2001 RESULTS PAGE - CLICK HERE
NTI Racing Schedule
Here's an index to the various 2000 race season stories on this web page...
My 1st Oregon Region SCCA Regional Race @ PIR
My 2st Oregon Region SCCA Regional Race @ PIR
My 1st North West Region SCCA Regional Race @ Bremerton
My 3rd and 4th Oregon Region SCCA Regional Races @ PIR
Getting Skunked @ SIR
My 2nd North West Region SCCA Regional Race @ Thunderhill
My 5th Oregon Region SCCA Regional Rose Cup Race @ PIR
My 6th and 7th Oregon Region SCCA Regional Races @ PIR
Getting Reamed @ SIR
My 8th and 9th Oregon Region SCCA Regional Races @ PIR
Date: 03/11/00 After Phase IX Mods. Chapter #1 ---------- Started the season off with a real BANG! Just got the car back from the body shop after getting the quarter panel damage, from two seasons back, fixed and had to spend a couple hours before practice checking loose ends to finish prepping the car for the 10:45 practice session at PIR. There was rain being forecast, so my hopes were not up for a real good weekend. But, a break was in the weather and Tim had come to help me out, so, we decided to go for it. Went on track and before I even completed lap two something went wrong. Had finally gotten the tires and brakes warmed up so it was time to pick up the pace and test the new front "Don Berry" lower control arms out. The chicane was bringing back fond memories and had been numbered turns 1, 2 and 3 for this season. So that made the west end turns into 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 I think. The east end was now simply 10, 11 and 12. I can live with that. So, I exit turn 9 onto the back straight and all of a sudden I hear this whoooosh noise. What was that?? Check my mirrors and see this funny object spinning back in the distance and off the track into the grass to my left... maybe 20 feet in front of a red 944 chasing me down. Look up and no T-top. SHHHHIIIIITTTT! Come back around and signal my hand out the window and tuck around the worker station wall near turn 8. Ask one of the workers if she'd get my top under yellow. No way. Had to go back after last lap and fetch it. OK. So I get the top finally and, believe it or not, there wasn't so much as a scratch. Apparently it flew like a frisby and just got a little muddy was all. What a relief. Now, if only the race steward would not make me leave my tops off for the race I will be happy. Nobody ever said a word to me. Cooool. Got my annual that morning too. What a hasle that was. Standing in the rain while the chief of tech jerked me around for a couple hours just because I did not bring two photos for the log book. Oh well. I get all the goof balls I guess. Tim and I bled the brakes, which was the only thing other than some rear end wobbles that I could find wrong with the car during practice. We double checked everything and called it a day. He offers to help on Sunday too. What an F-bud! So he and his wife and I finally end up going out to dinner and bench racing Sat night too. Sunday. SUNNY DAY. Great deal. My original plan was just to go easy this weekend and make sure to start this season out on the right foot without pulling any hit and runs or causing anyone any grief, now that I'm finally a real SCCA driver and all. With the sun coming out before the 9:00 am qualifier it was hard to relax, shall we say. I grid up number 2 in line to get out on track and stay ahead of traffic. Tim and I are a little worried about the fact that my rear end was wobbling the day before back on the back straight nearly every lap. It also wobble some on the front straight, once I got up over about 90mph. After talking to Joe Hermes later on Sunday we all concluded that 50% of my problem was due to the back straight somehow having developed some extra dips during the winter. As you exit turn 9 and take the bend on the first part of the straight the car is leaning left and the new dips have a way of really upsetting the back end. Even Hermes was noticing it in his car... a newly built up RED #1 AS Z28 with a "tweeeked to the max" LT1 motor. Not legal mind you, as it still has the LT1 vs carb intake. But he's working on it... well sorta. Anyway, I think the rest of my wobbles are due to only having 3.5 deg of caster vs the factory mandated 4.3 deg to 5.3 deg. The lack of caster resulting from my Don Berry control arms will need to be addressed ASAP. But, that's the reason I was racing this weekend anyways. To find out if this mod was worth it or not. Turns out it must not be all that bad though. The first car to grid for qualifying was a red BMW 325IS, whatever that is, ITE car? Obviously it was shelled out and ready to rumble. He blasted off onto the track like a bat out of hell... cold tires and all. I, on the other hand, head out under significant wheel spin grab 3rd and then 4th and do my normal brake warming exercises, through the chicane, hit the brakes 2nd to 3rd, brakes, up to speed brakes... heat them up a lap or so. Then start the hunt for a good lap or so. The 325IS is now the full length of the straight ahead of me and turns into the chicane as I exit from 12. Hummmm. I wonder? He's an ITE car too. So why not? 3rd to 4th. 4th to 5th. 5 marker, 4 marker, 3 marker, 2 and out with the anchors!!! Hauling her down and dive into the chicane, grab 2nd and left power on, 3rd and after burners kick in. Little grass on the left edge and out over the rise and anchors away. He's out there and I'm gonna see if I can bag me a beemer. 5 or 6 laps later I'm in his wake and he's starting to show me some puffs of smoke going into the chicane now. He doesn't want to get flamed but, sorry, I'm locked on and you're going down fella. Out of the chicane and I've got good grip. No reason to stop the fun and check the tires. Doing just fine seems to me. All the gages are a go too. Through 4 and 5 right. bank left for 6 and reel him in for the pass in 7. Late brake HARD and you're dead dude. I'm by on the inside and he tucks in RIGHT behind me. Tried to repass coming out of 8 but can't. I stick to the inside along the wall. He has to take the wide line. But I pull him and he's tagged and bagged. This is FUN!!! A few more laps and out comes the checker to end the qualifier. Tim and I are pumped. Still the wobbles but everything else held up real well. The brakes are working real FINE now. And it is SUNNY. This is my idea heaven folks. So we go get lunch and I take a nap and go through the brake and shift points for several laps in my head. Well, it's 12:35 and time to mount up for the big mission of the day. A 20 minute race. Tim and I have the qualifying sheet numbers and low and behold I'm gridded #5 out of 23 cars with a new PIR personal best lap time of 1:31.343. The time sounded good to me. But I had not brought my times from last season. So I wasn't too sure. And it did not seem like I had worked the car all that hard really. Told Tim I thought I could do better if the rear end would quit wobbling on the back straight. But there really was nothing we could do about that after checking everything and finding nothing wrong to fix. I had already added a half turn of tow out hoping that might settle down the front if the caster was my problem. To top it off though, I was gridded ahead of a Red Porsche 944 turbo (#44) that had spanked me pretty badly last year at the Rose Cup race. The other white Porsche 944 turbo (#98) had taken the pole with a 1:28.050 time. That did not surprise me at all as he had won the Rose Cup Festival Trophy race that past season. Having #44, who took second at the Rose Cups, gridded behind me with a 1:31.349 was a surprise though. Joe Hermes was sitting 4th on grid just ahead of me with a nice 1:30.716. His prior Maroon Z28 was now being driven by a "ladie friend of the family" and was back in the #22 spot. Her name was Suzanne Burrows and I had lapped her twice during qualifying. Cute red head though. The #2 spot was held by a blue RX7 (#41) with a 1:30.576 time. The #3 spot was held by a silver/grey RX7 (#91) with a 1:30.716 lap time. Both these guys were E Prod cars and were obviously going to be gunning for each other. The announcer decided that this would be a race to watch between the #2, #3 and #4 cars on grid and was telling the fans to keep their eyes open. I was just the #5 driver from Bellevue was all. So, Tim and I decided that the cars in the first row were of no concern at all. #98 was an ITE car but chances were slim that anyone would beat him. Our plan (I really don't know why I make these plans because the races never seem to go according to plan) was to simply follow Herme's Z28. He obviously has the car set up well so all I had to do was keep up with him and I should bring home a 3rd place ITE finish at least. And who knows maybe with some decent driving I could ward off #44 and grab a second place ITE finish. The other two ITE cars, the 325IS with a 1:33.317 and a Porsche 911 with a 1:33.602, could sort out 4th and 5th if they wanted to as they were gridded side by side in the 9th and 10th slots. So. Racers start your engines. Chapter #2 ---------- According to Hermes I should be running on the Goodyears vs the g-Forces. He says they are DOT rated? I thought they were racing slicks. But maybe he's right. I can use whatever I want in ITE anyways. Next time... So, we go on track and somehow we musta been gridded up wrong. I expected Hermes to be in row two next to car #91. But I'm in row two along side Hermes instead? OK. I'll take it. The grid marshal is the grid marshal. Who am I to question authority? We heat up our tires and Hermes keeps going nuts with his pipes roaring out my passenger side window. He's got these nice dual 4" side exit pipes which put out 12 db more than mine tested at! I've gotta have a couple of those!! The white 944 is ahead of me. The blue RX7 is front row to my right. The other Red 944 is back to my right... not beside me. The silver RX7 is behind me now. Hummm. Tires feel pretty good as do the engine and brakes. The adrenaline is beginning to pump up too. We form up and come out of 12 onto the main straight. The lead cars back down a notch and the group tightens as we come under the foot bridge and look for the flag. And out comes the green and we are OFFFF!! I slam down the gas and run up onto the 944's bumper in 2nd and grab 3rd at 6K. I'm seeing Hermes in his #1 car on my right side. Finally the 944 begins to pull away slowly on us all. #1 is actually catching #41 who decides to tuck infront of me behind #98. I get his draft now and grab 4th and thinking fast I see the hole #41 left to the right and play for it as I sling shot past the blue #41 RX7 at the 5 marker. 4, 3, 2 SLAM on the brakes! #1 is behind me now and it's time to turn in and HANG ON! BUT THE TIRES HAVE OTHER PLANS. Out comes the back end and I'm in a Kelchen version of a 4 wheel drift. Thank god the blue RX7 was behind me as was the rest of the pack! I counter full left rudder and the g-Forces finally hook up in 3rd. And then they wip out to my right. Counter full right rudder and shazam... I'm in #98's wake turbulance and heading due west out of turn 2. 2nd gear and away I go........ Check my mirrors and the blue RX7 and Red Z28 are dicing it up back there. Make turn 3 and head for 4 right. Hard on the binders again and after #98 I go. What a freeking start to a new season!! I can't believe I'm in second place and was just going to take it easy for once. The next several laps are a ton of hard ass racing fun. The two RX7s want me bad and change position a couple times fighting over the EP title and 3rd and 4th place. I catch #1 and #44 sorting out 4th and 5th as well. They are all trying to catch me. And I'm on the defense trying to keep from getting sacked in the first quarter. Then somewhere along the line after 5 or 6 laps the blue RX7 decides he's going to go kamikaze on me. Luckily I saw it coming as I noticed that rather than follow me along the wall on the main straight he was hanging out in my right side wing and trying like heck to keep up with me. My tires were hot and I did not want to repeat another four wheel slide through the chicane during this race so I decided to throw the anchor out at the #3 marker and let him go by if that's what he wanted. But the ass hole over shot the turn as I made my turn in and crossed right over my bow instead. He locked them up and tossed his tail around after I did a panic stop to keep from T-boning the jerk!! Then, to top it off, he cuts across my bow again, as he was so out of control, as I tried to take turn 2 the normal way. After the race Tim was more pissed off than I was I think. He told me he was about to chew that driver's butt for me as he'd seen the whole thing from the stands. So now I'm in 3rd and #1 and #44 have moved up behind me as well after I try to get back on the horse from all the chit this monkey just dumped on me. Next lap I find Hermes walking past me like it's a piece of cake and so does #44. Oh well. I'm finally in 3rd in ITE pretty much like I expected I would be. Just a matter now of pacing myself and making sure the other two ITE cars don't catch me after I make some dumb mistake of my own. Still, though, I have that darn silver RX7 who wants to get by me too so he can hunt down #41. Turns out #41 finally cooked his own goose and went off course giving it up to #91. Before that though... I'm coming through 11 and drop into 3rd and poke the brakes to set up for turn 12 with #41 shadowing me. The tires, by now, have started to show signs of stress from all the unplanned events of the day and some very intense scrubbing efforts for numerous laps. But they seemed to be hanging in there so far. So I think anyways as I do my standard turn in through 12. Then the next thing I know I lose the rudder and out comes the back end and BANG!!!! What the hell was that? Grip the wheel and my tail comes back around via some counter stearing effort. But I'm heading for the grass and the tire wall between me and the hot pits. SHI#@&T!! Both feeeeet in! And I'm off in the grass. Man I musta blown a frigging rear tire??!! Luckily I get it stopped right next to the guard rail and tire wall. That's a relief. BUT now the race is going south real f-ing fast. One minute I'm on cloud 9. The next I'm in the weeds. So I yell at one of the pit workers, "Do I have a FLAT TIRE??!!" He says, "Hold on I'll take a look... (long wait)... All I see is a strap hanging down!!!" "What?! You sure my tire is OK??!!" "No problem. Just a strap hanging down!!" OK. Now how the heck do I get back on the track? I can't see a dang thing from this angle due to the rear blind spot. Sheet. Sheet. Sheet. Put it in gear. Take a deep breath. Prey they have the yellow flag out and go real slow back on track. Now what? The starter hangs out the darn meat ball flag! SHHHHHHH! I suppose they don't want that strap hanging down now. One 90% lap and back into the pits I go. They finally hook my tow strap back up and give me the OK to go back on track. Well, so much for that race. I'm now a lap+ down in 5th place in ITE and all that work was for nothing!! So I go back on course only to find out that the car is running sluggish for some reason and seems to be coughing up blood a few times when I try to accelerate hard. Fuel filter again. Dang it! Bad enough I'm down a lap but now I can't even get back in the hunt because I'm getting fuel starved. So I decide to just take it easy and do a little Sunday driving until the checkered flag finally shows up. Chapter #3 ---------- So we are all in the post race holding area waiting for any protests to be sorted out and some kid who was driving the silver RX7 #41 comes over to Tim and I and wants to know if I was driving the red Z28? Yeah, why? "Just wanted to say I was sorry for rear ending you and punting you off the track man..." "Say WHAT? I didn't feel anyone hit me? What are you talking about?" "In turn 9 (i.e. now turn 12) when I bumped you off course there... you know?" "No sh@#$t. I thought I had lost traction and heard a bang and got a flat tire!" So I look at my rear end and sure enough the bumper was caved in. I reach up under and manage to pop it back out. Thank god for rubber bumpers. And thank god I did not have enough time to put my freshly painted new ground effects piece on before the race too!! That would have been a real waste. Only damange was a bent tail pipe. Naturally kid RX7 musta got a fine or something and I got last place handed to me in return. Way to go! Turns out, now that I have examined the evidence, that I will never race again without ALWAYS slapping on a fresh fuel filter and as soon as possible I'm getting rid of my tail pipes and the Y-pipe in favor of twin side exit dual exhaust. I'm pretty sure the BANG I heard was not the tow strap hook that I thought originally. But it probably was the tail pipe after being hit up against my storage well bottom when the RX7 banged into me from behind. Oh well. That's racing I guess. At least I improved both my best qualifying and race lap times at PIR. Managed to collect 1:31.403 fast lap in the race also.
