Spokane 16 hour, Our first race, and report.

[Ham Sammich]

Well, after a crazy 20-25 day build we made it, and raced.

Firstly big props for the CHUMP crew. They did a good job in the drivers meetings, seemed up beat, and willing to answer questions. I felt it was handled very well on their end. Not their first rodeo, and it showed. So good job to them.

Night before we're supposed to leave, the transmission died, swapped it out again, worked all night and loaded our crap in the truck and hauled donkey to Spokane.

We get there about noon on Friday, we're the 3rd guys there, it's cold 40-45 degrees, windy and slight rain now and again. I'm thinking, were is everybody, but happy to be there first instead of last. As noobs to the series, didn't want to be disrespectful by showing up late.

I meet my first Chump official, Chris, POSnova on the forums here. Super nice guy, we chat a bit. He helped me out with great information when we first started thinking about building a car. Guys start showing up. Capt. Wankel shows up in our pit and makes good on his case of "beverages" for us if we showed up! That was a nice gesture, and some damn fine looking beer, I don't recognize any of it, can't wait to give it a try.

Mean time, we're trying to get our generator hooked up to the trailer. first time we've hooked it up this way.. No cords we have mate with the trailer. I get sent on a wild goose chase to 3 RV stores, none of them have the plug, Finally I'm in Idaho, I find a cord. on the way back I find a Goodwill store on the way, and I pick up a couple of sweet couches for the trailer. Got this black leather couch for $39 and picked up a nice little couch for Frylock, little flowery one for $25. Couch is crazy soft and although pretty rough, perfect for the trailer and greasy dirty occupants. John calls me while I'm in Goodwill getting the couches. Just to give us the old digital "high five" for actually making it and not blowing to much smoke around. I feel bad, I almost have to blow him off as the lady behind the counter is trying to bill me, and explain to me where to pick up and load the couches, and I've become, "THAT GUY" on his phone in line at the store. Sorry about that John, we'll chat later.

tech time rolls around, we run through with $500 on the nose AIV. Would have been $450 without that silly eBay intake, that thing is getting tossed. We had a few holes in the firewall they wanted foil tape on, and we needed to put packing tape on the mirrors and tails. I understand the logic, but talk about making a good mirror suck. I'm gonna read up on mirrors, try and figure that stuff out. Got to be a better solution than putting tape on the mirror.

We work on some last minute details, like wiring the lighting, setting the wipers, getting decals on the car etc. We take in the "noob" drivers meeting, and are glad we did. Guy did a great job with the meeting, the guy from the Texas region. And he suggested we do some drivers testing on emergency exiting of the car. At first, I kinda blew off that idea, but thought, well it is a new car, maybe we should practice it. So we did, and I'm glad we did. If you want to survive a raging car fire, you need to get out, and keep your wits about you. Don't panic, think. Our first time doing it my son is out of the car in 6 seconds. Damn fine job. I get out in 12, Perry gets out in 11, Evan gets his hans stuck on the containment piece of the seat, he fiddles around for 32 seconds.... THAT was an eye opener. PRACTICE GETTING OUT OF YOUR CAR. Develop an order to it. We settled on this scenario, while rolling to a stop on fire, pull the radio wires, release the seat belt, drop the net, pull the steering wheel, and grab the hans to make sure it's up against your helmet. Got everybody used to that, with a bunch more practice and we are all out now in under 10 seconds. Safety first. I found that to be good information. I don't know why we don't normally practice that. glad we did.

Race starts. I'm out first, we settle on 20 minute stints in the car for the first few driver go rounds, just to make sure that everybody gets at least "some" seat time. We're still moving after everybody gets a taste, I go out for my first hour, it's about 10am, car is still smoking out the tail pipe, but no more or worse than when we started. I put in a solid hour. We're up to 16th and 2 laps behind the sock monkey team out of Great Falls, the other Montana team. We are the slowest car on the track, and getting passed at a rate I would consider to be "constantly". we're losing about 10-15 seconds a lap, but we're consistent even though the car is slow. and it's not the old "well if you drove a better line the car wouldn't be slow" argument. We'd pull onto the straight with a car in tow, he'd pull out, pin it and leave us, maybe put 150-200 feet on us before the corner. We got really used to being passed... I don't care for it, if I'm honest. Plus, it was mentioned on the forums here, "don't worry about the fast guys, just race the guys your speed". there was nobody our speed. ...lol... Perry gets out of the car after his run, I ask him, did that racing feel "odd" to you. he said, "it felt like those times when you go to a go-kart track with your buddys, and you're the guy that get's the slow kart". It wasn't racing, it was just driving, no real thrill of the race, just driving and getting out of the way. Took the fun out of it, if were honest. But that's reasonable for a first time out. LOT of seasoned teams at this event.

