Another night at the racetrack...
Well, this Saturday was a mixed bag...
Hot laps the car performed really well and I was feeling comfortable in the turns.
Qualifying, I don't know what the hell happened. I think I took it easy in turns 1 & 2 on the warm-up lap, then in turns 3 & 4 I didn't enter the turn where I wanted to hit it. I tried to make up for the lack of speed on the exit of turn 4 which probably caused me to drive into turn 1 too hot, washing up the track and nearly spinning out. I saved it and tore off down the back stretch, again trying to make up for lack of speed. Turn 3 & 4 were not that much better than the first two turns. I ended up listed as 29th of 32, though I'm not sure how many of those other cars managed to turn a lap, come across the scales correctly, etc.
In the heat race I was running REALLY well. We put an A compound tire on the right rear (A as in asphalt, as opposed to D as in dirt. The A is usually used when the track is dry and dusty, starting to get a layer of rubber on top.) I was racing with 6th and 7th place the first two laps. I was definitely faster than 7th place and was trying to work my way around him for the first few laps. I went into turn 1 real quick expecting him to run the bottom lane. I hoped to swing around him in the upper groove. Unfortunately he came up the track to the upper groove, too, and I had to slam on the brakes and jerk the wheel to the right to avoid pegging his rear bumper. I then was travelling a path that would put me into the wall, so I jerked the wheel back to the left. The car started to spin and slide backwards, eventually making contact with the right rear corner of the bumper in the middle of turn 1. The car rolled down the banking and up into the infield where I refired the motor and pulled into the center of the infield before unstrapping and inspecting the damage.
The damage I saw was not that significant, some sheet metal and the corner of the bumper. Had I known what it looked like, I would have tried to continue racing. However when I got back to the trailer and backed the car up so we could use the lights in the trailer, I noticed that the rear section of the frame had been shifted to the left. The bend happened behind the rearend (which is good) but it included some bars to which the rearend control arms are attached. This caused the rearend to "cock" slightly in the frame with the right rear slightly behind the left rear. We thrashed on the car for the next thirty or so minutes and got the rearend adjusted to where we thought was 'straight' and I went out for the semi-feature.
The car didn't handle too badly in the semi-feature. It pushed a bit in the turns and my crew chief thought he noticed the car being quicker to "snap around" when I gave it gas in the turns. But I can't say whether anything would have been different had I not smacked the wall.
I finished 8th in the heat race and am credited with 6th in the semi-feature because the 8th place car failed to start the race and the 7th place car failed to finish the race.
My next milestone remains to be 1 place ahead of the last car running on the track.
Some photos of the damage are here -
http://www.racing73.com/misc_debris/lj/racing73/073104FairburySpeedway/
Note the right rear side of the bumper which is crushed back, the bars to either side of the red fuel cell (which are now bent towards the left) and the large wave/ripple that runs across the white sheet metal decking on the rear of the car. The body is shifted to the left because the support pieces are attached to the frame. The sheet metal shifted the same way the frame did.
I didn't have any real injuries myself... my neck was sore on the back and to the right, I got a headache later in the evening and I have some bruising on the inside of my left arm. But I think the bruising would have been there just from the way my arms move in the cockpit of the car. And the headache may have been because I didn't take my allergy pill. :P
So, there's this week's action at the racetrack...
I'm going to Indy this weekend for the Brickyard 400, hoping to race on 8/21. So we've got to remove the right rear quarter panel, take the car to someone with a frame straightener, bend the frame back into line, reset the rearend and reattach the quarter panel as well as smoothing out the other rumpled sheet metal. To put it one way, my crew chief is saying "I guess we won't be going to any car shows anytime soon."
-asa
Hot laps the car performed really well and I was feeling comfortable in the turns.
Qualifying, I don't know what the hell happened. I think I took it easy in turns 1 & 2 on the warm-up lap, then in turns 3 & 4 I didn't enter the turn where I wanted to hit it. I tried to make up for the lack of speed on the exit of turn 4 which probably caused me to drive into turn 1 too hot, washing up the track and nearly spinning out. I saved it and tore off down the back stretch, again trying to make up for lack of speed. Turn 3 & 4 were not that much better than the first two turns. I ended up listed as 29th of 32, though I'm not sure how many of those other cars managed to turn a lap, come across the scales correctly, etc.
In the heat race I was running REALLY well. We put an A compound tire on the right rear (A as in asphalt, as opposed to D as in dirt. The A is usually used when the track is dry and dusty, starting to get a layer of rubber on top.) I was racing with 6th and 7th place the first two laps. I was definitely faster than 7th place and was trying to work my way around him for the first few laps. I went into turn 1 real quick expecting him to run the bottom lane. I hoped to swing around him in the upper groove. Unfortunately he came up the track to the upper groove, too, and I had to slam on the brakes and jerk the wheel to the right to avoid pegging his rear bumper. I then was travelling a path that would put me into the wall, so I jerked the wheel back to the left. The car started to spin and slide backwards, eventually making contact with the right rear corner of the bumper in the middle of turn 1. The car rolled down the banking and up into the infield where I refired the motor and pulled into the center of the infield before unstrapping and inspecting the damage.
The damage I saw was not that significant, some sheet metal and the corner of the bumper. Had I known what it looked like, I would have tried to continue racing. However when I got back to the trailer and backed the car up so we could use the lights in the trailer, I noticed that the rear section of the frame had been shifted to the left. The bend happened behind the rearend (which is good) but it included some bars to which the rearend control arms are attached. This caused the rearend to "cock" slightly in the frame with the right rear slightly behind the left rear. We thrashed on the car for the next thirty or so minutes and got the rearend adjusted to where we thought was 'straight' and I went out for the semi-feature.
The car didn't handle too badly in the semi-feature. It pushed a bit in the turns and my crew chief thought he noticed the car being quicker to "snap around" when I gave it gas in the turns. But I can't say whether anything would have been different had I not smacked the wall.
I finished 8th in the heat race and am credited with 6th in the semi-feature because the 8th place car failed to start the race and the 7th place car failed to finish the race.
My next milestone remains to be 1 place ahead of the last car running on the track.
Some photos of the damage are here -
http://www.racing73.com/misc_debris/lj/racing73/073104FairburySpeedway/
Note the right rear side of the bumper which is crushed back, the bars to either side of the red fuel cell (which are now bent towards the left) and the large wave/ripple that runs across the white sheet metal decking on the rear of the car. The body is shifted to the left because the support pieces are attached to the frame. The sheet metal shifted the same way the frame did.
I didn't have any real injuries myself... my neck was sore on the back and to the right, I got a headache later in the evening and I have some bruising on the inside of my left arm. But I think the bruising would have been there just from the way my arms move in the cockpit of the car. And the headache may have been because I didn't take my allergy pill. :P
So, there's this week's action at the racetrack...
I'm going to Indy this weekend for the Brickyard 400, hoping to race on 8/21. So we've got to remove the right rear quarter panel, take the car to someone with a frame straightener, bend the frame back into line, reset the rearend and reattach the quarter panel as well as smoothing out the other rumpled sheet metal. To put it one way, my crew chief is saying "I guess we won't be going to any car shows anytime soon."
-asa