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Tini really enjoyed her road trip to Elkhart Lake, WI and the Road America circuit last summer for DMD and PCA over the Labor Day summer holiday. We have already done quite a lot of events already this 2018 season: Thunderhill, Fontana and Utah Motorsports Campus. None the less, she begged me to take her on an extended road trip so she could strut her stuff on even more of the historic circuits on the east coast. So…. off we went!
PCA Club Race 'Festival of Speed' at AutoClub Speedway in Fontana, CA
Buttonwillow Raceway Park isn’t exactly my home track - that would be Thunderhill - but I do go there 2 or 3 times each year and it is one of my favorites on the west coast. I personally find it hard to find speed here. The track has wonderful flow and is constantly moving left to right. The weather was perfect for PCA’s Golden Gate Region ‘Duel in the Desert’ club race. The weekend got off to a great start, as I set a new personal best during the practice sessions on the Friday prior to the race weekend. It proved to be a great showing by the Black Sheep Racing team, as both cars finished P1 in class. Sprint race 2 had Michael Kim in the #124 2016 GT4 Clubsport GTD class finishing P3 overall and in Sprint Race 3 Michael was P1 overall. I also had a strong showing, finishing P4 overall in Sprint 2, and P2 overall in Sprint 3.
I immediately headed east after the race concluded. Tini needed a bit of TLC, so we spent some time at Olsen Motorsports near Chicago. Tim Olsen, Bryan Hise and the entire OMS crew are fantastic. They got Tini sorted and performing at peak performance once again. I rolled Tini into the trailer and contintued east, onwards towards to Mid-Ohio.
Buttonwillow Raceway Park, Buttonwillow, CA
Riverside banked sweeper, Buttonwillow
Esses, Buttonwillow
Last edited by 24Chromium; 06-27-2018 at 06:39 PM.
This was my first time at Mid-Ohio. I arrived at the track a day early and found there was a NASA event in progress. All the folks I met were so friendly. They insisted that I get a ride-along with one of their instructors. He had a brand-new 2018 GT3 and was quite quick. It can be terrifying to sit right seat, and even more so on a track that is completely unfamiliar.
The weather was great, but the heat and humidity was stifling. To make matters worse, the pump in my CoolShirt box died and I had to drive without it. Thankfully, Tini was rock solid after the trip to Olsen Motorsports. I got moved up to the RED group (fastest). Had to do a lead/follow to qualify. Got some great advice from that instructor. I immediately dropped 2 seconds as a result. I managed a 1:36.78, but could have gone at least 1:36.4 or 5, if not for traffic.
I met some really nice folks here. The Brown Derby Road House was a great local restaurant. We also ate at Rocky’s on the town square in Mansfield, OH. A quaint and picturesque little town. All the while driving through Ohio, I just couldn't get the Pretnders song 'My City Was Gone' out of my head!
I absolutely love it! So very technical and low grip (in the dry). I stay off in the wet as I’ve gone very slow and experienced ice-like conditions but in the dry it’s a BLAST!
After the heat and humidity of Ohio, the cool weather at the Glen was a welcome change. I’d only been to the Glen as a teenager, watching the legends of Formula One such as Niki Lauda, James Hunt, Jackie Ickx and Mario Andretti race in the mid-1970s. I had goosebumps knowing that I would be racing on the exact same circuit as my heroes. Sadly, the day did not start as planned. I had assumed I had signed up for this event, but in point of fact, I signed up with the Niagara region for the 2 days prior! Very embarrassing. Who could have known that there were multiple PCA regions doing events back-to-back at the same venue? I’ve never seen that in California. The Metro region folks were kind enough to grant me entry into their Black (fastest) run group for the day.
Watkins Glen is simply magical. So fast and flowing. Yet scary and daunting in places. I loved running here. Unfortunately, my MoTeC laptop died suddenly. So as a result I lost a lot of data collection and the ability to precisely coach myself. I was very distracted by the loss of my laptop (it was running, but had no video), and honestly a bit overwhelmed by the magnitude of the circuit and the event.
I got support and coaching from Matt ‘the professor’ Distefano and his Canadian crew. Everyone was so nice, warm and welcoming. The insanely fast Seb Juneau was one of the crew. I was in awe of his speed and finess. In fact, I was surprised to learn that the GTB1 cars were so well driven and fast. Faster than myself and the GTB3 cars.