car smelled like gas for the first 10 minutes of my hour stint, I wrote it off to venting, and no windows pulling in fumes, didn't see anything out of the ordinary. During my driver change to my sons turn, when I exit the car, it's slippery in about a 10x20 inch area by my feet. Just slightly. I'm looking around, can't see any logical reason for it. maybe some kind of grease drippings off the column, who knows. But I only started with just over 3/4 of a tank of fuel. We put him full of fuel, figuring we'd make a driver only change at the hour mark and get fuel on the second driver change. He radios in that the car smells like fuel. I told him it did for me as well for about 10 minutes, and that we chalked it up to being full and venting, windows etc. there was nothing wet under the car, nothing dripping, nothing excessive or wet on the back of the car when we checked it at the stop.

I used about 3/4 of a tank in my hour in the car. He radios in that he thinks we blew a tire, smoke everywhere and the car quit as well. (turns out we lost the engine, although we still haven't looked, there is a thumb sized hole in the back of the pan, but up high, we only lost maybe a quart of oil) They send out the tow truck, it was right at the hour mark for him, about 11:30am or so. They bring the car in, the tires are fine. We get a chuckle out of the fact that we worked so hard to make big "TOW" arrows and a massive red strap hanging off the car... the guy wrapped his chain around the light bar and dragged us back. We get the car back and the first thing we notice is a LOT of fuel IN THE CAR, puddles of it. If I had to bet, maybe like you spilled a 44-64 ounce soda throughout the car, in the spare tire well out back, under the drivers seat, some on the rear view mirror.. WHAT THE HELL??? Utterly defied every bit of logic. We had other teams looking in and under the car, everybody puzzled. No leaks, no holes we could see, nothing dripping, nothing wet. We start sopping up fuel, which initially was thought to be oil to further complicate this, as the fuel sitting on the floor mixed with the tar sound deadening and looked like thinned out oil. That added some diagnostic time while we thought about the "well, when the engine blew, did some of that oil seep into the car somehow"?

We pull the sending unit on the fuel tank, seals are great, everything dry, no fuel there... WTH? . It's not coming from the engine compartment, everything is dry, and not from the lines under the car, those are all fine. Finally we decide to just drop the fuel tank and inspect it completely. Turns out, the previous owner had installed a subwoofer in the trunk. At some point he drilled a hole to accept a screw and what looks like must have been a ground strap for an amp. It went through the trunk floor right into the top of the fuel tank, probably about a 5/16" hole drilled right in it. Our guess was, the reason the car didn't smell like fuel or leak when he owned it was because the screw was there plugging the hole. He pulled the stereo and sold it to us, with only 1/8 of a tank of gas, so the 3-4 miles I put on it before we stripped it, didn't show anything out of the ordinary.

We decide at this point that if the fuel tank can be repaired safely and reliably we'll do an engine swap, otherwise, we'd be out. We run to Napa, they have a fuel tank hole repair kit, just what the doctor ordered. We fix it and let it sit. Throw some compressed air at the tank, rock solid no leaks. So we start tearing into the engines about 1 o'clock or so. The "what ifs" surrounding that fuel leak scare the hell out of me. Driving around a race car with fuel sloshing about on the floor. Gives me the hee-be-jee-be's. Can't see the floor of the car with the Hans device on.