Date: 04/02/00 After Phase IX Mods.. Chapter #1 ---------- What a weekend for racing! I am now getting a post race with 1/2 tank weight of 3594lbs. Hooked up with my long lost cousin Jerry Jessup on my way south from Bellevue and he played "pilot car" for me as we headed south to PIR again... during rush hour. Tried to leave town early Friday after work. Took off around 3:30 p.m. Traffic was already thick as flies. Ended up going down I-405 and got into such a jam we took a detour via the Boeing plant and through Renton where gas is CHEEP! Then down the Valley freeway and another side road. Then one more jam up in Pile-all-up and another side road. Finally came out near the Tacoma Dome and we could average 45 mph from there to Olympia anyways. But was that enough trouble for openers. Nope. Before we made it to Centralia some jerk kid with a buddy and a couple girl friends just had to get past me on the right while I was overtaking another car in the left lane. He goes screaming up the side and JUST BARELY darts between me and the car I'm closing on THEN he realizes that there is another car I'm following by about 4 car lengths is all. So, what does he do? SLAMS on his brakes as we just start around a bend in the road. I had no choice but to lock up all 8 wheels and produce a couple mushroom clouds off the trailer tires. Still I was going to ram the jerk. So as the trailer began weaving left and back to the right I went with it and cut right just as the car I was trying to overtake goes by on my right. Thank god the rest of the right lane was clear as the truck wiggled back and forth a few times in the right lane before it settles down!! Dang F-ing idiot kids! Jerry wanted to go back and kick some butt. But they were long gone... and really lucky they weren't dead and gone for good too. Got to PIR in one piece somehow and we set up camp in the paddock. Next day was Saturday. I had swapped my race tread onto my newer OZs in hopes of getting rid of the wobbles I still had from the last week at Portland. On to the track I go to see how things are set up during our practice session. A few laps later and all seemed to be working pretty good. Tires were hooking up fine, no real wobbles except in the dips on the back straight, and lots of green horns going off in the weeds for entertainment. The white #98 Porsche 944 turbo was not running. The Red #44 was though. As was the yellow #8 911 who had managed to get 3rd in ITE last race when I got booted off the track and landed out in 5th. Then the next thing I know the yellow flags start flying and I come around turn 6 (with the chicane again) and see some red car surrounded by smoke near turn 8. Turns out it was the red 944 and the extinguishers were everywhere. Hummm. Maybe this will be and easy race to win. Who knows? Unfortunately, the red 944 had lost an oil line and, I found out later, he had managed to recover from that problem without any major damages. He ended up qualifying on the pole, naturally, with a 1:28.786. #2 in row 1 was that crazy Ken Shreve guy in the blue RX7 that I nearly mangled at the first race when he pulled that stunt pass of his entering the chicane. He had somehow clicked off a really nice 1:29.973 sub-EP track record time. The #3 qualifier was #59 in a nice red 3rd gen A Sedan Camaro with a very fast 1:29.990. #4 was a late arrival in a white high wing BMW T1 car, #79, with a 1:30.063. #5 was the other EP RX7, David Palmer, #91, who would wind up in my mirrors all season long. He had a qualify time of 1:30.589. #6 on grid, in row 3 also, was another quick EP 240SX who had a 1:30.661 time. Then comes Slowrider in row 4 with a new record time for me of 1:31.223! I was pumped as this told me my latest mods were actually paying off to some degree. I had also noticed that I was now more evenly matched with Joe Hermes in his red 4th gen Z28 #1 who had ticked off a spot right next to me in row 4 with a 1:31.450. He had, BTW, managed a fast lap at the previous race of something like 1:29.450 though. So he was off his prior pace now that he was trying to set up his new set of g-Force tires and wasn't getting the results he was hoping for. The other ITE car, the yellow 911, had qualified back in the 10th spot with a 1:32.272 behind a T2 Cobra in the 9th spot with a 1:32.236. Spots 5 through 10 could easily be anyone's fair game if they played their cards right. But I was feeling pretty chilled out for once as ALMOST everything was going well at this point. That is, with the exception of one small problem which had developed right on the last lap of my qualifying session. My O2 sensor had fallen out of the right side header causing me to limp it back to the paddock for repairs. The problem was it would not re-thread into the pipe as the threads were stipped out! Jerry and I had tried everything including bubble gum and bailing wire to get the sensor to stay in the hole. I guess had I called Kelchen he would have told me to remove the lock washer so I'd have had a couple more thread to screw in with. Boy do I need a crew chief! Anyway. I was crossing my fingers that my jury rigged repair job would hold up. Only time would tell, but at least it was running well for now. So. Racers start your engines... again. Chapter #2 ---------- This race started off with a bang. The tires felt like they were heating up well. The new race pipe was soooooo sweeeeet sounding it just made my blood boil. And the DynoMax would pop a little everytime I lifted to enter a corner. That rumble got me a few complements in the paddock after qualifying and it would wake up any driver I wanted to pass when they looked up after hearing me reel them in from behind and would point me by. The vibes off the back straight wall were AWESOME too. For once I was actually loving this ride. We came out of turn 11 and under the Good Year bridge and I dropped back a tad and then ramped up through 5800 rpms in 2nd and timed it perfect to grab 3rd just as the green waved. Away we went with all my fans (my mother Pat, my cousin Jerry and his wife Janis and their granson and Jim and Mindy Hodel) waiting for me down in the chicane. Figured I may as well show off my STUFF. Cars were breaking left and breaking right and I was beginning to haul them in. Next thing I know Hermes is up the left side fast and I feel like I'm beginning to get some draft from the car ahead off me. So I stay put in the middle of the pack. The red Camaro and red 944 are side by side in front with the blue RX7 hugging the wall in front of the white BMW. Talk about a drag race!! But I'm reeling them all in and the only hole is about 1.5 car widths to the right as break lights start to come on. All except mine that is. I keep my foot into it and by the red 944 I go. He has to anchor it and back down or maybe get pinched between the red Z28 on his right (me) and the red AS Camaro on his left. We enter the right hander with tires puffing smoke here and there and my car is shaking under massive ABS. Grab 3rd, kick out the back, counter and find myself nicely centered coming out of 1 with a bright red 944 breathing my fumes. Nothing I can do but tweek the power, grab 2nd to kick the tail out and around the left hander, back off a tad to let it hook back up and then FLOOR it and head for the three cars up ahead that managed to get through 1 and 2 without me eating them for dinner. Not too shabby for a race start! Went from 7 to 4 in two turns worth of work. But I could not let up too much or I would drop back for sure. Now, the game plan is to play it cool and get through the rest of the lap without any mistakes. I see Hermes two cars back as the other three in front of me are beginning to ease away up ahead. But I was able to lay down a pretty good first lap and for some reason the red 944 was not able to keep up the pace. Next thing I know Hermes is by him and trying to reel me in. Joe and I spent the next several laps clicking off a 1:34 followed by 1:31, 1:33 in a play for 3rd and traffic, a 1:30.862 (my all time best), 1:32, 1:32, 1:32, 1:32 and 1:32. Now I was in 3rd and Joe was back in 5th. Somewhere in there I had managed to push the red AS Camaro hard enough entering the chicane that when we exited turn 2 left he lost it and did a 360 as I went on by. That was the most fun pass I've made in a while. I think this resulted in my 1:36 lap however. Chapter #3 ---------- Then all hell broke loose. Suddenly the engine gave out this gastly groan and before I knew what had happened it felt like I was trying to run on 6 cylindars. The pipe was rattling when I let up and rattled like a banchee. The more I'd add the power the worse it ran. SHI$%@!! There goes the O2 sensor I'm betting? Before I know it I can't even manage to get the car to exceed 90 mph or pass a Pinto I was about to lap... or a VW Golf down the back straight. This REALLY sucks!! Here comes Hermes and he goes by. Then I actually managed to pass the VW only to have him pass me back. The 911 ITE car flys by us both like we're standing still and I click off a 1:39 lap and the car is running even worse. I can't even take the VW this time down the back straight. Finally, after basically giving up and trying different gears just to see if I can run it up to 4500 rpms somehow I manage an all time worse lap of 1:59 in fail safe mode (as Johns calls it). Then to add salt to my wounds here comes the last corner, the Good Year bridge and I see the checker flag way down the straight and the red 944 in my mirrors. Then next to me. Then right on by about 50 yards from the finish... even though I had managed to boost it back up to a 1:39 lap. Wooopppy. Darn! DARN!! DARRRRRN!!! 3rd place in ITE and 10th overall. WHAT A DOWNER! If I had just not konked out on that 1:59 lap I would have still captured 2nd over a wounded 944T that had a turbo which apparently had refused to compress air for some reason. So, now I get home and unload the car. Put it on stands and crawl under it only to find out the O2 sensor is still in there and snug as ever thanks to the muffler cement and bailing wire. But the pipe was banging against the cross member due to the hanger not being held on tight enough to hold it up. So what the heck is wrong? Fuel filter?? No way! I actually had planned to swap to a new one which I just bought the night before. But I had run out of time playing around with the O2 sensor. So, I swapped it in the garage and fire that sucker up and BINGO!!! It runs perfect again. I can NOT F-ing believe it. That fuel filter had fouled up in only two 20 minute sessions and about 15 minutes into the race. I must have a LOT of gunk in my tank from some place??!! That's just my luck. Oh well. I guess that's racing as they say. The three hot ITE cars only managed to finish 6th, 8th and 10th overall. What a crying shame.
