THSCC Forums

Great course this weekend. I disliked the course while walking, but after driving it, I couldn't wait for my next run. Another well organized and executed event!

BTW, Jess digs driving the M3, I didn't spin out or go off course once, and I still have my streak of not having a clean run for like two years now!!! Doh!

Phil

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Phil... Now I miss the ITR and the M3!!!
1990 Honda Civic SI

agreed, it was a very fun course, and a very well run event. It was my first time running down at that site, and I was amazed at how creative the course design was despite having to avoid so many bad "patches" in the pavement. A very fun day all around.

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2012 MX-5 Sport SUV

I really enjoyed the layout. The onion was particularly fun. Great job on the design guys!

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Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder.

I also really enjoyed driving the course (tires not withstanding). My humblest apologies to Rodney and Chris for doubting them (and perhaps making a joking comment or two) when I walked the course. It appears that they did know best.

The event was very well run and it was great to be autocrossing again. No offense to the designers who are great guys and good drivers, but I thought this was the worst course I have ever driven.
It was too long and way too busy. I didn't even know we had that many cones! Did anybody drive it and check out how long it would take???
Some gates were between 12 and 13 feet wide, not the prescribed 15 ft.
The finish was needlessly slow. I had to start braking before the finish line. Did anybody drive the finish in anything with more than 150 HP and over 3,000 lbs.??
The "gimmick cirlce" wasted the best concrete on the site and the best (fastest) sweeper we potentially can run all season. None of the other sites have concrete that grips that well and the space for a long sweeper.
With a 60 to 70 second course we might have been able to have 3 runs in the afternoon.
Thanks to the guys who got the timing equipment working and thank god we didn't have any timing delays!!!!! The people in the bus are really good at their jobs too.
I still had a good time and enjoyed the perfect weather.
Mike W. and I will get our turn at designing at the next event and the inevitable criticism. I think I'll try to do Greenville with 20 cones.

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Rubbin' is Racin'

Yes on both accounts...I couldn't get passed the timer on throttle. I believe I was braking just after my front bumper crossed the line.

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Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder.

Hey Walter,

How does a shorter course speed anything up? If the cars start at 30 second intervals, it will take the same amount of time to run 100 cars if the course is 1 minute or 2 minutes long.

For the above, 100 cars would take 50 minutes + 1 minute for a 1 minute course or 50 minutes + 2 minutes for a 2 minute course.

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1997 Acura Integra GSR

Just a guess, but I think this was due to the fact that if anybody had taken out the timing equipment, the event was effectively over, as the spares were out for repair and the only good one had been hit the day and kinda patched back together.

and if you're curious, I drove through the finish, in my 160 hp car, although probably only b/c I was really slow through that last slalom

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2012 MX-5 Sport SUV

I wasn't there (actually I was at home changing yet another wheel bearing) but the solution to your problem Walter is three letters... V I R

Typically "most" AX courses are not best suited for a big car with high HP like yours. Of course there are people who can manage a car like yours on the tighter AX courses, but even if you could it doesn't sound like you'd have fun anyway. While you can have fun and be fast in a F-body, IMO it's far less difficult in a Miata.

C'mon out and give track a try old man. You can press the go pedal all the way down the front straight and see 130 MPH. Of course when you hit turn one Ryan will still leave you in his Miata.

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Vincent Keene
'06 Ford Mustang GT (track rat)
'15 Dodge Charger R/T (yeah, it's got a HEMI!)
'07 Ford Fusion SE (205,000 miles and counting)
'98 Chevy Z-24 (retired)
'93 Acura Integra (Team SWB 24HOL Car)

Did my best to accelerate through the finish with my 300hp, 3800lb family truckster! Course I do have just a bit of turbo lag!

Was initially a bit concerned about whether my turning radius (or lack thereof ) would cause me to give up my affection for onion rings, but I remain a happy onion ring consumer!

Besides the nice change o' pace with the ring, I loved the long course and the sweepers! Nice job Rodney and Chris!

First let me say thanks and give a great big thumbs up Dustin and the other autox VP's, without their help, this event would not have been as successful as it was. As for the course that Chris and I designed, we tried to bring you some different elements. Could we have placed a nice sweeper at the end of the runway, yes, but there's always a sweeper there and I was tired of them. We thought the onion or skip pad would be a nice change and from a novice standpoint should really show whether your car pushed or rotated in tight circle.

The course was "busy", but chalk that up to Chris and I being novice course designers. I know a after while this thread will fill with the "I liked it" folks and the "I hated it" folks and that's fine, you can't please every one. You couldn't have asked for a nicer weekend and be it a good or bad autox design, you were outside having fun!!

I will throw this out, if you have not chaired and autox event, you owe it to yourself to perform this thankless job at least once. There is ton of work to do both from a prep standpoint and "day of the event work" you need to do. I think you'll get a very good appreciation of what goes on in the day and the life of a THSCC event chair.

To those that did not like the course, I'm not sure what to say other than we wanted to make something different and I think Chris and I succeeded on that note. You have more events coming up that hopefully will be more to your liking.

To those that did like the course, I'm glad we hit a sweet spot with you and you enjoyed the event.

I would like to list one major note for Laurinburg... the concrete is now dictating how to set up the course. So much patching and gapping makes it VERY hard to design a course with some different elements. I would suggest looking at another section of the area to see if there is any other area that would lend itself to an autox. I don't see Laurinburg holding up for too many more years.

your humble "would you like cones with that" co-event chair....

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Rodney

'08 Bullitt mustang, CAM 7
Autox VP '09-'10, President '11-'12, interim President 2nd half of ‘14
proud recipient of the Bowie Grey service award '12
Now just a guy driving a mustang....

i second that opinion Walter. personally i spent the day racing the drainage gremlins on my orange hot rod.

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BenchWarmer Motorsports

another one of those damn LeMons heads

just another Chump

we are an Autocross Club Dammit............

I dont think Walter's desire for a shorter course has anything to do with speed but just the ability to be able to commit the course to memory with good detail. A course with that many elements can never be totally committed to memory. Looking ahead was at a premium.



In a perfect world, good luck with that.

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02 Focus SVT
STF 9

The only real issue I can think of that a longer course adds is more cars on course, which makes things more hectic for Timing&Scoring. We often had 4 cars on course this time, which is about the most we can deal with at 1 time. Then with so many cone calls and DNFs, the "fun meter" in the bus was just about pegged! I really feel bad for the T&S workers in the first 2 heats while everyone was finding the course!

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Carl Fisher

Be Cool to the Pizza Dude:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... Id=4651531

Bad day autocrossing is better than the best day mowing the yard. . . .

Not that I had a bad day. Despite my inability to put together a decent run, I had a really good time yesterday. I wish my driving had faired as well.

I didn't hate the course. Not at all. I'd probably not want to run one of those more than once a year but it did serve as a great lesson in looking ahead. As in, "Martha, check your presciption, get the binoculars out." looking ahead. If you failed at that task you were hosed.

I'll get the full round of pics uploaded a little later this week. Need to play firefighter on some work stuff today and tomorrow, but I hope to edit the photo set down to something bearable.

As a preview I present FTFillintheblank Feinberg:

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Not spectacular just decent.
I'm not sure what I'm driving.
Maybe an ITR in DS.
Or half-assed STX prepped 330.