We brought a spare running parts car in the trailer. We don't have any oil pans with or a cherry picker, the team across from us has a cherry picker they borrowed from the Porsche guys. I ask the Porsche guys if we could borrow it when the other team is done. They say no problem, but if we need it half way through your project, we're coming for it, just so you understand. And we're cool with that, and understand. happy to have a shot. We start pulling linkages, hoses, radiators, on both cars. I make a run to NAPA for oil pans, and floor dry. We get the engine out of our car and start on the spare car. Somehow or another, I pull "under the car" duty. I'm now covered in anti-freeze and oil. Pulling an engine is something I HATE when were in warm shop with all the tools necessary. Here I am laying essentially on gravel, it's 40 degrees, windy, cold, but I have 2 drivers that have not seen more than 20 minutes of track time, I owe it to those guys so we keep at it. About 4:30pm both engines are out and on the ground. we start swapping wiring, computers, exhaust, transmissions, etc. about 5:30 it's in the car and before we button up the suspension and put the axles in, i want to hear it run. we hit the switch and it fires and idles... THANK GOD!!! I tell Evan to get his suit on, we'll have this thing on the track in about 20 minutes.

Seasoned dudes have moved their pits way out from their trailers, we're kind of nestled back in a hole. We have to back out to get to the track. Evan hits the track about 6pm. Car is running great, shifts great, no fuel smell, nothing leaking, nothing getting hot. We made it back on the track. 6 hours to go. Lets see what happens.... we've dropped to 20th. Halfway into Perrys hour about 9:30pm or so, a guy goes off at the end of the straight, safety crews and ambulances everywhere (he's okay, just slightly tore up). This leaves the track full course yellow for 45 minutes to an hour. Perry is the lead car under yellow. He's actually happy about it, he's only been out for about 20 minutes total, and now he gets to baby it around the track for a long time, and learn the track. So he's pretty happy about it, learning the track in the dark. He's not bummed to be under caution. We do a bit better in the dark. I think it's the other teams slowed a bit in the dark, we're not getting passed as much. We're slow enough our lap times stay about the same.

Perry gets out, he's happy to be out, he was in for about 90 minutes. I go back in about 10:30 or so. Track feels cold, car is "slightly" more tail happy, but the good kind, the fun kind. I learned a LOT about lighting on my last stint that we are going to apply to our car. The faster cars with the headlights further apart, get more courtesy when they are passing us. Here is why. If you have all your lights slammed in a tight group in the middle of the hood, you look like one big dot to the car in front of you. When you can clearly see 2 dots getting closer together of further apart, you can gauge speed and distance of the car behind you, and make decisions that benefit both of you. One dot, no idea how close you are. There was one car with the oddest headlight setup, I wanted to track it down later to see what they did "differently". What they did, did NOT work in their favor. Turns out the best time to have a look see how far back the cars are behind you (in the dark) is to watch the mirrors exiting the corner, before you're blinded from behind you get a pretty good gauge of how far back they are, and how fast they are gaining on you.

Long story short, this particular car, you'd see exiting the corner behind you with what looked like 2 seperate "white" lights on the front. the very second they were squared up again on you, the lights were bright yellow, like pace car yellow, looked like a completely different car, a nano second later, did he gain, did he lose ground, very confusing to be followed by it. But one yellow dot that you couldn't gauge distance with, all blended together. I don't know if the K rating of the lights is additive or what, but he'd go from white in the corners to bright yellow when squarely behind you. Whatever it is that made that happen... I'm not doing that to our car and am going to read up on it. And I'm moving our lights out to the sides, more in keeping with where the factory lights end up, go figure they were in the right spots to begin with... ...lol... I asked Perry about it when he got out, "Did you see the car with the bright yellow single light", he said yea, what was that about, I couldn't gauge the distance with that car. I said, "me either". I'd really like to see how they had their lights pointed and the K rating of the bulbs, I have a good guess what the configuration looked like, just like to see if I'm right. I'm guessing they all point in toward the center, rather than perhaps apex lights on the sides pointing out. Make it easy for people to see and gauge your distance, you're gonna be allowed more frequent and safer passing.

Randon gets in with 40 minutes to go, car is working great, and he brings it home, we get 20th. Sadly, we didn't get to sit on the couch...maybe next time.

What a pile of work. For a while, i was thinking, you know, if we hadn't broke down, where would we have ended up? But then, that's not a fair thing to judge, because then nobody else would have either, we'd have likely finished in the same spot or 22nd. Car was that slow. But we had a good time in spite of the engine swapping. I wish we'd have had more time to come by and chat with more folks, we just flat were out of time with all the shenanigans of the car. But we made it.