Date: 04/09/00 After Phase IX Mods.. CHAPTER 1 --------- You know you think you have your car set up and ready to rumble. You check every nut and bolt. You replace all the lubricants. You fire the sucker up and it seems to run like a champ. Then you get to the track and take it out on the first 15 minutes worth of practice laps. You want to see how it handles and sort out the road course. First lap you warm up and settle in. Next lap you begin to pick up the pace and start taking note of how all the systems are functioning. Third lap you're settled in and you start to drive at the 98% level. The car is beginning to tell you where to go and how to get there. You're having FUN! Then you come down to turn one at about 115 mph in 5th gear. You apply full stop breaking and BAM!! You hear this god awful noise banging around back under the car's frame so you begin thinking in over drive what you should do next. You're already hard on the brakes but guess what? The rear suspension of the car feels like it's about to bust into a million pieces as you are about to enter a difficult at best to negotiate left hand corner. Well this is not one of those BEST case situations. Not the way the rear end of the car is currently behaving. So, time for plan "B". Continue straight ahead... Luckily, on this particular race tack located at Bremerton Airport, going straight ahead is not a bad thing. Just so long as you can get the car stopped within the next 500 yards or so. That's because the main straight takes up about 1/2 the length of a closed runway. So, the other half is still there to land on too in cases like this. I let off the brakes and the vibration out back gets better. I put the brakes back on and it gets MUCH worse. Let off and past the corner I go. Try easy braking and the vibration returns but at least it's not unbelievably bad. So I try gently pumping the brakes and down shifting. But letting out the clutch just gets a ton more bad noises out back. So clutch back in again. Tapping the brakes and I eventually get the car stopped... about 150 yards from the nearest turn workers and any help. Now smoke comes rolling up from under the car. Oh GREAT! Time to bail and see if my extinguisher will be enough to put out the fire. Takes 15-20 seconds, which seems like for ever, to get unstrapped and out of the car. Grab my fire bottle and start looking for fire and damages. Humm. No fire really. Must just be some oil on hot things I guess? Look under the rear of the car and there's an expensive 1LE aluminum drive shaft dragging on the ground. It's beat up pretty badly too. Just my luck! So now rather than spend the rest of the weekend racing and having fun I get to be towed back to the paddock and go home. 3 or 4 laps for $150. What a deal. After getting towed back and having the drive shaft fall out in the process I finally get the drive shaft back and the other ITE 944T driver comes over and wants to know what happened to my car. He then tells me to call a junk yard and get a new shaft and I'll be able to race him in no time. However, Carlo, after taking a gander at the damages informs me that my torque arm is busted also. No wonder the rear end shook so badly under braking! Now the damage estimate is starting to double. Time to head home where a full assessment of the situation can be had. Some of the gang pushes the car onto my trailer and I start the long haul home. About 3 miles from the track, and a near fatal encounter with a Sunday driver (which is an entire story in itself) later, I realize that maybe I can just swing into Grey Chevrolet and score on a few parts to assist in my repairs. Who knows. Maybe I can get the car up and running for the Sunday race at least? Find the part man and we start looking at part numbers for the rear end. Drive shaft? Nearest one is in Arizona. Not today. Torque arm is a moot issue without a drive shaft. How about the four universal joint bolts and the two straps that hold it to the rear differential yoke? BINGO. They have the four bolts. But nothing else. Well that's something I guess. Get to Federal Way and realize a detour to Auburn Chev might produce some more parts. So I head on over to Auburn. They have one of the needed two yoke straps. OK. Where's the other one? Up at Auburn Pontiac about two miles north. 2 hours later and I now have the four bolts and two straps. No drive shaft or torque arm though. When I finally get home it dawns on me that maybe I can get a loaner drive shaft from Ken Bollman. After all he got his from me last winter. He should still have it. After calling him we decide that he can meet me in Tacoma Sunday morning on my way back to Bremerton IF I can get everything else repaired before then. However, that means I can't take the car off the trailer to effect repairs as I'll never get it back on again until I get the drive shaft from Ken. So, I decide to jack up the rear end right on the trailer. Crawl under the car and start tearing things apart. Yep the torque arm is toast. No way to fix it. Torque arm. Where to get a torque arm on a Saturday afternoon?? The light finally goes on in my brain! John Kelchen!! I had already called him and left a message about needing a drive shaft. Now I realize maybe he has a torque arm too. He pulled his engine and it's in the shop as we speak. He should have a torque arm and a drive shaft laying around on his garage floor. But he can't be reached for an interview. After all, it is a nice sunny Saturday, so the family is probably still out at Jaren's soccer game. John does call back about 2:30 pm. And he says he can save my racing career by bringing me both a drive shaft and a torque arm at about 8:30 pm after he gets done working on his car for the day. That's the best news I've had all weekend. I decide it's time for lunch and a breather before I go take the mangled bolts and universal joint straps off the yoke. Not much else I can do until I get the drive shaft and torque arm anyway. So, I eat and finally go back out and pick up where I left off under the car. Except now I find out that it's 4:10 pm and my yoke is ruined too! I yell at my next door neighbor, Cliff, "Can you run me over to Brooks Chevrolet before their parts department closes?" My truck is still hooked up to the trailer and it's not going to be unhooked very fast. So Cliff and I head over to Brooks and LUCKILY, for once, they have the yoke. I decide to get a pinion seal also just in case. Besides, mine was also showing another slight leak which I noticed while inspecting the damages. Once I got home I read the manual on extracting the yoke. Seems doable. Should just check the pinion nut torque before removing it and then remove the nut and slide the yoke off the pinion shaft splines. Crawl back under the car and finally end up with the yoke in my hands and a bunch of rear differential oil in my FACE! Boy am I glad I bought a new pinion seal. Obviously it also needs to be replaced. Now all I have to do is figure out how to extract the old one without the right tools. Turns out you start with a very small screw driver to pry it out just a little around the edges. Then you can get a larger screw driver to wedge in and pry it out some more. Then an even larger screw driver and a hammer and you can eventually tap, tap, tap it out. Then you can see that the rim of the rear differential housing has sustained a rather hard hit which actually dented the rim a bit as well. Getting any future pinion seals in is going to be harder than normal. That's for sure. Speaking of pinion seals. How the heck am I going to put the new one back in?? I don't have a large, round special tool (per the manual) to drive the new seal back into the differential housing. Hummm. I know! Maybe an old 2 1/2" diameter piece of exhaust pipe, a piece of wood and a hammer will come in handy. Yep. That's what you call yankee ingenuity. After plastering a little RTV around the seal rim, for good measure, and a lot of pounding on the exhaust pipe and seal that sucker shouldn't be leaking again for a while anyway. The dent in the differential housing did prove to make it more difficult to get the seal in. But I managed to work around it finally. Took another break and called Ellis for advice on how to put the pinion nut back on so the yoke and crush sleeve would be set up correctly. I also figured John could double check my work once he got to my place. Never hurts to consult with the experts when you haven't got a clue what you are doing. Between Ellis, John and the manual it turns out that "good and tight" was in order. When John showed up he made sure it was good and tight and proclaimed, "That should be tight enough Chuck." That's all I wanted to hear. So, by 11:30 pm I finally had a fully operational rear drive line assembly and the car was strapped back down on the trailer. I went to bed tired and sore from only 4 minutes of track time. CHAPTER 2 --------- Took just about an hour to haul the car back to Bremerton Sunday morning. It was overcast. Boy I hope it doesn't rain. Steve Sampson passes me about 5 miles south of the track. We wave and he blasts off the next off ramp. I finally get to the track and begin unloading the car by removing the tie down straps and going through the typical process of raising the trailer tongue so I can get the ramp angle correct to unload the car. So, I'm jacking up the front of the trailer when all of a sudden I realize that I had forgotten to set the parking brake the night before while working on the car. Usually I never tow the car without setting the brake. But this time I had a major brain fart, coupled with all the work on the car, and the fatigue factor. So what happens?? The car, assisted by the increasing slope of the trailer and gravity, starts rolling backwards off the end of the trailer WITHOUT any ramps in place to assist in the unplanned off loading procedure. You can imagine the horror which came over me as I stood there and watched my baby drop about a foot off the back of the trailer and onto the ground with these borrowed parts attached to the underside of the car!! John's gonna kill me if he ever reads this! Then, luckily, the car high centers stopping it before the front tires follow the rear, which surely would have ripped the front end components (things like a radiator, air dam, ground effects and bumper to name a few) to shreds in the process. Talk about being embarrassed! I mean what could go wrong next? Well, I have about 45 minutes until the first practice session begins and one high centered half on, half off, the trailer race car. Anybody want to guess how you get a hung up race car off a trailer with no way to get the ramps out from under it? Let's just say that three heads are better than one and leave it at that. Believe it or not the only damage this time was a bent exhaust outlet and a scraped power cable to the battery. Boy was I lucky that time! CHAPTER 3 --------- I actually got to run around the track about 10 minutes during that practice session. And, get this, nothing broke. Well, almost nothing. I did manage to figure out how to take turn 1 going side ways on cold race tires. Not once but twice before the day was over. Did the same trick during the qualifying session later that morning also. But, the car was running and the wheels and tires stayed pretty much on the ground. So, that's somewhat of an accomplishment. Right? During the qualifying session I had mixed feelings. I ended up starting late also... after figuring out that I had to bleed my mushy brakes. I also had to fix the damaged power cable and the damaged exhaust tip. And, I found out that the sound readings from the day before were all bogus. I was not hitting 107db like I was told after all. Turns out the sound meter operator had set the sound meter up using the wrong setting and had made about half the drivers royally pissed off in the process. Yours truly included. Then, after lunch I finally got back my qualifying times. It seemed to me that I had maybe run some 1:03 or 1:04 laps. I figured I'd be gridded way behind all the Porsche 911 and RSAs. And probably way behind #98, the other ITE car I had to race who had been forced to race on Saturday without me. Steve, I had gathered, had clicked off some low 1:03 laps on Saturday as well. And rumor had it that Ron McDuffy had gotten into the 1:02 range with his A Sedan Camaro. NOTE: I find out later that #98 had run out of gas during the Saturday race I had missed. I would have taken home a 1st place finish if only... Any time I've run at Bremerton in the past I've never been able to do a lap faster than an A Sedan car. I've usually come up about a second slower on my lap times. So, perhaps 1:03 was to be expected. NOT! I had somehow managed to click off a 1:01.161!! Well, I'll be.... I finally had some reason to smile. I may not be able to run a 0:59+ like the other ITE 944T was able to produce. But I was a very happy camper to get back this qualify time. I'd be gridded one row behind #98 in the 4th row. Some 0:57 and 0:59 second 911s would fill up the first couple rows. Ron's AS car ended up back in row 6 after he had to drop out of that qualifying session due to mechanical problems of his own. But his times from day 1 showed that he was good for row 4 normally. In the mean time, Steve Sampson had posted a decent 1:02+ during one of his timed Solo I sessions putting him right behind the ZR1 Vette with an LT5 motor which posted some 1:00+ laps times also for Solo I. TEAM NW F-Body was definitely exhibiting a show of force this afternoon. CHAPTER 4 --------- As we went out for the pace lap I was counting on a default 2nd place finish in ITE and a rather much needed 25 minutes worth of seat time. Porsche engines where whining all around. The sound of my DynoMax muffled power plant was enough to make me feel like a P-38 Lightning being surrounded by a flock German Messerschmitts over Europe. The next thing I know the green flag is out and the race for turn 1 is on. My plan is simple. Don't do any side slides through turns 1 or 2 on my still cold g-Force rubbers. I guess everyone else had about the same plan except Ron McDuffy who showed up on my rear view radar screen hot on my heels out of turn 4. #98 was just ahead still and I was trying like H to keep up. By-the-way, #98 was being piloted by a second driver this day. Rather than racing against Craig Hillis who owns the car I was told I had a different driver to contend with named Alex Neckas. But right now it was Ron I wanted to actually beat. And from what I could tell he had me in his sights and was looking to smoke me as well. We came out of the hair pin and back onto the main straight and #98 began to walk away slowly up ahead. And it looked like Ron and I were pretty much even down the straight. One more 98% lap and then, once the tires were good and warm, I would turn up the juice for lap 3. We'll see who's Camaro will beat who's Ron. By the time we had reached the hair pin on lap 2 I had managed to reel the 944T back in to within a couple car lengths again. Not too shabby for a lowly F-body if you ask me. Then he walked away again down the straight. Hard braking into turn 1 and I could close the gap a little. Late brake for #2 and I'd close the gap some more. Apex 2, 3 and 4 correctly and foot to the floor out of 4 and through 5 towards 6 and hang on tight! Brake hard into the hair pin and once again I had #98 in my cross hairs. Ron was dropping back. I was on fire and beginning to like how the road rocket was performing. Who knows, maybe I could hang on and wear #98 down?? After several laps of this yo yo game I finally managed to screw up though. Coming into 1 I could not find my 5th to 4th to 3rd down shift. Damn!! Where's 3rd freaking gear??!! "Don't go into 1 and blow another clutch CHUCK!", said a little voice over my shoulder. "Let go of the shift lever and let it find neutral center. OK. Clutch in. Shift to 2nd. Now GO!! For crying out loud..." Well now Ron was back on my tail and #98 was a good 50-60 yards down the back straight leaving me in the dust. A couple more hard laps and I'm once again ahead of Ron in my very own no man's land... racing all by myself. Slower cars way behind me and faster cars way ahead of me. Boring! Then, as I enter the hair pin, out comes the yellow and red striped debris flag. As I round the hair pin I see what they mean. Car parts all over the track on the entry to the main straight. Some poor Porsche had banged into a large tire placed there just to mangle cars like that. Then out comes the "pace car" sign at the start/finish station. Hummm. Pace car. This is perfect. A full course yellow! All I have to do is get going and maybe I'll be able to catch #98 before they clean up the mess. Peddle to the metal and away I go. And sure enough after another lap we all find ourselves in single file behind the pace car. Then I have another brain fart. Thinking this will be another lap behind the pace car I look down to check my temp gages only to look up and see #98 pulling away hard another 50-60 yards ahead of me and here I am in 3rd freaking gear putzing along with my head up my you know what. Jeeeze.... Grab 2nd and away I go. What better way to give up all I gained? This just is not my weekend for racing. Oh well. Maybe next time. A few more laps for practice, and to once again stretch my lead on Ron, and out comes the checkered flag. Game over. Lessons learned. Just as I had figured, second place in ITE. Oh well. It was fun. That much I can say at least. And I was happy that the car is now fast enough to beat my 4th A Sedan so far for the season. So, I must be doing a couple things right at least. I started in 7th and ended in 6th over all. My fast lap time for the race was a decent 1:01.277. Next time I'll see if I can cook up a sub 1:01. I guess I'll have to in order to stay ahead of Steve Sampson. He cooked up a 1:01.8xx later that afternoon himself.
