Well...another race weekend has come and gone. This particular one was a
little bit up and a little bit down.
Practise:
Went out and felt the track out as I had never been there before. Did about
10 laps and the throttle cable broke. No big deal...but had to find a
replacement. Off to wal-mart and a universal bicycle repair kit later the
spitfire is back to normal. Best time was a 1:54 something...not to bad, but
I figured it was about 3 seconds off what was needed to be competetive.
Qualifying
The car never felt right and never got any grip. After about 5 laps the left
rear tyre had a massive deflation. Not due to any puncture, I had worn
through the cords and seperated the tread portion from the side wall. These
tires only had about 7 sessions on them, so it was a surprise, but I found I
can't run the Good Years with my set up. Luckily, I had a set of Hoosiers
mounted on the second set of rims. I parked for the rest of the session and
qualified with a dismal 1:57, pole time was a 1:52 or 1:53.
Race
I was feeling good about the race. I suited up, strapped in and headed to
grid. We got a split start from the spec racers so I lined up in row 3, 2
rows behind the polesitter in my class (outside row 1). The starts are always
hard in the spitfire because there are so many cars that end up behind me with
more horsepower. It actually wasn't too bad, only 1 guy got around me, and by
the end of lap 2 I was right on the tail of 2nd, who was right on 1st. after
3 laps, I got by the 2nd place guy, and was riding around behind 1st. Then I
made a mistake and tried to get a run on him where I was quicker through turn
3 and I misjudged it and had to lift the throttle and tap the brakes...a big
spin ensued...and 20 seconds later I was back going. At the end of the race I
was able to get back 17 seconds of the 20 deficiet, but it wasn't enough, 2nd
place was all I could muster. fast lap was a 1:51.736 against a track record
of 1.51.704...worth the 2 sets of tyres I destroyed (the good years and the
hoosiers from the race) over the weekend! Sponsors would be great at this
point :) anyone want to help out for my run-offs bid?
Thanks to Joe Guinan and Gerry Conant who came to help out. Which was a
bigger task than expected as it was diabolically hot all weekend.
I also got a chance to finally meet Rocky Entriken.
Aaron johnson
#87 HP Spitfire 1500
Southern Illinois Region SCCA
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