Pulled into the yard, got 98/100 of an inch of rain during the day here. I got stuck pulling in to the yard.... AAAAAHhhh!!!! We're not opening a trailer door for a week.... maybe not every again if that mud don't dry up. ...lulz...

[Ham Sammich]

Few pics, (hosted on flickr)

Transmission blew out on the way to the alignment shop, the day before we're supposed to leave.. Yea, we just put it in, out it comes, again... Aghh.

Here's how it looked 18 hours before we were supposed to leave, at the alignment shop, no windshield, doesn't run, no panels... no lights, no radios, nothing.

[Ham Sammich]

18 hours later, loading it on the trailer. The red car in front of it, is the parts car... it will play it's part before the weekend is over.

Very happy with the way this all turned out.

[Ham Sammich]

We're here, were here!!!!

The pimp couch I bought while talking to John when I was in the Goodwill store. Cinco-DeMayo chips and salsa on the floor, ready for action.

[Ham Sammich]

Other dudes starting to roll in.

This guy, the first car here.

[Ham Sammich]

No pics of the start or racing. At 11:30pm, the carnage starts for us. This is NOT what you want your pit to look like only 275 miles into it

parts car, giving up it's engine.

[Ham Sammich]

Here's the culprit. Curious to have a look in there. Not REAL CURIOUS, but curious none the less.

That's me pulling, "under the car" duty. How did I get that anyway?

[Ham Sammich]

Red car giving up the goods.

Freezing and parts swapping engines. I made a run to Walmart and bought us some cheap sweatshirts to help take the chill off. No place within 30 miles sold coveralls, who knew?

Was killing me to NOT put a performance clutch in the car, and I was true to my word, I didn't. Factory clutch, right there for all to see. And to be honest, other than being soft, didn't work all that bad.

[Ham Sammich]

To busy to take anymore pics. Changed the oil, fired the car, got it buttoned up and sent it out again about 6pm. Ran flawlessly for the next 6 hours, that's some much appreciated luck. All of us felt this crappy 90whp engine we have in the car now was better than the 125whp engine we blew. All 4 of us commented on how the car would now pull 102 on the straight instead of 98-100. it was a touch better, but lacked bottom end power. That original motor must have been pretty hurt to begin with, but we got 275 race miles out of it before it let go.

Picture of Randon, just after midnight, we FINISHED!!!!!!! HURRRAYYYYYYY! I'm glad we didn't give up.

Tire wear was great with the azenis. But we were in a slow car, and only got 10 hours of track time, I'm sure that helped play a part in it. The crew poses for a picture after we finish.

in order left to right, Randon, Bob (20-Montana on the forums here), Perry, Evan.

I'm wearing 2 sweatshirts and t-shirt under that driving suit... still cold...

[Ham Sammich]

will we do it again? Ask me in a month...

[Frylock]

Nice! Glad you were able to get it back on track.

[Z Greek]

Hey Montana, I am really glad you guys were able to make it. We had some troubles of our own, and for me it was my first race of any kind, so I was pretty preoccupied, otherwise, I would have liked to meet you. I hope you make it in July, I sure as hell am, but I live less than two miles from the track! I confirmed on Saturday what I have known all my life, I am a racer! See you in July!

[ONEBADBUG]

Excellent write up, thanks. I wanted to come say hello, but one thing I learned at my first Chump race was that there is very little down time. Especially with a 3 car team.

[Craig]

We are the slowest car on the track, and getting passed at a rate I would consider to be "constantly". we're losing about 10-15 seconds a lap, but we're consistent even though the car is slow. and it's not the old "well if you drove a better line the car wouldn't be slow" argument. We'd pull onto the straight with a car in tow, he'd pull out, pin it and leave us, maybe put 150-200 feet on us before the corner. We got really used to being passed... I don't care for it, if I'm honest.

Been there, done that, got the T-shirt, and yes, it does get old quickly. The highlight of my first stint was that I passed someone. I'm sure you were hurt in part by the small field.

I've seen Civics be pretty quick, so there ought to be some stuff you can do within the $500 competition value to get the car more competitive.