Date: 05/07/00 After Phase IX+ Mods.. RACE 1 ------ This was a double race weekend for Oregon Region SCCA at PIR. The sun was out and the action was hot and heavy... in more ways than one. The first race was a so called "sprint race" and worth 1/2 the normal points. 20 minutes. The second race was set to be a 30 minute race for full points. Turns out that due to a couple track clogging spins during race 2 that it only ended up running for 20 minutes also after stopping the race to clear the carnage. During race 1 I had an awesome start thanks to my Bear brakes. A couple cars, including the red 944 Turbo #44 and Joe Hermes red 4th gen Z28 both managed to out run me down the straight for turn 1 into the chicane. But, I found a seam down the middle and felt fairly sure I had warmed my BFGs well enough to try late braking them as we went to the binders. By waiting till the 2.5 marker I regained what I had lost and then some. The tires hooked well and I slipped on by and into turns 1 and 2 and came out in 2nd and off we went. A baby grand and a white Nissan were running side by side in front of me so I could not get past them until we finally got on the back straight. I passed the B.G. car and was working on taking the Nissan on the left as we came into turn 10 (old turn 7) but he cut me off. I stayed with him through 10, 11 and 12 and down the straight and again through the chicane and into turn 4 where I tried to pass him on the right again... with #44 trying his best to reel me in from behind in the 2nd place ITE spot. As I got along side the Nissan he once again failed to drive like a man and pushed me over onto the curbing through turn 4. I was forced again to back out. My race was not with the Nissan, so I simply followed him another lap and decided to cool my equipment and take him down going into the chicane on lap 3. He was setting a good fast pace. I decided that by holding off until the chicane the #44 car would probably be about to mark up on me by then anyways... as he is noticably faster down the straights once his boost kicks in. The idea was to take the Nissan once the twisties started and spread my lead during the 1 to 9 turns out back, using the Nissan to screen off the 944T in the process. This would require full binders going into the chicane and a good clean pass though, as the 944T was going to be hot on my tail by then. All was going as planned and I was coming down hard into the chicane when the Nissan (must have been reading my mind) locked up while trying to out break me as well. His tires turned to smoke and he realized he was not going to make it going into turn 1. He took the by-pass and DID NOT STOP! I, having been distracted by all this, ended up missing my mark also and did a tire slide going into 1 when I over pumped on my brakes too. The result was that I lost valuable ground on the 944T and now had no car between us at all. By the time we came around on the following lap the 944T had reeled me in and was just barely able to go by as we broke for turn 1 again. He had the inside line. I was forced to yield. From that point on, for the next several laps, it was all I could do to campain a yo-yo race with the 944T. I'd reel him in in the corners and under braking and he'd put some space between us again each time we went down the front or back straights. By the 3rd lap from the finish though I had observed that his tires were not sticking in the corners like mine where. I decided it was time to try a re-pass entering turn 5 right (between 5 and 6). He had been blocking me (illegally) for several laps knowing he could keep me behind him that way until he got to the next straight. But this time I faked right and as he blocked I went left. It worked well enough to get me beside him coming out of 6 and down the short straight between 6 and 7 but I could not seal the deal. Again, he had the line into 7 and the boost going through 8 and 9 onto the back straight. He pulled away again!! Last lap. Again I push hard going 110% to get by in the 5 and 6 corners after reeling him back in between 1 and 4. And, he makes a BIG mistake. He comes out of 5 too hard on the throttle and goes into a slide to his left. Seeing this I start to make a pass. But he swings back trying to fight for control and wags to the right again. TOO DANGEROUS to get by him. @#*%$&! The luck is on his side. We enter 7 right and I want by sooooo badly I try a down shift to 2nd for a bit extra torque through 7 and 8. But my upshift to 3rd fails. Darn thing would not go into gear!! And there he goes. He had the lead, point, set and match. Crossed the finish 3 corners later about 50 yards back. RACE 2 ------ Race 2 was, as I said before, stopped mid-race for carnage. Dave Dickoff nearly rolled his 3rd gen Camaro after skidding into the grass in turn 7 and came backward onto the track right in my path. I was chasing #44 and managed to evade Dickoff's car to the right. This was lap 2 and a full course came out thanks to Dave and a B.G. car that bought the farm in the chicane. We followed the pace car for like 10 minutes while they removed cars from the track. After the restart I managed to move up to a respectable over all Group 1 finish but thanks to the 944T having replaced his spent tires with better rubber there was no way I could ever get by him. Racing in his wake was fun. But he did the remainder of the race without a hitch and simply managed to keep me in my 2nd place position just like the race before. Both races were a lot of fun. But beating the 944T cars is going to take quite a bit of tact (and maybe some extra horse power) to be sure.
Date: 05/21/00 After Phase IX+ Mods.. John and I both managed to show up at SIR for a week of fun. Started out reasonably well but things only seemed to get worse. My practice session soon told me that my rear end wobbles were back again. Could not get up over 80 or 90 without major wagging out back. Darn it anyways! Carlo and I spent most of Sat afternoon investigating what the heck the cause must be. After lots of head scratching I finally decided, via old fashion logical deduction, that my rear must be wagging because my front toe was set way too far out. I decided to crank my toe in a turn or two on one side and out a turn on the other side... after we eye balled the car on some flat asphalt. Then I went out and got a decent qualify time. In the mean time John was trying to sort out a few problems of his own with his tranny tail shaft and a leak some place in his newly rebuilt engine. At least he was happy with his brakes. He had spent a lot of time converting his car for C Production class this season. Nice new roll cage too. He managed to qualify a couple rows back and we were both in the show for Sunday. Come Sunday though John was still trying to work out a few bugs and swapping out driveshafts, etc. He just barely made the race in the CP class. I was trying to play in SPO as usual. And my air filter had become clogged during my prior day's qualify session which did little to help me get a better lap time as well. THE RACE -------- The start was wild and the race group was going into turn 1 three and four cars wide. I got a good jump and moved up a couple cars taking 1 on the inside. But a Mazda proceeds to nearly run me into the wall forcing me to back out. John is on the prowl behind me and I've got my sites on Terry Ward a couple cars ahead. We make it through 2 in one piece and head hot and heavy down into 3A and 3B. I'm making good time coming out of 3B and we head for 4 and 5A and 5B. Taking 6 left I made a rather costly mistake with John in my mirrors. I early apexed and ended up dropping my right side tires off the edge into a bit of a rough ditch there as we come up out of of the valley. 7 told me I was now running on some vibrating tires. And I nearly lost the back end trying to take 8 to the left. Coming out of 8 was like rolling over a cattle grate... major rear end vibrations. But I decided to press on thinking maybe my tires had picked up a bunch of off road gravel which should spin free sooner or later. I hoped. This did not prove to be the case, although I did manage to finally pass one more car during the next couple laps. And I was actually able to pick up some ground on Terry Ward. But the car simply was not going to stop vibrating. To make a long story short, the vibrations only got worse. So I finally dropped out on lap 7. Turns out I had managed to break two studs on my right rear wheel/hub. And two of the three remaining stud lugs were nearly lost as well. The tire had just about gone AWOL. So, I was lucky I stopped when I did. John ended up having more fun, but he too was called in once on a meat ball to check his oil/smoke issues. They let him finish out the race though. Although he had vibration problems of his own I hear tell later. So much for SIR that weekend. Maybe we'll have better luck next time.
