THSCC Forums

What an awesome weekend!!!

Book Smart had a blast! It is crazy to say that it was even more fun than I thought it would be and we learned a TON from the first race.

The car ran amazing and the two issues we had were self induced. Notes taken and will make adjustments for next time. The car is fast, fun, and it just a pleasure to drive. We did 1hr driver stints in the morning and then transitioned to 2 hours after lunch. At night, we all spent 30min in the car just to get used to driving in the dark. Wow... What an experience!!

Congrats to all the THSCC teams!!!

-Scott

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THSCC Timing & Scoring

Turtlespeed Racing DBU'd four hours in. not sure what happened yet but the guess is head gasket or cracked head.

so personally that makes me 0-2 at VIR races and basically 1-4 in the last year or so. haven't turned a lap at VIR since April 2010 and that was in the now busted Magnum Prelude. my karma must be askew.

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BenchWarmer Motorsports

another one of those damn LeMons heads

just another Chump

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

For those who have driven in the dark for a few events. Does it get better? I was really struggling to find my turn-in points without all the extra cues I use in the daytime. Does your brain just adapt after a while and make new ones or is it always a struggle to figure out exactly where you are?

upgraded lights help. knowing the course well is a plus. as with anything else, seat time is key. there other factors also. smoking is known to hurt night vision; lack of sleep and nutrition also factor in.

there is a good thread over on the Chump forum about night driving.

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BenchWarmer Motorsports

another one of those damn LeMons heads

just another Chump

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

I believe it was a 2nd gen RX7 (#99) that was dumping fuel on the track. That's who VIR thought it was based on the brief period we had someone on the scanner.

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2001 Honda S2000 - SOLD
2012 Boss 302
2003 BMW 330i

This was only my 2nd time driving at night. 1.5 hours at VIR 24 last Aug and 1.75 hours at this race.

As previously stated, good lights are key (including lights aimed to find apex points). There is a certain element of faith when driving with lights at night. If you know the track, you body/brain remembers the mechanics (steering input, etc) for all the turns. Even though driving in dark with lights is like driving with blinders on, just take baby steps to go a little faster each time and soon if feels no different that when you drove it during the day. I noticed by about 10-15 mins into my night stint, almost all of my shift points coming out of the turns where almost the same as during the day. I kept that up for about an hour and then when we realized that we were not going to gain another position unless P1 or P2 had issues (and that we had 4 laps on P4), the team decided there was no need for me to keep pushing and I dialed it back to 80% (I was very fatigued during the last 30 mins).

Be sure you know which flag stations have the warning lights at night. Even though your head lights don't go that far, you need to make sure you are looking early for the lights (ex. when you cross start/finish, you should already be looking for yellow or red in turn 1). There is the potential for nasty high speed impacts at night since a car can die with no lights and the driver doesn't get the car off track or cars can drop fluids and the flagging stations have no idea (can't see the track).

Another key is to have someone from your team monitoring Race Control on a scanner so they can communicate to you and tell you where problems are on the track.

As for me, I love driving on track at night. I requested to be the last driver for team Simon on Sat. But there again, you can ask others in the club that know me....I'm not quite right in the head anyway!!

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Rob Harvey
919-697-5485
1997 BMW M3
1992 Acura Integra (Simon)

Proud Silver Bullet team member here. I'd like to publicly thank my team members (Randy Melton, Walter Houston, Cline Hall) for all the work done on that car to let me "arrive and drive." Randy and VK build a heck of a good car.

I am NOT a fan of racing in the rain...that was a LONG session. I think I spent more time in the grass than I did on track. Ugh. The afternoon session was excellent, and made the weekend worth the investment.

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Tom Freeman
'98 M3/4/5 | '93 Spec3 325i | '12 TSX sport wagon | '03 Tahoe
Team Silver Bullets '91 240SX

i feel the same way about rain as rob does about the dark

i drove the first two hours and loved it, being in a fwd car certainly didn't hurt. it's not as classically exciting as dry racing but rewarding in its own way. it also gave us a leg up on the faster (rwd) cars that beat us up in the dry. we were mistakenly assigned penalty and/or MOV laps at the start so when the first result sheet was printed at the two hour mark it showed us in 6th, two laps down on the leader. since no one passed me i knew that had to be a mistake, we alerted T&S and eventually they got it sorted out. if it wasn't for our failed wheel bearing we'd have been right up front with the winning e30 at the end, but we're still 4 for 4 on podium finishes so hard to complain about it too much!

I don't like racing, driving, walking, standing, working, singing, or anything in the rain. However as it turns out, at least I don't suck at it too bad. I'm not as good as Jason in the wet, but it's well documented that he has a screw loose. At least I can say that I stayed on the pavement my entire 2 hour stint.

Our FWD car was like a Ferrari against the high HP RWD crowd which was actually quite fun. I guess FWD is the equalizer when the conditions are less than ideal.

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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)

Hey now...I don't resemble that remark!

I know I had at least 5 offs in the morning, maybe 6. The brakes on the 240 were pretty sensitive and locked up in the rain pretty easily. It took me a LOT offs to figure it out.

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Tom Freeman
'98 M3/4/5 | '93 Spec3 325i | '12 TSX sport wagon | '03 Tahoe
Team Silver Bullets '91 240SX

Did you have an off at T1? If so, I'll have the video up soon.

I only locked the brakes once on the Prelude.

I had a solo run into T1 with no traffic so I was going faster and braking later. I'm sure why I thought I could brake later unless the grip fairy showed up in just one lap, but I did.

Once the brake locked, I slid, released the brake, rolled, re-locked the brakes, rinse and repeat, 3 times. It was like redneck ABS! I was finally able to turn-in, abeit very late, and dialed it back enough to keep it from happening again.

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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)

Oh yeah...maybe twice.

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Tom Freeman
'98 M3/4/5 | '93 Spec3 325i | '12 TSX sport wagon | '03 Tahoe
Team Silver Bullets '91 240SX

Yeah, I did that 3 or 4 times, car died on me twice doing that. It felt like I had McDonalds plastic trays underneath the front wheels.

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02 Focus SVT
STF 9

I was told I invented a new braking method - "brake steering"
Going into 1, and likely at least one other corner, I had locked up the fronts. I released, turned the steering wheel hard in the direction of the turn, and got back on the brakes again. My twisted theory at the time is that the tires sliding sideways might have more friction and more of a chance of stopping me, with the added benefit of turning me in the direction I wanted once I finally stopped sliding.

I don't recommend trying this at home...or on track...or anywhere.

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Tom Freeman
'98 M3/4/5 | '93 Spec3 325i | '12 TSX sport wagon | '03 Tahoe
Team Silver Bullets '91 240SX