improved driving, I was back into the 1:37's. I put the car's swaybar back to the middle,
and put the rear ride height back up where I wanted it, since I'd changed it before the event to be extra-safe-understeer
mode, just in case my brain freaked out about the higher speeds. About this time, Mom and Dad arrived from Pagosa
Springs, and Dad made a gallant attempt at being an umbrella girl, to the significant amusement of Erik Larsen's (DSR)
dad....
I ran into Ron Doyle from Surface Exploration again, who chatted with me at great length about zero droop and preload.
He was also able to tell me why I've been getting the weird ridge on the inside of my Hoosiers - apparently I've
been running my pressures too low. I've been running them to about 18psi hot. He said 20 is about what you need,
and sure enough, the weird ridge went away, as did the odd squirmy feeling from the front of the car. I spent a
lot of the weekend talking with Ron and Chris - what a nice couple of guys!
As I mentioned, the tires I had were the practice/qualy/race tires from La Junta, so they were pretty well dead. I took a click of
wing out of the back (down to 2 of 4 holes), and picked up about 500 RPM at the end of the straight. I wasn't able
to really tell the difference in the rest of the track, so that had to be a net win. By the end of the day,
the fronts were corded, so I definitely got my money's worth from them. I resisted making changes to dial out the
understeer so clearly caused by the dead tires, and somewhere along the line, I'd lost a corner of the (nearly dead anyway)
front splitter.
Saturday night we had an unbelievable feast - man do they know how to treat us right! I am surely appreciating how
at least regional club races are just as much a social event as they are competition - the people I have met are
almost universally fantastic.
Sunday
Sunday started a bit early, since I had a few things to do with the car - fixing some small battle scars from Saturday. The
biggest pain turned out being able to get the battery in and out, since the alternator was inop this weekend, due to
a wiring problem discovered on Thursday. As well, I swapped windscreens to the heavier Radical nose, since I
had no spare splitter to put on the nose with the damaged splitter. Other than that, the usual tires-chain-fuel routine, and
the car was ready to go. I put my new front tires from John Berget on the front with 8" wheels, and my newer
set of rear tires from La Junta on the rear, also on 8's. (yeah, yeah, weird, I know, but I only have 1 set of 10's...)
I went out for the first practice session, and immediately - wow, front grip! Unfortunately, holy cow were the rears
reluctant to come up to temp! After about 3-4 laps, the rears had finally gotten the message, and the car settled
into as beautiful neutral balance as I could ask for. Slight lift in 1 to help the car make its way to the bottom
for the T1 apex, and then back hard on the gas. This is how I've wanted the car to handle!
Curiously, I found
that I had to consciously reduce and smooth my inputs compared to how I had (apaprently?) been hustling the
car around on dead tires. Much smaller inputs resulted in a much more stable car, so it was certainly a fun
challenge to re-adapt my driving to the faster car. Net result, those newer tires were good for a 1:33.6.
Since 1:34 had been my "hopeful" goal for the weekend, I was thrilled to see that on the timesheets.
Unfortunately, that may have been the beginning of the end for the rears. I did just a few laps in qualifying,
after seeing a few 1:34's on the dash, figuring I should save my tires for the race. Erik Larsen in the West,
and the fellow in the ProFM were comfortable 1.5-2 seconds ahead, and I had a reasonable measure of Tyler
Hunter in the FSCCA behind.
Race time!
Our relatively small group of 10 or so cars grouped up nicely out of turn 10, and we got a green about the same
place that it had been thrown for the other groups. I got a very good start, and was able to get a pretty reasonable
tow from Erik in the West DSR down to turn 1. Tyler Hunter in the FSCCA got an even better tow than me, having
gotten a better start, and being smart enough (unlike yours truly) to stay completely in the draft of the ProFM in
front of him. We stayed side by side through 1, 2, 3, and 4, and he finally only backed off when I turned in for 5.
Encouragingly, Erik and the ProFM didn't check out nearly as quickly as I thought they would, although locked tires
and other signs indicated they were certainly pushing eachother!
Tyler and I ran about 7 laps pretty much nose to tail, which was thrilling. I was absolutely driving as hard, yet smoothly as I could
to try and keep the back end of the car behind me - the rear tires simply had not come to play this race! Hard to
blame them of course. It was, of course, incredibly fun to drive such a loose car around, although I knew it
was tremendously slow relative to before. I did have a few tense moments with some oversteer after turning in for 10,
but other than that, no worries. The dash was showing 35's mostly, with some 36's. No good. Tyler said he'd never
seen somebody hanging on to a loose car like that!
Around lap 8 or so, the Atlantic that had started from the back came roaring by on the straight. I had
been halfway expecting it, but unfortunately, Tyler tucked right in behind and went by me. Inexperience
talking I suppose, but I am not sure how I would have prevented it, since the Atlantic waited until the last
possible second to pass me for some reason, forcing me out into the clag on the outside of the track.
After that, I was looking forward to a good fight to get back by, since I was pretty sure I could do it.
Unfortunately, half a lap later, turning in for turn 7, something jolted, and when I accelerated out, the motor
was flat and didn't pull. Temps, pressures and such were all normal, just no power. Since I needed to get the finish
to get my regional license signed off, assuming whatever damage had already been done, I puttered around shifting
at about 6000 RPM for the rest of the race, listening madly for anything to deteriorate in the engine,
and took my second checker.
A disappointing finish, but to an overall superlative, fun, successful weekend. The primary goal of getting
my license was achieved, I ran a zillion laps, was competitive, and generally had a fantastic time. Hopefully
the engine will turn out to be OK, but after all the abuse it has suffered, I can hardly be angry if it finally
gave up the ghost.
Car Notes
I did pick up a few tidbits about the car. The current setup, I believe, would be very good on new tires. The front
grip is there when it has rubber to use. running 20psi hot instead of 18 gets rid of all the mush in the front end
I felt in La Junta, as well as the goofy wear.
The 15/47 sprocket combo was a bit too long, I'll need to go up
a tooth or two in the rear to make sure I'm using all my gearing. I was barely hitting the shift light in 5th
at the end of the straight, so there is a whole extra gear to be using, which should help acceleration everywhere.
400/600, with around 2 3/8" ride height, zero droop but no preload, resulted in very modest
splitter wear (if any), so that's a good baseline for now, I think.
The HANS device, with the new harness mount from Built-By-Bones, was a total nonissuse, I totally
forgot about it on track. My early suspicion that I won't want a helmet with a chin spoiler is confirmed,
although I have not found helmet buffeting to be a problem in the car where I am sitting currently. It is
looking like a Bell M3 or M4 is in my future, based on my earlier fitment tests.
Time to start some diagnosis and repairs, and see if I can get the car ready for September races.
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Video of the start
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