To study for the event, I had been using a video of Rick DeMan in a GTB3 car setting the PCA class record at the circuit. Sure enough, Rick was there. I introduced myself and we got to chatting. I explained that I'd been having a major issue with the car and had been told that a PWIS was needed to fix the issue. Rick confidently said he could fix it, and asked me to bring the car over to his garage. And sure enough... he promptly fixed it! I was gobsmacked at his expertise with the PWIS (which is in German, by the way) and how fast he was in diagnosing the issue and getting it fully sorted.
Tini suffered some damage from the clag during the heated battles in the sprint races
My Black Sheep Racing teammate Laura Ely flew out to join me. She races a Clubsport in the Pirelli Trophy West series. I first met Laura at a DE event at Buttonwillow about two years ago. She was in a GT4 street car and I immediately thought ‘She’ll last maybe one more event and then quit.’ However, in about 12 months time, not only was she still tracking cars, she bought a Clubsport and shortly thereafter was beating me at just about every circuit we ran together!
I forfeited the warm-up session so that Laura could get seat time. She did really well, posting a best time not too far off mine. In the first sprint race, I got a terrible start - I wasn’t even remotely close to the car in front of me on the pace car lap; the cars ahead were all single file, and were nearly full speed by T8. However, I ran quicker yet again and finished P13, first in class.
The start of Sprint 2 was much better. I was in a battle the whole race, and yet again managed to go quicker still, posting a PB of 2:03.36. I got 2nd in class, and finished P19 overall.
The GTB3 cars were in the ‘White’ enduro group with the Cup cars. Oddly, the GTB1 cars were in another group, despite the fact that most of them posted quicker lap times than any of the GTB3 cars. I let Laura do the morning warm-up, and chose to drive the first stint. The weather forecast for Sunday looked like it would rain during our race. Sure enough, just as I rolled I onto the grid, the rain finally came. However, it was very light and I decided to carry on with the slicks already on the car. I was very cautious for the opening laps, but as the rain wasn’t an issue, I got into a nice rhythm and pressed on. I lost 1st place in class in short order, but after a few laps I got it back and pulled a healthy gap. But the rain did finally come down and it ultimately caught me out in T8, where I did a 180° spin. That was all I needed to prompt me to box for a driver change, fuel and a change to wets. Laura got in the car, having never raced in the rain, and took off. She was going at a great pace and moving up the overall leader board. Until she met Joe Still in his GTC4 car in the bus stop. She radioed in that she’d been hit, but was confused as to how or why as she never saw him. She got moving again and radioed in that she was going to box so that we could check for damage. It was raining harder now and the wait seemed to take forever. All we could see at the time was a very gouged rear right wheel. I had a decision to make. Park the car now and be assured that I had a solid car for the rest of the trip. Or… go back out and take the risk that the rain wouldn’t get worse, or that we wouldn’t get hit again (or worse, crash out ourselves!). I am still kicking myself that I took the conservative path.
Tini gets her toe set for the races
The only damage we noticed after the enduro was to the wheel
Despite the car-to-car contact in the enduro the day before, I decided to run the car and see how it felt. It seemed to run OK, but as I got up to speed, the car felt a bit wobbly. The steering wheel was cocked at about 15~20° to the right while going straight and the rear end wasn’t very stable during high speed direction changes in the esses. I wasn’t confident to push it hard, and honestly there wasn’t much opportunity to do so in the DE. Despite these issues, I was probably the fastest car in my run group.
Concerned about potential damage to the car, and the long trip ahead, I took Tini to DeMan Motorsports for inspection. I decided to abandon the Audi event’s second day in favor of getting Tini into New York and his shop. Turned out she did suffer some damage. Rick’s shop is very impressive and quite large. Tini came away even more of a true Clubsport than before as I had some of the suspension replaced with CS parts.
Tini can be quite needy at times
The office
You can tell a lot about a shop by their customers
On the way to Road Atlanta, I spent the night at VIR in one of the pit lane suites.
The local Peach Tree chapter is cool - nice people. There were 2 quick guys in GT4’s. One turns out to be GeoJoe from Rennlist. There was also a Clubsport that was a good rabbit for me. First session out I ran 1:34.695. The tablet and MoTeC installation were a bit wonky, so I may have lost that data.
It was Africa hot all weekend. Unfortunately, the schedule only had us out once in the morning. My 2nd session started at 12:30 PM and by then it was already too hot. I tried the Cool-a-Clava. It works really well. I do recommend trying one if you already have a CoolShirt setup.
