Macca

John. A few have commented about the GT3 road train. I'm sure those on

Macca

Oops. ...I'm sure those bad boys will behave themselves on 30 March..,
I'm confident you will be fine on the box too as long as they don't find any Kleenex in the assembly that is ;-p

John McM

Haha. As far as I know my part in this was all good.

Unfortunately, even if I have Herman back by the 30th, the Bank have decided to send me to Perth that week so I'll be hearing it all second hand.

Btw I don't want to give the GT3s a bad name. They pay good money to be there? It's just about making everyone comfortable on the day. Newcomers are dealing with enough without a large speed differential.

kiwi 911

^^^ There will always be a speed differential - a third of the grid does sub 17's, so will be blasting past the other 2/3rds.

I think the question is more to do with driving attitude and safety.

I know the GT3 train go 2-3 into a corner, but we do this knowing well how each other drive and don't do this with a slower car in the front. If someone thinks they drive in a way that endangers others - they need to speak up and I will be the first to say something (in the mirror).

If speed differential is an issue for newbies or slower car owners - we may have to simply revert to fast and slow groups.

I can’t see people with faster cars driving slower, and this will only exasperate over time as Porsche produces and people acquire faster model cars.

kiwi 911

Some nice times achieved in the final run of the sprints - Patsy did a 1.14 dead, and Chris B was doing 13.4.

Of interest was that Chris only had one lap recorded due to a weak signal - he may well have been doing faster times across 8 laps.

Walt doesn't seem to have raced??

Pel

No issue here, fortunately/unfortunately it's the nature of the beast.

Only gripe is is less guys to run with, considering air cooled ask prices nowadays I can't see any new recruits being air cooled either.

964X33

Was the engine compartment cover release cable pull not aways in the left door of the 911?

kiwi 911

There are plenty around Pel - you need to recruit Eddie Grouten and the other guy in the matt black and oranged stripes SC. They are in Arrow's - you need to join them.

Besides close to half the RSG have 964's - there is no shortage of air cooled mate.......

Macca

Good question. If I had my 911 here Id ask Jo to d likewise and check it out :-)

Pel

Hopefully this year mate, looked like fun out there!

Mark H was humming too

996tnz

Thanks Pete, Paul and others for the encouraging comments. Most everyone, including those at the sharp end of things looked to get faster over time and many ran personal bests so it was pretty competitive.

Thanks Paul - will look into those coilovers in case I do a 2WD conversion when I go LVV. Jake is right in that they would either need modified or married up to GT2 uprights. That second a lap was actually sitting a lot closer to hand though at the Pirelli tent. New vs new, Trofeo Rs have at least a second on Nitto NT01s, and my Nittos are almost 3 years old now (bought used from US but the sidewall date codes don't lie). Can't really justify Trofeos yet as the Nittos still have plenty of tread. Regardless, I really enjoyed fighting my corner against Pete, Patsy and ChrisB over the weekend. After 6 laps this morning I managed to cross the finish line about 2 sec behind ChrisB on his 221s so more than happy with my last race. Was good to learn from some of his braking points and lines too. Your own times yesterday were pretty damn spectacular, especially for a 996 GT3 Paul, and those would have really had me running over to Pirelli if I wanted some chance to keep in touch!

Here's hoping I can speed up my retraining. For years I've run without PSM and ABS as they'd always crap out within a corner or two anyway. They seem to have come right in the last 6 months (but I unplugged the PSM connector under the bonnet as I hate it) but this festival was my first time on track in the yellow terror with functional ABS. So I was learning to trust it during the weekend, but I have a ways to go yet, especially for the infield corners where old habits die hard. I also got a lot more comfortable with my car at HD as the festival boosted my HD track lap Porsche tally by half.

I was getting closer to ChrisB's braking point into T1 as that confidence built over the weekend. Yesterday already I was told that my whole front discs were glowing bright red into T1 in the middle of the day (I was just happy they were red and not orange) but today Roger Anderson was also kind enough to seek me out to let me know that it worried him as apparently they weren't getting nearly as visibly hot on the other cars.

