double header weekend

i'm super tired from this weekend, not much sleep with 2 autox's in 2 different states and spending some time hanging out with dad in between. i had 3 different people ask for codrives in my car this weekend (maybe because it's fun to drive?) but mr. autox4u (aka perry) ended up taking the seat for both the nnjr event and also at warminster with philly scca today. he'll be codriving nedivs at warminster so he needed some solid seat-time in the car.

*update*

here's a little compilation of saturday. perry top pax.. me, 1st loser.

perry is going to kill me but whats in there is way too entertaining to leave out. lol.



if you codrive my car, you are subject to any and all video posted on the internet.

now on to warminster.

jan's fast run.. 4th in pax!





here's my fast clean run from today at warminster.



one of perrys runs. for some reason the cam shutoff on his clean fast run.



so perry and i were within a tenth of each other and corey ran away with top spot. i'm not really disappointed with this result since i know my driving isn't half bad with perry as a benchmark.. but it does make me think of how to improve. of course good driving is key. i've looked at our data (beauty of having it) and it looks like if we combined both our strengths in different sections of the course, we could have a kickass theoretical time. enough to be right in line with corey's kickass fast time or better.

now that's easy to say of course, but challenging to implement. i am purposely not burying my head in the maxQ data in between runs, but focusing on getting my head in the game during the event. as jay posted earlier.. info overload can be overwhelming so sometimes it's better to keep it simple and focus at the task at hand.

with dangerboy jeff hurst hitching a ride with me down from long island.. we had some solid discussion on where we can improve the hardware end of the equation. i was lucky since jeff was working on course and watching what the car (and drivers) were doing, and determining what the car needs:

full tread depth tires on stock wheels isn't quite cutting it. there is just way too much tread squirm. the available treadwidth of the steamroller sized neovas isn't getting optimized on a 17x8 rim. so i may be jumping to some shaved re-01r's (since they're nearly half price of neovas!) on 17x9's if funds allow. now they won't be here in time for dc, but i'm looking at big picture improvement for myself.

i think i will also give an adjustable rear swaybar a shot to reduce my midcorner push. i'm using overdamped rear shock valving to get the car to rotate on corner entry. i'm using this to balance out the car and compensate for not enough rear spring. this is semi-detrimental in two ways. 1. it makes the car very snappy on turn-in. 2. steady state balance doesn't not care about valving. since my car is a daily driver.. it's rough enough on the street as it is. instead of increasing springrate in the rear to where i'd want (if it were a dedicated autox car), i'm keeping my compliance while helping steady state rotation with a slightly stiffer rear bar rate. we'll see.

jay watched the incar and has suggested some front spring swappage (to a lower rate) the morning of dc. i think it may be a good idea! lots to think about in terms of setup.

i have room for improvement driving-wise, but there's a quicker path to reduced times with an improved setup. of course i'm still focused on improving the driving.

i guess my advice is don't throw parts at the car, until you really think it through.. you save a lot of money that way.


-dan