I didn’t put in any fliers on the second day, but I was fast compared to the locals. No one caught me.
The Chateau Elan resort is so nice, I decided to simply spend all week there prior to Barber. The area in and around Braselton is quite impressive. Everything seemed perfectly manicured, shiny and new. I coud see myself living here, if it weren’t for the heat and humidity. We are very spoiled in Northern California!
I took one day to venture into Atlanta to visit the Porsche headquarters and Experience Center. The restaurant 356 is every bit as good as the flagship restaurant in Stuttgart.
Tini needed a bit more TLC, so I took her to Goldcrest Motorsports near Atlanta. Bob Sanderson and Steve Cosgrove are true Porsche experts, hardcore racers, and standup guys. They discovered that I had a bent thrust arm on the rear, and that this was the root cause of some of my issues. They got her sorted in short order and I loaded her in the trailer and headed directly to Barber.
Waking up to motorcycles at VIR
GT4's were in abundance at Road Atlanta!
This Clubsport was a great rabbit
Staying at the Chateau for a full week was a real treat!
The car that led to the evolution that was to become the 917
Latest GT2 RS
LeMans winning 917
Looking at this lineup... I knew I was in good hands at Goldcrest
I absolutely love it! So very technical and low grip (in the dry). I stay off in the wet as I’ve gone very slow and experienced ice-like conditions but in the dry it’s a BLAST!
Don't take this the wrong way, but Mid-Ohio pales in comparision to WGI or VIR. WGI is my favorite in North America. VIR would have to be 2nd. Having said that, I'm really glad that I got to run Mid-Ohio. It was well worth it.
I’ve been to the circuit twice before while attending the Porsche Sport Driving School. The one key frustration I had with the school is that you’re always going out on the circuit with a different car, so (at least for me) you never develop that intimate bond with the car to fully exploit its potential. During my last school there, I had quite an epiphany when we did a data review session. I was grossly over-slowing for a couple of key corners and not properly using the brakes. I’d been dying to go back and put that knowledge to use and demonstrate what I’d learned and how much I had progressed in the two years since then.
Right off the bat, I was laying down laps that were quicker than I had gone in previous visits (and cars such as the 991 turbo, 991.2 Carrera S with turbos and the GT4). I got down to a personal best time of 1:38.21.
Shortly after lunch on Sunday, lightening strikes forced the corner workers to come in. No sooner had they come into the tower building did the rain come down. And just like my very first visit to Barber, it was bucketing down! I was soaked in an instant. I decided to break down the paddock and load the trailer. But I left happy that I’d gotten more out of the car than I had hoped for.
I was excited to stay in a pitlane suite while at VIR. I have to say, there is no need for an alarm clock when roaring engines fire up in the garages below you! VIR is a lot like WGI in scope, scale and history. I’ve been watching sports cars race on TV here for years. The strange thing is, I was very disoriented and couldn’t really reconcile the reality with the images from TV. It seemed to be so much more narrow and in some sections surprisingly very tight and twisty.
I first ran with DMD last year at Road America. I love the open pitlane format and low-key environment. Plus, David, Mark and Dylan are such nice helpful people. I actually purchased David’s track tutorial for VIR prior to arriving and had studied it quite a bit. It was well worth the money. I highly recommend them! As had happened at Mid-Ohio, I arrived a day early and discovered that there was a DE event going on. I began kicking myself that I hadn’t checked the track calendar in advance. The Nolasport team was here with two of their Trophy East Clubsports running in the event. I was desperate for seat time to gain any advantage for the upcoming Club Race. Sure enough, the gentleman paddocked next to me was an instructor for the group and he kindly offered to take me out for a session. Wow! What an eye opener! He had a race prepped BMW spec e36 car. The first time we went up the climbing esses, I thought for sure we were going to simply fly off the track into space. His car was obviously a momentum car, and boy did he ever keep up the momentum! After the session ended and I climbed out, I thanked him and asked what was the lap time we were doing. He told me he didn’t have a laptimer, but guessed we were doing mid 2:20’s. I was thinking it was going to take me a long time to match that pace. I guess it’s very easy to underestimate yourself when you’re in the right seat, as I went quicker during my very first session.
I took my sighting laps as a passenger in this BMW
I immediately recognized Rennlist royalty
Beautiful and fast
Love these events!
Such a luxury to have the paddock mere meters from your door
06-27-2018, 06:12 PM
Tini’s Summer Vacation 2018