Date: 05/28/00 After Phase IX+ Mods.. This race was a long haul down to Thunderhill, CA. And to start things off on the wrong foot my tow vehicle's water pump broke down near Medford, OR on a Fri afternoon. Nearly died trying to find someone running a repair shop who could get us back on the road again. But we managed. Got to Willows, CA (about 5 miles east of Thunderhill) at about 11pm that night. Next day my uncle Kenney and cousin Ken Jr showed up from San Jose, CA to assist me and we set up shop, unloaded the car, etc. My uncle used to race dirt bikes and is a real auto racing fan. He was glad to hook up and watch the races slated for that weekend. First thing I did was go out on track for my morning practice session, do a "slow" warm up lap and manage to fly off the corner at maybe 25 mph, going up over the "Crow's Nest". So, I took a rather bumpy down hill ride and short cut to the bottom and managed not to roll the car in the process. This particular corner is a BLIND 90 degree left hander at the top of a fairly steep hill. Because the hill is so steep, and the turn goes left right at the top, you simply have no idea where the road goes unless you have been over it SEVERAL times before. It took me a few laps to figure that one out, and still it was hard to time and get right, even once I got into my qualifying session later that afternoon. 2nd gear and hard breaking on entry, hard left with the wheel, a little tire squeel and that pretty much makes a decent apex there. Then upshift as you reach the bottom right hand turn 5a, if the g-forces don't make you miss your shift. Some of the other corners at Thunderhill have tricks of their own. Of the 16 turns you have one that's off camber, two that are blind entries, one that's sharper than it looks (and which I also missed a couple times), one decreasing radius, etc. So, it is a track that takes a lot of practice to get anywhere near a best lap out of. In my case I was running 2 minute 20+ sec laps the first day and had managed to widdle that down to 2 minute 10 seconds on one lap by the end of Memorial Day Weekend. Some of the A Sedans where cutting 2:06 and 2:07 laps though. So, there's more to be had there for me. I entered two races. The first race I did not even manage to complete a entire lap before I washed out. Yet that first lap I will not soon forget! I was forced to start at the very back of the group due to being disqualified during qualifying because my loud pipe broke the sound rules. There was only one other ITE car, an RX7 out of San Fransico Region. I figured I could beat him easily. Most of the rest of the group was made up of those darn Porsche 911s and RSA type cars though. They would be more trouble to deal with. Got a good start though and managed to pass about 4 cars at the green, including one black RSA with a high wing who eventually ended up working his way up from the back and taking 2nd over all (he too must have been zapped for sound). I nearly hit that sucker twice in the first 8 or 9 turns along with another white 911 who managed to cut me off while trying to pass him in turn 3 and again in turn 6. By the time we had come around to turn 11 I had encountered no less than 4 near misses already. Then, both the black RSA and I decided to go off road racing as we went too hot into 11 left. In the process I managed to pick up a clump of gravel in one of my front tires which rattled the heck out of my suspension as I came back on the track and down the back straight. The vibration was so bad that I was sure I had, once again, snapped a lug or two. So, I came in; only to find out it was a major out of balance condition which probably would have righted itself had I stayed out long enough. First I lose some lugs at SIR and think it is gravel. Then I get gravel at Thunderhill and think it is busted lugs. What next??!! Well, later that afternoon I go back out and manage to qualilfy and the car seems to be back in order. Uncle Ken decided to stay another day and we get back out on Monday with me sitting about mid pack surrounded by 911s and the one other ITE car, who took my 1st place win that I handed to him the day before. I was out for blood and decided this was a do or die race. I needed a 1st place, to factor into my OR Region points race, which is the main reason I had gone so far south for this race weekend. And by god that's what I would have! Again, I got a decent start, passing a couple 911s and leaving the RX7 in the dust. Things sorted themselves out and before long I found myself paired up with another 911 which seemed to be about my equal. I missed a shift during lap 4, after having reeled him in for the kill, only to lose a good 50 yards on him in the process. My engine had been taxed pretty hard under the stress of racing that well. So, I decided to back off a lap and cool my jets. It would be a long, HOT, 30 minute race. I wanted to beat the 911. But, not at the cost of losing the lead over the other ITE car or killing my car in the process. I decided to start reeling him in again and probably posted my best lap of the weekend in the process; a 2:10+. Turns out that was also good enough to set a track record in the ITE class. Frosting on the cake for me. After several hard won laps the 911 was beginning to show signs of wear down. Then, as he entered turn 9, with me gunning for him, he manages to do a 270 loop out. I go by him in 3rd thinking that was way too easy. And, as it turns out, it was. I put quite a bit of road between us and there was no other cars in sight up ahead. So, I pressed on for a lap or so. Again the engine was showing a hot temp guage. And again I decide to cool my jets for a lap. Generally, if I cut a lap by leaving the car up one gear higher in the corners than I would normally run the coolant will chill down in no time. Then I can resume 100% speeds again. However, this would prove to be a slight mistake this lap. As I was taking the sweeper, turn 2 to the left, I did not have the normal exit grip using 4th that I was used to when using 3rd. I'll be darned if the car did not drift out wide on the exit and I ended up putting my right front tire off the edge right as I approached the white and red curbing that marks the exit side of the turn. The darn tail pipe managed to drag over the curbing and the tip was torn loose. I did not know it at the time, but the exhaust tip was hanging on my hanger cable and had been bent enough that it was blocking my exhaust gas flow. I could tell the engine was muffled all of a sudden. And I noticed a measurable drop in my horse power and exit speeds. Within, a couple laps the 911 had regained everything he lost on me during his spin. He tried to pass me on the right as we entered turn 14 but I out broke him and took the pass back as we entered the corner. He over took me down the front straight as he now had the acceleration over me. But, I managed to get back around him as we flew over the Crow's Nest and he slipped out there. I'm betting I was one of only two cars to ever pass anyone there!! You just don't pass anyone on the Crow's Nest. In fact, what you do is HOPE nobody slides out there. Because if they do the next car will probably T-bone them before they even see them in a case like that. That's how hairy that corner is. Once again he tried to get me at trun 14. And once again I get him back under braking. He finally gets me for good on the front straight though, as the car won't get going again for another few laps. The tail pipe finally rattled free at which time I got most of my power back. But by then the 911 had gotten back on the horse and I simply could not find a way to finish him off before the race was over. We did battle for some hard fought laps. And in the process we both lapped the RX7 car. That was good by me. So, I went home with a 1st in ITE, some well earned points, a fast lap time in ITE at Thunderhill and a lot of great race footage to study back at the farm. It was a fun Memorial Day weekend.
Date: 06/17/00 After Phase IX+ Mods.. This race was another memorable Rose Cup race at PIR. The practice session for the Group A bunch proved to have its memorable moments too, after nearly gathering up a white Neon who managed to spin and cut back across the track, backwards no less, in front of me as we were taking turn 12. Then during the qualifier another car lost a left front tire in turn 12 and headed nose first into the tire wall. So it would seem the hex was out for cars in turn 12 that day. Next day I found myself qualified in the 13 spot over all. I was gridded in row 7. Last season I was in the 13th row, 25th spot, for the race. So, this was a better starting spot than before at least. And there was only one other ITE car, the yellow Porsche 911 driven by Jim Cashow, who had qualified back in the 22nd spot (finished 16th) and was now in the 11th row. The faster 944T cars had, for some reason, decided not to come out and play in Group A today. Fine by me. Still, there were 47 cars who finished this race. A LARGE race group to be sure. Per the qualifying results we had the pole sitter, a VERY FAST Chris Billings in his red A Sedan Mustang who somehow managed to click off a 1:27.947 lap time. Personally, I think his engine is a cheater. In row 1, with him, was a nearly new black 996, driven by Steve Valentinetti, who eventually won the race. Second row held Scott Culbertson in a 200SX who took 2nd in the race. Beside him was Tom Petramalo in his new red C5 Corvette. He must have had troubles somewhere during the race though, as he finished back in the 18th spot and I never even saw when I went by him. Steve Zink and David Palmer in RX7s where in the 5 and 6 spots. Roger Stark, who had just aquired a new red '99 Viper (vs driving his Cardiac Racing GT1 Camaro) was in the 7th spot along side Will Hunholz in another RX7. John Browne driving a BMW M3 LTW and Craig Merrilees driving an RX3 were in the 9th and 10th spots. Mike Holden in a white/orange Baby Grand and Bob Mullikin driving another RX7 were in row 6 ahead of me. I was paired up with a white Baby Grand driver name of Jeff Baron (who drove the first few laps not unlike the ace himself). Then came the A Sedan rivals, and always fun to watch out for, Ron McDuffy and Dave Dickoff in the row behind me. Ron drives his yellow and purple AS Camaro while Dickoff pilots the blood red AS Camaro. And one more row back were a couple other hard chargers (one of which managed to get past me no less); Rick Gough in a blue and red Datsun PL510 and Paul Lambert in a red BMW M3 who gave me a real run for my money too. Now, keep in mind that this race was a real position swapping sucker. I felt somewhat like a yo-yo going up and back in places all throughout the race. But, I'll try my best to keep things straight as I rattle this off. We pick up the race with me finding myself in 13th somehow as we head into the first turn of the chicane; now designated as TURN 1. The old TURN 7 is thus TURN 10 now and the old TURN 9 is now TURN 12. The back straight is now TURN 9 vs 6, etc. Things are dicy from the start and I did not get a jump on anything or anyone. We are all running cold rubber as the pace lap was extra slow. Cars are ducking and bobbing everywhere as we round TURN 2 and McDuffy has managed to slip by on my right while the white Baby Grand took me wide left. I was back in 15th exiting TURN 2 and lost another position to the blue and red PL510 as we went for TURN 3. I was watching the orange Baby Grand up ahead as we ran the shoot for TURN 4 right. Then the cars all parted left and right and I see Chris Billing's red AS Mustang sideways in our path. Ron McDuffy and the PL510 go evasive onto the grass and pass in front of his nose with dust and grass flying. I SMASH on my binders and toss out the baby and the bath water as the orange and white Baby Grands veer left and I tuck and follow just before I slam into his right rear quarter panel. MAN THAT WAS CLOSE!! Still 15th in the pecking order now... 3rd revs back up and off we go around TURN 4 and TURN 5 right. Then we do 6 left and shoot for 7 and 8, as I recall yelling to my camera that, "These guys are all CRAZY!" Ron is trying to hold off the blue and red PL510 as we exit onto the back straight and through turn 9. I grab 4th and use the draft to gather in the PL510 who should move right to follow Ron. But he doesn't move over. In fact, if anything, he keeps drifting out to the left as we arch around the back wall and I move up along side him on the outside. I want to take him down and he wants to play freaking blocking games at over 100 mph. I just keep pushing on up along side his driver side door about 2" away with my left tires blowing dust and dirt up off the ground on the left edge of the back straight. Smucker! Move over!!! I get by and swing right in front of him (into 14th) as Ron starts breaking early. He probably figures, as I do, that the tires still are not 100% sticky yet. So, we all start breaking for TURN 10 left. And I've never grabbed 5th yet. Then I decide to go 4th to 3rd (vs my normal 5th to 4th down shift through this turn) just to make sure I don't slam into Ron's AS Camaro from behind. The enigine revs up hard and the backs help haul me down as McDuffy swings left through 10 and right through 11 and I almost kiss his hind end as we both slip past a white BMW M3 LTW, with a raised rear wing, on his right while coming out of TURN 12 and heading for the Good Year bridge on lap 2 (Ron's in 12th and I'm in 13th now). Heading down the main straight for the second time. Ron starts to run up on a white Baby Grand which passed me off the start. We all charge for TURN 1 and I figure Ron is doing a good enough job to let him lead the way for now. We take down the Baby Grand before TURN 1 on lap 2. Puts me in 12th for now. Our next moving target will be the white and orange Baby Grand. Skid through the chicane again. Then we all battle hard through the back corners. Ron is driving so hard, in order to ward me off, that he ends up trail braking all the way through TURN 4 right. I decide to shadow him down the back straight as I keep Ron's AS car in my cross hairs. I see a couple other contenders in my rear view and decide I will take Ron down as we enter the chicane on lap 3. This will hopefully let him run screen for me for a change. Besides, it's not like I was going to pass him anywhere else the way he was driving right now. It's a red M3 and the PL510 marking up on us from behind. So, time to pull the planned pass. 5th gear. Wait. Wait. Ron's tail lights shine on. Wait. I pull right and out from behind. Wait. Now!! Onto the binders as I slice off the corner and scream on by. Stay on the brakes hard... right up to the corner and grab 3rd. Rev and turn in. Grab second, rev and turn left. Hop over the inside curb. This tosses the tail around and I hook and go for TURN 3. Ron is history. But now my tires are HOT and I'm right on top of another RX7 while in 11th place. This is more like it. Sorta. I'm now 2 slots ahead of where I qualified. But my front tires are telling me they are NOT up for this kinda of heated racing as they begin the old understeer thing out through the back corners. Now I must constantly deal with massive push for the rest of the race! My fastest lap this race was a mere 1:32.504. Thats a good 1.8 seconds less than my best time on this track. But I can't complain as things are actually going reasonably good. After all, I am in 1st place in ITE. And that's the main thing in so far as the season points race goes. Then I miss a 2 to 3 shift. Darn. That's not a good sign. Tranny is getting hot too maybe. As is the coolant guage. Hummmm. Better keep an eye on the dials, etc. There are still 11 or 12 laps to go. Follow the white RX7 and try to take him entering turn 10. But he won't give up even though I have the line. He squirts back in front as we do TURNS 11 and 12. I then take him at the Good Year bridge, into 10th place, as I shift into 4th. This one finishes 14th over all as it turns out. Then I goof up again. The last run into the chicane caused some rear end hop under that hard braking. I wanted to avoid that happening again. So, I started braking back a bit farther, thinking the BMW would as well. Well, he had other ideas. Next thing I know he passes me, not unlike I had done to Ron. I'll be danged! As we start lap 4 I'm now back in 11th, just like that. Then, as the M3 and I swing through TURN 2, he wobbles and I almost tap his left rear quarter panel. We both hook up and race for TURN 3 right. But he's going strong too and has the inside line. I let him swing out left and take his draft as I go to the right and start along side watching TURN 4 coming at us fast. I also notice that orange rear end of the Baby Grand up ahead who's driving a darn good race so far. I try to repass the M3 but recall my weak front tires. NOT a great idea I think. I do not trust the front tires by now. Just too greasy this race. I back out. He takes the lead through the next set of corners. His right front actually shows day light under it as he does TURN 7 right. I guess he wasn't getting any understeer like I was. Not if he can do TURN 7 on 1 front tire! We head down the back side and the pesky PL510 is now shadowing me again too. What happened to my screening cars? They weren't much help! These guys are all after my poor red Z28 I guess. Nothing worse than getting beat up on by an M3 and a 510 I'm thinking. Oh well. We'll see what happens... Next lap, as we exit TURN 3, I try my 2 to 3 upshift. This time I get not one, not two, but three missed up shifts. Darn thing would not go into 3rd gear!! The M3 left me in the dust and was now 50-75 yards up ahead. The PL510 was breathing down my back side with his loud high rev'ing motor. Lap 5 and I'm about to get flamed again by Rick Gough. And not far behind him is that darn Dave Dickoff in his red AS Camaro who apparently is running one of his better races too. We head out onto the back straight. Then, from out of no where, I see Chris Billings, blowing by all three of us like we are standing still, in his red AS Mustang. Damn that car is FAST! Too fast to be legal if you ask me. He's now back into 1st place in A Sedan; spin or no spin. And I'm now punted back down into 12th again. Laps 6, 7, etc... Keep on plugging away on massive understeer. The PL510 keeps chipping away at me too. Billings is by the M3 and I'm trying to reel the M3 back in as well. But I can not negotiate that darn TURN 6 left and my Z28 fades right with more push out. The PL510 crackles underneath me and squeeks back ahead. Now I'm in 13th. OK. Still 1st in ITE. Just make sure I don't do anything too crazy from here on out. Somewhere, during all this action, the red T1 Corvette must have dropped off the race course bumping everyone behind him up a spot (putting me in 12th). There were, amazingly, no yellow flags. He eventually ends up doing the same 14 laps I did but finishes back in the 19th spot, two cars ahead of Ron McDuffy. So all I can figure is he went into the hot pit for a check/fix of some kind. Next, Dave Dickoff gets by me down the front straight, as his car is pulling better than mine. Back to 13th again. But the good news is that I now seem to be gaining on the red M3 and the orange Baby Grand. Time to turn up the heat I guess. No use getting too sloppy in my old age. We start lapping traffic to make things a little more interesting. Clicking off slower cars like ducks in a pond. Sometimes two and three at a time. Hard to tell which cars are lapped cars and which ones are just cars that were ahead of me before. The M3 moves past the Baby Grand. I do likewise. 11th and 12th places respectively. A few laps of this and the red M3 gets hung up in traffic about lap 11 or 12. I get back what I lost via those 3 missed shifts. Fair is fair. My lap timer chimes away its "end of game" warning to me. Maybe 3 or 4 minutes left in the race now. Better start pushing it, if I'm going to get back past that darn M3. Believe it or not the PL510 must have been holding back the whole race, because he actually stayed ahead of Dickoff and me both. I chase the M3 one more lap as we pass a couple more cars. Finally, I reel in the M3 exiting TURN 12 and begin to gain on him ever so slowly as we race down the front straight. We cross start finish and no checker flag yet. I break right to pass and wait to lock on the binders. This time I take him under braking into TURN 1. Frosting on my cake. IF I can make it stick that is... 11th place overall again. Turns out there are two more hot laps. But I hang on to 11th, capturing my second ITE win. The first 10 cars to finish are the 996, the 200SX, the Viper driven by Roger Stark, an RX7 and RX3 and another two RX7s. Then Chris Billings, in his AS Mustang, the PL510 car and Dickoff in his red Camaro. Then me. We were tailed by the red M3 and another 240SX that started the race back in 52nd spot, with no qualify time. He must have been really moving to have worked his way that far up through the grid. That, or timing and scoring made a BIG mistake in the results that I got. Like I said before, only 47 of about 54 cars finished this race. Time to try out those Good Year GS-CS DOT race tires is what I'm thinking. More stories coming soon.
