rm21

It has been a pretty rough summer for track events in the Southeast. I’ve cancelled my last four events due to the temps but thought it would be safe booking a CHIN event at Road Atlanta this past weekend. Not only did the temps not cooperate, with highs in the low 90s, but other challenges made it one of least enjoyable tracks events I can remember.

Fellow Rennlister bhf_clt was coming in from Charlotte for the event so I didn’t want to cancel, despite knowing it was going to be hot. In addition to the heat, at one point during the week, it looked like there might not be any gasoline in Atlanta due to a pipeline break. Riots in Charlotte made us wonder what might happen next! As the gasoline fear passed I was trying to look at the bright side - fresh tires and reasonable temps for at least the one morning session.

With the CHIN format, there is one 40-minute session in the morning and then four sessions in the afternoon. After two warm up laps in the first session, a Pagani lost a wheel, the first of many black flags to come (more in fact than I can ever remember). By the time I got back on track, there were around 8 minutes left in the session. I got one clean lap and that was it. Missed beating my best time due to overcooking turn 6.

Thanks to a cool shirt and shorts, the afternoon sessions were tolerable, but a large contingent of 991 Cup cars that were practicing for Petit Lemans made it hard to get many clean laps. bhf_clt and I wanted to swap cars to get a sense of whether his new setup was dialed in. So I took his car out for a late afternoon session. The car felt good and after about 20 minutes I was getting ready to bring it in when I noticed the car got squirrely in the braking zone on the back straight. I slowed down, did a cool down lap and brought it in to the pits. By the time I stopped the car, the front tire was totally flat. His TPMS had failed so I didn’t get any warnings, but had I continued to drive I surely would have wrecked. It appears it was a puncture that caused the tire to loose pressure. He runs a 265/19 setup and needless to say, those aren’t easy tires to find on a moment’s notice. So his track weekend was over. Plenty of beverages that night helped to ease the pain.

On Sunday morning the first session was once again interrupted after six minutes, when one of the Cup cars lost it in the braking zone of the back straight, made wall contact, and littered the track with debris. I was the next car behind him, but was far enough behind that I didn't see the incident and had plenty of time to slow down and avoid the debris. The good news is that I believe he was OK, although I’m not quite sure of the extent of his injuries. When I turned my car over to bhf_clt to drive in the next session, he only got to drive about half a session due to a Corvette blowing its engine on turn 7 and proceeding to drive all the way down the back straight billowing fluids. Duh! We went home after the 12pm session, happy to be alive. Looking forward to a safe and sociable Smokies weekend. Hoping all the demons have been exercised.

tonymission

Sorry to hear all that, but I'm also looking forward to the Smokies event. My first one. Can't wait to meet you and the rest of the folks!

bhf_clt

If I wasn't there I wouldn't believe it. rm21 left out a few other fun things we dealt with including a power outage at his place, the Atlanta traffic jam from hell, etc. etc. We're hoping our Smokies friends bring some good karma with them because rm21 and I have bad karma going to cover the entire group.

STALKER99

I've had a similar experience at Road Atlanta with NASA where the weekend seems cursed, I took off early both days and was happy about it cause afterwards it was a very eventful weekend.

bronson7

Just have to hope that you got all the bad karma out of the way in this one track weekend.

soulsea

Sorry to hear about the bad experience.

I've gotten so frustrated with HPDE organizers who overbook their event, making it almost impossible to get clean laps, and that's after waiting ages between sessions, that I've started booking track days just for me and my friends, and only in the late fall to spring, cause as you know in the SE it's just a slip and slide out there when the weather gets hot, and we're just using consumables to go slower.

We've booked Roebling for Dec 5th https://rennlist.com/forums/racing-a...d-raceway.html ... shoot me a PM if you wish to attend and I'll send you the super secret registration link.

shapiroeric

Sorry to hear but at least you have a good attitude about it and made the most of it!

Haku

Rich and Brian, sorry to hear about all your woes but thrilled you are both still with us!

As you know, the bar at our lodge is awesome!

hughp3

Sorry Rich. I am going with Chin in October. They do a good job and its rare that stuff blows up etc... just sounds like a bad weekend. Stuff does happen and good you were out of the way and felt the tire. hope to see you soon

Accel Junky

I took my Fiesta to AMP this weekend and it too was one of the worst track events if not the worst I have done. No wrecks fortunately, but super hot and greasy track conditions. I overheated, destroyed my tires, broke a motor mount, and ripped a CV boot somehow. I think I'm going to stop going in the summer. Just too damn hot and too many problems. I'm taking the GT4 to RA next month.

warp10

Rich,

That sounds super frustrating. But glad you are and the cars are good!

Hope all that is out of your systems as it seems we will be at Road Atlanta Oct. 7th together.

Hope to see you then. Hopefully cooler temps!

Adam

sgroer

In 4 short days you will be relaxing in the comfort of your smokies friends and all will be forgotten. Sounds like a terrible time! Glad you all are safe.

Sean

meaker

This!

JesseRohr

I was at Barber yesterday and it was 97...scorching.

rm21

Here is some video from the weekend of my one clean lap followed by some snippets of the 991 Cup cars smoking me at various points on the track. It is amazing how fast they are able to pull away from a 991 GT3 on the straights, let alone the turns.