volksdragon | Sunday Sunday Sunday!

Sunday, Race Day.
Got up at (URK) 5:30am, to drive up to NEW HAMPSHIRE for racing. Charlie (my regular car-owner/partner) couldn't make this race due to work, so I bummed a drive with Ed Savage, our racing mentor, and all-around nice (fast) driver guy. He's got a 1998 Neon ACR coupe. Hahaha, I hear those of you unfamiliar with AutoX saying, "Pfft, a Neon!? WTF, Over!" Back in the late 1990's, Neons, and especially the ACR and RT models, were the SCOURGE of GS and DS classes, respectively. It's still pretty darn competitive in GS (as you'll see) even 7 years later, and Ed's taken care of his baby. :)

I always forget that it only takes 1.5 hours to get to NHIS from my place, so I ALWAYS think I'm late, but I got there at just about 8am on the dot (after leaving the house at 6am AND stopping at Krispy Kreme), registered myself, and then drove down to the pits to find Ed. We chatted a bit, I helped him prep his car, and helped him help out some novice folks with questions, as he's the Chief of Novices, and that's his job. About 8:45 or so, I strolled over to the truck (which I didn't have to help set up this time, as it was still out from the race the day before, hooray!) and did some course-walking, cone-chalking, and general prep and setup stuff, like getting radios and fire extinguishers out. The course at NHIS is always physically teeny, because we're on a 400x400 foot lot, and there's only SO FAR you can run before you hit a fence. :)

Anyway, drivers meeting, and there's not a lot of cars. Oh goody, more runs today! Only 80 people, and on a 30 second course, that means a LOT of runs. As a matter of fact, we were done with all our first runs by NOON, we even took an hour off for lunch! How DECADENT! NHIS races tend to be more relaxed, because the runs aren't as long, cars can't break down 1/2 mile away, and you can SEE the car at all times, which makes calling times and cones easier. Plus, with 80 versus 180 people... Yeah, you see the difference. We did have one car break down, a Lotus Europa(!) which lost his throttle cable 50 feet out of the start box. Yeah, so, just push him back out of the way, and keep running. About 2/3 of the way through the morning, we got a few drops of rain. OK, that's fine, no more than that....Well, when we finished morning runs, it was a light pattering of rain. OK, more than that, right? Ha Ha Ha.

By the time we got back from lunch, it was raining lightly but steadily. It was just enough to slick the track, and I ended up subbing for a guy chasing cones. Of course, the corner I was in, that hadn't had ANY cones hit before, became CONE CARNAGE CENTRAL. I was running all over the place, while trying to have a nice conversation with the guy there, David. It was well worth it, because he offered me a co-drive in his BMW at a future event. Schweeeeet! So, yeah, we were wet. I wasn't soaked to the skin, but I was mostly wet down to my waist, so YAY for being warm. Times of the cars were off by probably 3 seconds from the dry-times earlier, and it was especially amusing to watch the Mod cars on their big slick tires out there in the PUDDLES that developed.

I've always liked racing in the rain, and I knew I wasn't in first place, and wasn't gonna GET there, so I figured I'd just go out and have fun. We didn't even switch the tires back to the Azenis from our Kumho's. (Azenis are more like street tires and decent in the rain, Kumho's are almost totally slick no-tread tires, GREAT on dry, and usually treacherous in the wet. There was almost NO real traction loss for me out there in the rain, it was amazing. I was only 1.1 seconds slower in the rain than in the dry, and I was one of the fast stock class cars out there in the afternoon overall. I'm pretty sure I was the fastest GS driver in the rain, even beating Ed, and that actually means something! Ed's been class champion in GS once before, and the other two people in GS, Josh and Allen Parker, are always very quick in their Honda CRX Si. Any time I beat Josh (which is never), I'm doing something right. However, I was doing something right on Sunday. Final times had me in third place. However, 3rd place was only 0.2 seconds behind FIRST PLACE and (ARGH) .013) seconds behind Josh Parker in Second place. Yes, I lost 2nd place by 13 THOUSANDTHS of a second. Considering Josh normally beats me by 2-3 seconds, and Ed does the same, yes, I'm very pleased.

So, the rain slowed down everything a considerable amount, and I didn't end up leaving NHIS until 5pm or so, and then I SAT In traffic coming back from NH. Darnit. I got home around 7pm or so, unpacked about half the stuff in the car (I just left the other half in there, I was LAZY and TIRED) ate some foods, and watched some TiVo'd racing while I filled up the new fishtank with water, and then transferred the filter system to the new tank. (that whole process took probably two hours.) A little gaming, and then when I started falling asleep WHILE PLAYING, I knew it was time to go to bed. Shower, Bed. SLEEP.