Date: 07/29/00 and 07/30/00 After Phase IX+ Mods.. RACE 1 ------ This was the second double race weekend for Oregon Region SCCA at PIR. The sun was out again and the action was hotter and heavier than ever. Dropped some more weight from the car and tried out some fresh Good Year GS-CS tires. They ran well in the corners where I was getting major understeer in prior races... until the second race anway... The idea this weekend was to qualify well enough, within race group A, to stay close to Mike Belzer in his red #44 Porsche 944T and to try and finish no more than one position below him in ITE class. I had earned enough points to date to be able to retain my points lead for the ITE Championship IF I give up no more than one spot to him over the remaining four races. Big IF. Unfortunately all my plans in this regard seemed to be quickly eroding as a new kid has showed up on the block. Dave Parker decided to come to the party late, running his red #93 911 RSA with Speedware as his sponsor. He was clicking off some darn good lap times and had qualified ahead of me as well. So, this wild card entry was quickly pouring rain on my parade. I ended up qualifying 8th in the cool morning air with a 1:21.721 personal best lap time w/o the chicane. But, running the full straight at PIR, minus the three extra corners afforded by the use of the chicane, only made it that much easier for the 944T and 911 cars to take full advantage of their extra HP to weight ratios. Belzer qualified 2nd in group A with a 1:18.203 putting him in row 1. Parker managed a 1:19.183 for the 3rd spot in row 2. I ended up a couple rows back in row 4 with a fast RX7 and RX3 and a couple AS Camaros (Joe Hermes and Dave "In The Dirt" Dickoff) between myself and the other ITE cars. The pole sitter was a super quick SPU Cellica who could turn 1:13's. As it turned out Joe Hermes' car was having clutch problems and did not show for the race. So, that resulting in Jim Coshow in his ITE 911 Porsche, and the rest of us, moving up a spot to back fill. Still I stayed in row 4. But Parker got to move to the front of the class beside Belzer... making matters even worse. Oh well. At least my fresh front tires where hooking up and showing some promise of less push through the corners than my last trip down to PIR. We do the normal pace lap. I knew it would be important to get a good start if there were any chance at all to catch and/or pass the 911 RSA car. So, as we came out of turn 9 and headed for the green flag, I tried to hang back and run up on the row ahead in hopes of getting a good jump as we came under the Good Year bridge. Problem is doing this forced me to grab 3rd gear at the red line and the starter did not drop the green. I then had to back out in 3rd which, naturally, resulted in my torque dropping away as well. Then the green dropped and I was forced to downshift back to second for a moment in order to get the revs back up. Well, the result was that I lost a couple spots and Coshow in his yellow 911 even managed to pull by me down the long straight as we drag raced for turn 1. I was now in 4th place in ITE and 9th overall; three spots below Belzer in the 944T ITE car way up ahead. The SPU car and the front running ITE cars did exactly what one would expect. They walked away from the rest of the crowd. In the mean time I ended up doing battle with an RX7 down the back straight after surviving turns 1 through 6 on partially heated rubber. Passed the RX7 under braking for turn 7 left to move into the 8th slot. Coshow had managed somehow to also put another RX7 and a purple and white, gutted out, and very quick, RX3 between us a well. Then, as we came around turn 9, out comes the full course yellows. We make for turn one and finally stack up behind the pace car as I see smoke off in the weeds from turn 1. Someone always seems to buy the farm on the first lap in group A for some reason. The pecking order at this point was Cellica, 944T, 911 RSA, AS Camaro, 911, RX3, RX7 and myself, in 8th, in my Z28. I needed to move up at least 3 spots to save my points lead. The next three laps were cool down laps and quite boring. Finally, they clean up the track and we come around through turn 9 again and find ourselves drag racing once more for turn 1, a good 1/4 of a lap behind the lead cars thanks to drivers up ahead who refuse to pull in close while under the yellow. It is basically like starting out in row 8+ under these conditions. I was gunning for Coshow though, and luckily managed to get enough speed up to take down the RX7 between myself and him under braking for turn 1. Next I put the RX3 in my cross hairs and reeled him in close for the kill by the time we exited turn 6 on the back straight. He was very hard to get past though but I managed to get along side by the time we were at the 4 marker for turn 7. I waited to the 2 marker before reversing my thrusters and dropping hard on the binders. The RX3 had no choice but to drop back while I moved into 6th behind Coshow's yellow 911. The RX3 tried to repass in 9 but thought better of it when I began to wag the dog running on the ragged edge to ward him off. Once we came out of 9 pulling 1G and I got in Coshow's wake it was easy to draft him and walk on past before going to 5th gear and tossing out the binders at the top of the rise leading into turn 1. Two laps after the restart and I was finally back in 3rd place in ITE, where I should have been all along. I was now 5th over all, which was a good thing as well. However, that did not last long. The RX7, driven by David Palmer, still managed to take me down a couple laps later in the twisties. My tires simply got too hot to hold the corners after all the late braking I had done in order to ace Coshow out. No matter though. My race was with the ITE cars and 3rd place in ITE would be my eventual reward. 6th over all after qualifying 8th and starting 7th was a reasonable finishing effort. Thanks to all the heat and traction problems though, I only managed a 1:22.626 fast lap vs Belzer's 1:19.389. He finished a good 1/2 lap out on me too. Dave Dickoff ran a darn good race, in his A Sedan Camaro, posting a 4th place finish and a 1:22.491 fast lap. Hummm. Maybe I should try racing with him next time? RACE 2 ------ Joe Hermes managed to get his 4th gen AS Camaro back on line with a repaired clutch. According to him he was still going to have to run hot though. Seems his new 305 V8 and 5 spd, per the AS rules, was being a pain to cool. Still though he managed to ace me out once again in the qualifying, as did Dickoff. Group A had to qualify after noon. It was HOT. All our lap times showed it. Belzer's 944T qualified with a nice 1:18.633 vs his 1:18.203 the prior day. He and Parker in the 911 RSA held down row 1 at the start after the SPU car dropped out. I qualified a tad slower than on the 29th with a hard won 1:21.902. But, I still landed out in row 3. That was a step in the right direction. Joe Hermes clicked off a 1:20.628 in his AS behind Parker! The RX3 was in row 2 also. Dave "In The Dirt" Dickoff was one spot ahead of me, but in the same row, with a 1:21.586 time. Dickoff and I had a little chat before the race at which time I proceeded to inform him that I was gunning for him. After all, "If I can't beat those two ITE Porsches at least maybe I can beat you," I proclaimed. He laughed and said bring it on. I was playing with his mind and had hopes that somehow a little pre-race psychology just might work out for Mr Hermes. As it turns out my ESP must have been working that afternoon. My plan was simple. Once again I would hang back, by the book, run up on the RX3 in row 2 as we came around for the start and then late brake the snot out of turn 1 after drag racing all these other rocket jockeys down the straight. And that's just about exactly how it worked for once. The starter dropped the flag a little sooner than before and off we all fly. I grab 3rd right as I came up on the RX3, I draft him a second and pull out to walk on by. Joe and Dave are still in front but I ace them both under braking into turn 1. My tires squeal and slide and I crank it to the right. It gets a bit dicey to say the least as I trail brake 1 and try like heck to keep from kissing the nice red 911 RSA as I drift around the first apex. BINGO! I've already managed to go from 6th to 3rd in one sweet move thanks to the good old Baer/Alcons and some decent front tires. But the battle had only begun. Joe Hermes somehow managed to take Dickoff down as well. And so had the RX3. Hermes was now in 4th, the RX3 in 5th and Dickoff was running third fiddle in 6th. He was no doubt being haunted by at least one very fast RX7 piloted by Palmer who had beaten me the last race. The two front runners, just like before, slowly walked away from the rest of us once they came around 9 and onto the front straight. Hermes, in the mean time, was dogging my ass like there was no tomorrow. He darted from mirror to mirror and quarter panel to quarter panel every chance he could get. It was extremely hard to hold him off!! Seems like the only reason I could keep him behind me was sheer will power and determination and perhaps a little luck. As we'd round a given corner or bend I was able to command the shorter inside line. A couple times I tried so hard to take a corner fast that I would drift across his bow even if I really did not plan to. He may have thought I was blocking him when in reality all I was doing was trying to keep the car on the black top. And each time he would just get beside me, down the back or front straights, I would hold on as long as possible before hitting my brakes in order to take advantage of the only real edge I had on him. I just had to hang on and hope he would finally get that new engine too hot to hang with me. And after about five or six laps of this dog fight he eventually did drop off the pace. Thank god! I finally got one lap to cool my jets. But no sooner than I got rid of Hermes did I see that Dickoff was now on his usual high horse. Seems the pony express was about to swap rides and keep chasing after me. While Joe and I had been racing each other Dave apparently had finally gotten past the RX3 and shaken off the RX7. Next thing I see Dave and Joe going at it for the 1st and 2nd spots in A Sedan. I was rooting for Hermes and hoping he could hold Dickoff at bay. And he did for about a lap. But not for long. So, Dave gets by Joe and comes hunting for my blood. I could see his red eyes even when he was a good 50 yards back. Within a couple more laps he was now breathing right down my neck. I decided to step up the heat and once again began late braking turns 1 and 7 and squealing the hot tires through nearly every corner on the track in between. I got one heck of a lot of fish tail counter steering practice over the next 5 laps. Dave's car is simply faster than mine also. Not much. But a little. We'd go hot out of 6 and like bats down the back straight. I'd wait for the 2 marker and dive for 7 each time. He would lose a smig through 7 and 8 and come on hard out of 9. I'd slam my way up through 4th and 5th and try to squeeze every drop out of my motor as he started pulling me down the very long main straight. I'd get maybe 130mph at the top of the rise as he probably topped out at 135 or so. At about the point where the chicane entrance was he would pull from my draft and begin to make his move on my right. At the exit of the chicane he would be along side. At his brake point he would be half a car length ahead to my right. But he knew he could not go as deep and on came his brakes and I would wait 20 extra yards and haul myself down hard and trail brake the turn 1 apex. Then I would baby the car around the next 5 corners wagging the dog and drifting my messed up apexes on greasy hot tires the whole way. Sometimes you just do what you can do and let the chips fall where they may I guess. For three straight laps he dogs me like this. Each time nearly getting past me before turn 1. Each time I manage to nose him out under braking. The turn workers, my mother and friend Tim must have been loving this show. Finally, on the forth pass around, after lapping some slow cars to make life even more interesting, Dave manages to tuck right in on my spoiler coming out of turn 9. I knew he was going to make a clean pass this time. There was no way I would be able to out run him with that small of a lead between 9 and 1. Well, maybe no way. We cross the chicane entry and he's already along side me. We cross the chicane exit and he is tail to nose on my right. I think to myself, "Dave. Don't you dare cut left and slam on you brakes! If you do..." Well, that's exactly what he did! &%@$#!$. He did not simply stay right and take away my inside line. No. He cuts left to set up for the normal line through 1 and leave the inside line open. Then he slams on his brakes. I still have my peddle and foot clamped to the fire wall and it takes at least a few tenths to go from fuel to full out brakes. "Too hell with this!" I think. And as we come up on the rise I just keep peddling right on by his brake lights. THEN I SLAM ON MY BINDERS while going low and to the right. Then the rear wheels HOP!!! Shhhhht!! Off the binders. On the binders. No road left. Off the binders a little. Right front catches the yellow FIA curb as I try my best to give Dave as much room as I can. Our tires are whining and mine are beginning to slide hard to the left as my right front nudges the curbing and wants to go AWOL on me. Dave's car is now inches out my driver side window and a tad ahead on my left. I could probably reach out and push him away with my hand if I didn't have such a death grip on the steering wheel! I was sure we were both going to swap shades of red paint. Then, just as suddenly as it all happened I was hooking back up and heading for turn two and watching the right rear wheel of Dave's car as he headed off of turn 1 and out into the grass and dust. YES!! I got that sucker even if it wasn't the way I had planned it. I then started to worry (why worry when you are racing?) that perhaps the corner workers would be writing me up for running him off the track. Maybe I should cool my jets? I check the rear view and all I can see is the purple RX3 about 1 turn back being followed closely by Mr Hermes who was now running free and clear in the 1st position of A Sedan class again. I back off a tad and decide to just finish out the race without pushing my luck any more. A lap or so later I let the RX3 go ahead and pass me. Eventually I finish the battle in 4th place overall and 3rd in ITE once again. Luckily, once we got off track and to impound Mr Dickoff was actually happy to see me. He was a great sport about the whole thing. Congratulated me on a great race and told me my brakes were awesome to boot. I told him that I thought maybe he had gone off because I had nearly slammed into his door. But he explained that his rear end stepped out and away he went. Wasn't anything I had done after all. Hermes came over and wanted to know what I was doing racing with the A Sedans? I wanted to know why the A Sedans were racing with me? We had a good laugh, all turned out well and luckily nobody got hurt. Managed a 1:21.963. That, and my 1:21.721 qualify time the prior day, proved to be my fastest qualify and race lap times at PIR, w/o the chicane, so far. So, I was a happy camper on my way north to Bellevue.