Along with the slotted discs that were held up on the US order I placed several weeks ago, my new caliper pins were held up too. The old ones are pretty crappy and pitted so may have been sticking a little? Could also explain the noise the evening before. Time was tight before this mornings race as they were running an hour early vs schedule and I got there at 10.45 but I still pulled the right front wheel and checked the pads as they'd made such a bad scraping under brakes on the way home after Saturday's racing that I wondered in the inside pad was down to the metal. They looked fine though.

Staying on the brake front, it also only became obvious a few days before the festival that the slotted discs wouldn't arrive in time so I bought factory cross-drilleds for the front as my old Sebros had finally developed 1 inch+ radial cracks all around and I thought they might fail scrutineering - or pehaps me on track.

So my Thursday evening was spent replacing discs rather than applying a banner sorry Macca. I ran naked at practice on Friday then bannered up for the two race days and proudly rotated through my 3 RSG T-shirts over the race days and the dinner too. 2KCup got a bit of a nod as well since I ran their series stickers as flank badges and recommended 2K to a few people.

I don't know if Patsy was running a camera but I did get tidier over the weekend after she accused me of running a drift session in race 1 yesterday. That said I still had to rescue a tankslapper exiting T8 today.

Yes, I only got one race today but am still very stoked with everything. My car was weeping coolant after today's first race (drip by drip so hopefully just the expansion tank, if Matt was on the money). Dan of EuroPacific advised that it was not a quick swap out, nor was 'radiator stop leak' a good idea for a Porsche so I'd be best to call it a day. About 750 ml dripped out while parked (caught in coffee cups to save polluting the place) and 1.5L went back in then I still got under the car to troubleshoot before doing a hot test down the road (just high revs) but she still leaked so I scratched myself from the last race. I really enjoyed watching that race though, with Patsy crossing the line first (possibly some team orders involved per Patsy and Chris but it looked convincing from the spectator bench) and then she also picked up a good looking festival award at the end of day prizegiving for demonstrating the Spirit of the Series for the Sprints. Well done!

When you also add in the best ever Spitfire flyby (he banked so hard you could see right down into the cockpit as if it was a model aeroplane you were holding), seeing Bruce McLaren's Austin 7 debut race car start up and come out past the P1 for a run around the paddock, watching the LMP1 tear up the track, getting a much better perve at the factory racers as they were loaded onto the flatbeds, hearing and seeing the rebuilt 996T that held (holds?) the NZ 24 hour endurance record, taking in the exciting last race from the Porsche hospitality platform, plus some good chats and camaraderie with fellow sprinters and other Porsche aficionados around the paddock and at the dinner - man was it a great 3 days!

Beyond all the fantastic effort that obviously went into the Festival's organisation, my 'man of the match' nomination must go to Mack Storey. A guy that can run a one hour enduro in a '68 muscle car at the hottest hour of the day and still share the shade of his marquee with all of us sprinters is a hell of a class act!

Macca

Great to see Patsy fly. Be interested to hear what she thought of the new Trofeo Rs. They like heat...

The NT01 is a great tyre Walt and goes the distance from what I've told with generous heat cycle allowance. My guess is it's quicker than a R888 but a fraction slower than a soft c70 z221. I'm keen to try them myself as I understand they are bringing out some 20" fitments later this year. After using the z221 again for 3-4 track days last week on the 993 I have to say they make the MPSC2 seem like a roadie. Just so much grip those things. Addictive.

gt38088

Sounds like a great time had by all. A very successful 2 weekends. The boys pushing the machinery and looks like a bit of heavy maintenance due? I guess that's inevitable

kiwi 911

Great write up Walter. Thanks for sharing.

I agree with your comments about Mac Storey.

Tim was saying your disks where glowing into turn 1.

Anther thought is to pester Chris B and see if he will sell his 997TT brakes when he gets serious about selling the 996TT. P.s. you are brake copying his braking points given he has much bigger brakes.

peterC2S

+1

Bloody awesome effort!