[Absolut Speed]

That anyone who autocrosses with Trackbird takes his or her life out of their own hands. :leaving:

I'll just throw out some random words and you can make your own story because I'm not one to tattle.

two-seventy
grass
timing station
scatter
cones
flatten

Well, that's enough randomizing for now.

[trackbird]

Yea, I'm not thinking the nittos were worth 2 seconds on that course....

And, I wasn't driving through the grass, I was sliding.....for a really long way.

Actually, you slid past the drainage ditch. If you'd been 3 feet "deeper" into the grass, you'd have landed a wheel in it at speed. Oh well, it happens. Your run looked really good until that little problem.

I bashed many cones this weekend and spent a bunch of time sideways/backwards. Dead tires seems to be one of the reasons, a loose nut behind the wheel may explain the rest.

And, thanks to Sam Strano who offered suggestions (I called him trying to figure out why I was spending so much time backwards) that really helped the car (yes Scott, it was worse on Sat than when you drove it). Unfortunately, it only helped make the car "better" (and as good as it would likely get), but not great.

I was "on a mission" I guess and was probably driving at 11.5/10ths on tires that were between 4 and 6/10ths of what they should have been. Brian Burdette said to me "well, you are certainly attacking the course". He later admitted that the runs that I got "right" looked really good (and felt pretty good). I'm not sure that my car was going to go any faster on that course with those tires (if Sam had been there, he'd have probably been able to prove me wrong). On a good note, I equalled my best time from Saturday, but without the cone I hit saturday. So, my personal FTD for both days was within .008 or something of each other and on day two I didn't hit a cone. I guess I was consistant.

And, as I said, the event was a blast. The nittos have been reduced to "good smoking tires", or I may run one last event on them (they are not corded yet) this weekend. I hate not getting my money's worth out of something. There's still rubber on there.....

It's getting to be time to order a new set of Victorracers (I'm going cheap...I'm not going to be $100 faster on the extra $100 in tires that the 710's cost.).

And, for reference, I was actually into 3rd gear before the timers (exiting the slalom) on a few runs. That's how fast this return slalom was (and the course was pretty quick in spots as well). And, I think the curb "bashing" has taken a toll on my front left wheel bearing. It is starting to make some noises. I had wear marks over 1/2 way up the sidewalls of the rear nittos from the landing when coming off the curbing. It was really pulling those tires under the car.

Oh, and I was making my first run and wondering what the banging was in the rear of my car. It turns out, it was my helmet that was in the rear seat bouncing off of the side panels. I hadn't put it on yet when the starter waved me off (and I went). I realized it somewhere in the final slalom (that I wasn't wearing a helmet). I didn't have a stellar weekend, but I did have fun.