Date: 08/06/00 After Phase IX+ Mods.. This was another one of those hot weekend races. Better than running in the rain though. You know, as road racers, the expenses involved just never seem to end. Most of us have to learn how to crack open the old wallet and spend whatever it takes to play the cards dealt to us. In my case, by the time I finished my first 10 minute practice session, I had to toss three corded tires. $56 to mount the three backups. Another $36 for 100 octane race gas. $40+ to go back and forth to home base to fetch rubber or to sleep each night. Just little things like that. Then you add the cost of entry at $165, $10 here, $15 there and before you know it you find yourself gridded for the race on Sunday afternoon after $300+ has been extracted from the monthly race pot. During Saturday's runs I got to see what was left of a green Mini Vauxhall (the little boxy cars that run around in europe usually) after he tried to keep up with the Viper through turn 5a. Based on the skid marks and destrcution I would guess he launched of the FIA curb there and rolled a couple times coming to rest a total wreck on his roof. On the up side I found out that during my second qualify session on Sunday morning I had again managed to break my prior best lap time by scoring a 1:39.232. This still was not good enough to grid me ahead of Terry Ward who managed a 1:39.165 in his CP Camaro. Still, it was good enough to bump me up one row ahead of Brian Horn in his silver Strictly BMW 325is. Well almost anyways... Turned out Terry Ward had front sway bar problems and did not get to grid in time and was shoved to the back as a result. Brian moved up a row next to me way back in row 11 after I had managed to qualify 22 out of 43 cars. That really wasn't so bad considering that Glen Peterson, who edged me out for the SPO title with his Mustang last year, was sitting back in the 34th spot with a 1:43.437 time. Alex Long was driving another white BMW M3 along side Bob Boyer in his Porsche 944T in row 10. I figured Brian, Alex, Bob and I would have some fun sorting things out in mid grid during the race. The cars forming the first 9 rows, with few exceptions, would be pretty much untouchable; things like 12 ProFormance GT1/SPO cars, Roger Stark's A Prod Viper on steroids, the matched set (father and son) of blue and white SPM Fieros and the always quick Mazda R100 would lead up the pack. Then, somehow, a new, all white Nichols Industries GT1 Corvette must have arrived late to the show with no qualify time. But it would not take him very many laps to slice through the pack and get up front once the race started. As it turns out this particular race car and driver also ended up screwing the remaining 42 drivers out of a good race. Read on... We did a standing start behind the pace car. The idea was to make the start safer somehow. And the Race Steward also told us all to "be safe" at the driver meeting before the afternoon races. And, the other officials explained that they wanted us to all get as much seat time as possible, etc., etc. Promises, promises. So we start the ball rolling and try heating up the rubber and brakes as we do a fairly standard pace lap. Coming around turn 9 I am stuck on the left side, with the silver 325 getting the far better right side slot. By the time row 11 gets past the drag strip area the green has dropped. Before I know it I've run into slower traffic and must dodge right and do an end run around drivers who seem to be asleep at the wheel. I manage to pass the 944T and a couple other, supposedly faster, cars before I am held up by the silver 325 and Ken Shreve in his blue Mazda RX7. Long, in the white M3, has rocketed away up the right side as well. He actually passed 6 cars by the time he got to 3a. I end up coasting around turn 1 (3 wide), add throttle and sweep the middle zone of turn 2. A white ProFormance car and I are side by side the entire way. I stay right going down the hill heading for turns 3a and 3b. We go two wide through the S turns and the silver BMW 325 has managed to stay ahead of me in all the confusion. I am on Ken's tail as we exit 3b and Ken nearly hits the 325 in the left door. I follow Ken as we leave the silver 325 and the white ProFormance cars in the dust down the back straight heading for 5a. My tires are not that sticky yet, so I play it safe as I pull up behind a green ProFormance car through the twisties. He's following the #2 Fiero. At this point I've moved into the 18th spot and that's about where I end up, give and take a couple cars. The M3 (still 5 spots up) handles better through 8 than me, even though I was now sporting a used BFG R1 on my right front matched with a g-Force on the left side. Seemed to be working better than I expected though. Still got some push in 8 but not nearly as bad as I got with my corded g-force that I had replaced right before the race started (four tires wasted already). The M3 is fast and holds everyone off down the straight as we start lap 2. But Long must have cooked his rubber because as we go into 3b he can not hold his line and he ends up dropping a tire off as he comes out. He ends up getting passed, nose to tail, by the #1 Fiero, Ken in the RX7 and the green ProFormance car down the back straight. The #2 Fiero and I tuck in behind him as we enter 5a. The 944T and the white ProFormance car are hot on my tail! The #2 Fiero passes the M3 in 7 and I close in braking for turn 8. The 944T catches me under braking also and has WIDE tires. He goes under me in 8 but comes out wide. I get the power down better and pull along his left side as we exit 8. He tries to pull me and we do turn 9 side by side for the crowd, who is loving the show. I walk away (this time) down the straight and through 1. He also gives way to the white ProFormance car, who now has me in his cross hairs entering turn 2. Not much I can do about that. They have better power and far less weight after all. The Fiero also manages to take down the green ProFormance car once he got around the M3. Yet the M3 still has real good speed in the straight and turn 2. The white PF car finally makes his move on my left down through 3a and I tuck behind him. He goes too wide in 3b and I shoot under him, but see that the apex cone is right in my path. I did not want to wedge it under my tire so I stab the brakes to dive my nose ground effects lower and manage to kick it off course as I tuck behind the PF car. We rev and go for turns 4 and 5. The black 944T is again locking on my tail like a dog in heat. I watch the white PF car chase down the M3 as the four of us do battle through 7 and 8. The PF driver takes the M3 in 7 as I try to gather him up braking for 8. But then the 944T dives under me again in 8 taking away my apex! We come out one more time side by side. But this time he wags and blocks me as we head out onto the straight. The M3 has pulled away. I get back up to the 944's right rear quarter as we cross start finish but then he starts to squeeze me over playing his blocking games! So, I back out for now as we apex turn 1. Figure I'll let him wear the M3 down and then see who comes out on top. It's still a long race after all. He locks onto the M3 as we enter 3b. Then I catch the Nichol's Vette in my rear view mirror from out of nowhere. He tries to pass on my right as we enter 3b so I must slow to make the tighter corner there. Then he walks away as we come out of 3b... he's after the next two victims. The M3 begins blocking the 944T (several times) and the Vette can't get by either of them until they come out of 9. By now I have decided that Long, in the M3, is a major jerk. Boyer will get him sooner or later I figure. Then it will be my turn. By the time we get to turn 2 the Vette has put maybe 50 yards between the other two who I'm stalking from 30 yards back. I close the gap coming down into 3a and see the Vette exit 3b. Then as I exit 3b I just see the top of the Vette drop down in the back straight with the other two cars not far ahead of me. We drop into the dip through 4 and all we can do is slam on our brakes as a massive dust and smoke screen hangs over the entrance to 5a. Somehow the Vette had skidded left, gone into the dirt right before the left hander, launched off the curb, gone across the track to the right and down into the hole about 50 yards sideways. Naturally the yellow flags were out as we tried to get through the dust and smoke without hitting each other and all the car parts flying around on the track. It was a total mess as we came out the other side and started racing up the hill for turns 8 and 9 again. The M3 once again took every opportunity to block the 944T and we all seemed to find a way to skid back down into 3a where I darn nearly lost it in a four wheel drift myself. Hummmmm. My tires are getting hot too. But that was about it for the day as the full course yellows finally came out. We had raced a full 6+ laps. 8.5 minutes of racing and the Vette wipes out the whole show. 2 more minutes and they finally had the pace car holding up traffic. Then we do a bunch of parade laps while the ambulance checks out what is left of the Vette driver in the hole. We putts around for a good 12 minutes like this (vs just bringing all the cars into the pits) if you can believe that. Then, to make matters even worse, Long, in his M3, keeps following the white PF car TOO CLOSE. Maybe he thinks the restart will happen any second or something? Nope. We come around turn 5a and the green PF car suddenly stops behind the #2 Fiero. The white PF car hits his brakes as well. But Long brakes right and slams into the white PF car killing his right rear quarter panel, axle and tire. I stop. The 944T brakes right and nearly hits the PF car also. Long ends up passing both the white and the green PF cars under yellow to top it all off. No way was I going to pass under yellow and have the conference Race Steward fine me again. But one of the course workers can't hold her water and she comes running over to my car and starts screaming for me to get going!! The damaged PF car finally starts moving and I follow him until he finally has to drive off the side of the track and stops again. Then I figure it is safe to pass. We finally go up the hill and NOW they decide to get everyone into the pits and park it. Long gets out of his M3 and runs up to the green PF car, driven by Rob Stonesifer, and acts like a total ass hole screaming at him. I recall saying something on my video camera as I'm recording the entire scene that, "...he probably drives the same way in rush hour traffic...". All after 13 long minutes of ICSCC B.S. One more minute sitting in the heat (24.5 minutes of the 30 minute race) and they call off our race. They don't revise the rest of the day's schedule. They just send 40 of us packing, $165 lighter than when we came there on Saturday. That's Conference racing for you.
Date: 08/19/00 and 08/20/00 After Phase IX+ Mods.. RACE 1 ------ This weekend was going to be a roller coaster ride. But I wasn't going to realize it until the end of day on Sunday. These were to be the last two races for the Oregon Region SCCA championship season. It was do or die. Things started out well as the car was ready to rumble with the new roller rockers, I did not have to get up early in order to get registered and tech'd and it looked like the rain clouds were going to cooperate as well. I hate racing in the rain. But, I was beginning to think that maybe my best hopes for the season championship just might be my Firehawk SZ50s vs my race tires this weekend. So, if it would have started raining I would have sucked it up and played the cards dealt to me. By this time my points lead in the ITE class had all but been demolished by Dave Parker who took 2nd place both races last time out. Having been knocked down into the 3rd place slot thanks to his faster 911 RSA left me with only a 3.5 point lead in the points race. Doing a little quick math and knowing that the extra 5 points handed out for a first place over a 2nd place finish plus and extra 4 points for 2nd vs 3rd would mean that Mike Belzer would end up taking the championship by around 14.5 points if I ended up repeating with two more 3rd place finishes again this weekend. Maybe mounting up the better rain tires and taking my chances would be a good thing? Turns out that we ran our qualify session in nice cool, overcast conditions and about 65 degree temps. My car felt very strong and I came off the track after about 10 laps once it began to sprinkle at the east end. I expected a new personal best lap time with the 9 turn configuration (no chicane... which I was hoping for but did not get) and that's what I got; a 1:20.488. This was a full 1.233 seconds better than any other time I had cut at PIR to date. But it wasn't nearly enough. Mike cranked out a new track record of 1:17.084 with his turbocharged 944T. I just sat down and decided this was not going to be my weekend for winning. And, Dave Parker topped it off with a very fast 1:18.455 to clamp down the #2 starting spot. I was stuck back in the 4th row in the #7 position with Dave Palmer's E Prod RX7, the SPU RX3 driven by Craig Merrilees, and a couple of those darn A Sedan pilots Dave and Joe beating out my best efforts. In fact Joe just managed to beat my time by .008 to take the #6 spot. The race was going to be very interesting... if my tires would hold up. Next thing I know it is 5:30pm and we are doing our pace lap. We come around turn 9 and head under the Good Year bridge looking for the green. I get a good jump and we are off. It's a bee hive and I get blocked down the right side. A couple trailing cars blow by me on the left and I swing over next to the wall to give chase. A seam opens up in the middle and the car jockeys start picking out which side they want to enter turn 1 on. I go down the middle, hold my breath and ask my tires to "be sticky please". Then I bring on the binders as we peak the hump into turn 1. The tires squirm under the drag and want to slide out so I modulate the pressure and they finally hook up as I slide back past the cars that got by me. As we take turns 2 and 3 I start counting cars and find myself in 7th still. Better than 9th I guess. Now we all begin settling in to our chosen slots and I decide to give it one lap before stepping up the pace. The track felt slippery during qualifying and the last thing I wanted to do was to lose control before I even got started. Now, to make matters more complicated, it was not just Mike and Dave I had to worry about during this race. Back in the pack there were still 4 more 911s who had come to the races in ITE this weekend. Two of them were potent RSAs also. No reason any of them could not figure out how to beat me just like Parker had done a couple weeks before and was already doing to me in this race too. As we came down the main straight for the second shot at turn 1 I could see at least one of the Porsche RSAs already passing a trailing A Sedan. I was going to have to work the car to the limit just to hold on to 3rd place it would seem. Then, all of a sudden, I saw dust up ahead and brake lights everywhere!! Somehow, a white E Prod RX7, which had aced me out and gotten by David Palmer's E Prod car, was now taking turn 1 the hard way... by doing a pair of 360s along the outside edge of the track. Palmer ended up diving into the grass to avoid hitting him and I found myself getting by them both on the right. I was now suddenly in 5th place and had already taken down the SPU RX3 back on the straight under braking. A couple more laps at 110% and my tires started getting really wicked to deal with out back. Palmer had gotten back on the track behind me and was able to push me really hard in the twisties on his full racing slicks. My DOT tires simply were no match for his slicks and lighter car. He'd reel me in in the corners and I'd gain a little ground down the straights. But now I could see WHY he had posted a 1:19.486 qualify time. He was about 1 second faster in the corners than me. But, I wanted to keep him back there to screen off the hard charging 911 RSA who was also trying to keep the other EP car behind him. Then, as I entered turn 6 my rear end lost traction and out it came. I had to use all my skill to stay on the track as my left rear rode the rumble bumps and Palmer slipped by on my right. I grabbed 2nd and headed for turn 5 thinking it was time to reel him back in and put him back where he came from. Turns out that I was just a tad faster down the front straight and I got him under braking for turn 1. Good! I thought. Two laps later and out goes the rear end again. And around goes Palmer. I get him under braking again. This chit went on maybe 2 more times. It was the worse case of oversteer I've ever had. My g-Forces simply did not want to stick in turns 3 or 6 and were hard to control in turn 9 as well. Palmer would just wait and watch and, once he saw me slip out, around he would go. I was learning counter steering at its best in the mean time. I checked my mirrors and saw that the other E Prod car had finally gotten around the 911 RSA also. So, I decided now was a good time to let Palmer go and start using the next car as my screen. This worked for a couple laps but he too finally took me down as I simply had to cool my jets to keep the car in the ball game. I was once again back in 7th place over all where I started. At least I was still in 3rd in ITE. And now I saw that the RSA was a good 50 yards back. So, it would seem he was just as over heated as I was. The rest of that race we all stayed in the same spots that we held from then on. And that was that. I gathered up one more 3rd place finish and my points lead had been cashed out. I was now 5.5 points down rather than 3.5 points up. Steve Laughlin had finished 8th in his 911 RSA and Donald Pickering came in 9th in his 911 RSA. They were followed by Peter Johnson in his 911 RSA and Jim Coshow in his 911SC. All of these guys were chasing my tail in ITE! I was starting to worry A LOT. The only good thing that came out of that race was my fastest lap time, which was also my fastest time ever on PIR w/o the chicane... a 1:20.391! But that was nothing as Mike Belzer had just posted an astounding 1:16.725!!! He had already broken the ITE track record he set during qualifying a few hours before! Oh well. That's racing as they say. RACE 2 ------ Sunday was yet another HOT day. We all were maybe 1 sec slower as a result. Belzer qualified with a fast 1:17.699 on Sunday. Parker, in the red 911 RSA, was hot on his heels with a 1:18.643. Dave Dickoff in his AS Camaro got a fast 1:19.928. And now the #4 time, 1:20.202, was posted by Donald Pickering in one the SpeedWear 911 RSA cars. Problem was he got in over his head by pushing his 911 too fast and managed to go off in turn 8 and into the tire wall 50 yards away. He was out of the race. Joe Hermes managed a blazing 1:20.565 for the #5 spot. Dave Palmer was out of form with his 1:20.772. Next came Craig Merrilees in that SPU RX3 with a 1:20.867. He was followed by Peter Johnson in his 911 RSA who was gunning for me big time by posting a 1:20.879. I only managed a 1:21.332 on my freshly mounted Hoosiers on the back and my very worn Good Years on the front. The Hoosiers seemed OK after setting them to 32psi as a best guess pressure. But the Good Years were showing a lot of push in turn 3. Not good for fast lap times. I was still in row 4 though. So, Jim Hodel and I went and had lunch and watched my prior race on video. That was all we could do after all. 6:00pm on Sunday afternoon and we are at it again doing our pace lap. This race turned out to be so crazy I almost forget all the details. I had decided that the championship was all but gone. There really was no way to beat Belzer or Parker. I was not really worried about beating Parker anyway as I knew he could not rack up enough points to take away the #2 points spot from me. So, I decided to just give it my best shot with whats I got and try to beat this other Peter Johnson kid in his 911 RSA gridded beside me as we came down the straight and headed for the green flag. I would also keep a close eye out back for the other ITE cars who probably wanted a red Camaro kill just as badly. The flag drops and so goes my hammer. The car jumped ahead and I left Johnson behind. Hummmm. That seemed way to freaking easy. The Z28 felt really solid and I got past another car before hitting the breaks for turn 1. The red AS Camaros are hot after the red Porsches up front. I see David Palmer and put him in my cross hairs. We come around on lap 2 and I take him down. My tires are working great for a change. I work the peddles and settle in to a couple really good laps. Palmer had approached me before the race and ragged on me about not letting him by in the last race and slowing him down. I said if I had to race I would race, if not I'd let him go, so long as it did not mean risking my own points lead in the process. Palmer couldn't even reel me in in the corners this time. And Peter Johnson couldn't get by him. Johnson falls off the pace and I go full out for several laps to add some extra ground as a margin of safety. Palmer kept after me though but the other EP car was no place to be seen. It was against my better judgment, but I decided that I could make points with Palmer if I waved him by. So, I backed off in turn 3 as I started getting some understeer there and let him go by. This put me back to 5th place behind Palmer and Craig Merrilees in his SPU car. Dickoff was in front of Craig after Joe Hermes red AS Z28 had lost a T5 tranny and dropped out. Then everything went south as we rounded turn 9 and the yellow flags came out. Another E Prod MGB had flipped and plowed into the tire wall. It was a mess and we went to full course yellow. They finally black flagged all of us into the hot pit. This really sucked as now the 911 RSA was exacty 1/2 car length behind me and I no longer had Palmer to screen for me. I should never, EVER, listen to some frigging RX7 driver!!! And I never will again! By the time they got the race going again there must have only been 6 or 7 minutes left. We did a single file pace lap and away we went down the front straight. Johnson's car pulled hard now, just as hard as my car. This was NOT a good thing. He had good brakes and now he had the red mist. All I could do was sweat. And drive the best I could. A couple laps later and Johnson nearly managed to take me under braking in turn 1. This made me wonder. Not many cars can out brake mine. This kid was getting better every lap. The old man had his work cut out. And Palmer was not giving up an inch in my favor either. We were all racing hard, as this was the LAST race of the season. Then it happened!!! I came around turn 3. The yellow flags started waving. Craige passed Dickoff under yellow and was later penalized a lap by the officials. Everyone else slowed down and Paker came up behind me. LAP 13. And MIKE BELZER's red 944T was off the track. I was passing him and I slammed the hammer down. "Holy Cow!!!" was all I could think. I was ahead of BELZER! Time to fly this crate until the wings fall off!! And that's exactly what I did. I left Johnson behind like he was standing still. We came around again and Belzer was still sitting there, out like a light. I'll be darned??!! I could not believe what was happening. I was now in second place in ITE. Parker was maybe 100 yards ahead. Johnson and Steve Laughlin and Jim Cashow were behind me. And, to top it off, some dude in a RABBIT had entered the race in ITE in order to get an extra race. Next thing I know they have another full course yellow and as we came around on lap 15 it was game over and the checkered flag waved. YES!!!!!! I WAS NOW THE OREGON REGION SCCA ITE CLASS CHAMPION!! Turns out, if my math is right and the points keeper and Porsche drivers don't get in bed with each other, that Belzer finished 16th over all while I finished 4th over all. Parker took 1st in ITE in his 911 RSA. I took 2nd. Johnson took 3rd in his RSA. Laughlin took 4th in the other 944T. Coshow took 5th in his 911SC. That put Belzer back in 6th in his 944T with a broken rotor in his distributor... of all things. A couple dollar part killed his car and lost the championship to a electronic fuel injected LT1 powered Z28. I'll take my optispark over his distributor ANY F-ING DAY! And I took the championship title with only a 5.5 point margine. A bow tie and a little old dependablity I guess. Oh, and a lot of hard work and hard racing to stay in the hunt on my part and the part of all the folks that helped me all year long. I can't tell some of these folks how much I appreciate their support. But I sure can give credit where credit is due... First my sponsor and main tire guy Chris Stone (Manager at Bellevue Discount Tires) who really helped me a LOT obtaining rubber, mounting and balancing and numerious other services not to mention GREAT PRICES, Tim Kolmeyer (primary grease monkey at PIR), Jim Hodel (pit helper), John Kelchen (tech support and driving coach), Carlo Sparacio (brakes, tech support and tool man), Don Berry (suspension engineer and welding), Jim Greenwood (roller rocker install), Nancy Moses (brake support and all around helper), Ellis Groo (parts advisor) and Mary Stavik (moral support)... to name just a few. Chalk up one for TEAM NW F-BODY!
'98 and '99 RESULTS PAGES - CLICK HERE