[Ron_e]

Hey 20-Montana, you are welcome for the beer and I hope you enjoy it. At one time Big Rock was the largest micro-brewry in the world, not sure what defines micro-brewry but anyway enjoy. It is a 15 can sampler pack and when we came across the border I had to declare it and the officer asked who sells 15 packs with a confused look on his face.

That was us with the three lights only because one was not working - I am going to upgrade the alternator as suggested by one of the Cone Damage guys. We have two 3000K center lights (one was not working) and two 5000k apex lights with the right one aimed to the left and the left one aimed to the right apex. I was told yellow light travels the furthest so that is what we put in the center lights.

[skierman64]

Thanks for the rundown of your weekend. It is a good read.

[Ham Sammich]

Hey 20-Montana, you are welcome for the beer and I hope you enjoy it. At one time Big Rock was the largest micro-brewry in the world, not sure what defines micro-brewry but anyway enjoy. It is a 15 can sampler pack and when we came across the border I had to declare it and the officer asked who sells 15 packs with a confused look on his face.

That was us with the three lights only because one was not working - I am going to upgrade the alternator as suggested by one of the Cone Damage guys. We have two 3000K center lights (one was not working) and two 5000k apex lights with the right one aimed to the left and the left one aimed to the right apex. I was told yellow light travels the furthest so that is what we put in the center lights.

Ah, that was you guys with the lights. I'm just saying, it cost you some free passing, we couldn't judge your distance. Take it for what it's worth. and the apex lights crossing over the main beams would explain it looking like one big ball of light. (at least I think that's how it would go). I'm changing our lights based on the experience, we probably looked the same, just didn't get to follow any body. ...lol... Everybody that made it easy to see and gauge distance because you could see a gap in their lighting, and could judge distances got a free, un-contested pass. It's worth noting. I'm moving our lights as far to the edges as possible to help the other guys in front of us judge distance. Can't wait to start on that.

Oh wait, I wasn't supposed to open the trailer door for a week. Wife's orders!

[Team Infiniti]

New priorities huh

Glad you made it!

[daily driver]

We're up to 16th and 2 laps behind the sock monkey team out of Great Falls, the other Montana team. We are the slowest car on the track, and getting passed at a rate I would consider to be "constantly". we're losing about 10-15 seconds a lap, but we're consistent even though the car is slow. and it's not the old "well if you drove a better line the car wouldn't be slow" argument. We'd pull onto the straight with a car in tow, he'd pull out, pin it and leave us, maybe put 150-200 feet on us before the corner. We got really used to being passed... I don't care for it, if I'm honest. ... But that's reasonable for a first time out. LOT of seasoned teams at this event.

I have had drivers 10-15 seconds slower than my fastest driver and they were by no means just out for a drive. It's most obvious if it's their first time in the car or on a certain track. You had both of those against you. Never under estimate the power of experience and fast drivers. Sometimes a car will go flying by and an hour later you could be passing it. Same car different driver. And yes the passing happens on the straight where you thing it's a drag race but it's not. Corner exit speed means everything and you really can't judge it without radar. I will also add that we are all probably 10 seconds faster than when we first started a year ago. I thought we would be up to speed after about an hour on track but I was so wrong about that. As we got more comfortable we started going faster...maybe that was just us though.

90hp won't cut it but if you get your 125hp engine healthy again you'll be fine. Also that 90hp should have kept up with all other cars in the corners drivers being equal. It amazes me that mustangs etc can blow by you on the straight but then you can catch/pass them in the corners. That's what makes this type of racing so great!

[Ham Sammich]

And yes the passing happens on the straight where you thing it's a drag race but it's not.

I was referring to cars that were in tow, same speed, get to the straight, pull out and stomp your bacon. Those are drag races.

Also that 90hp should have kept up with all other cars in the corners drivers being equal.

All things being equal, we'd have to be in the same car. All of our drivers were within a second or so of each other. Hard to say for sure though, as most of us couldn't recall a lap where we didn't let 2-3 cars go by. At no point was there a time where you could "get into the zone" and just concentrate on yourself or follow some body. It was about working around everybody else. I seemed to do best for us in the night. i enjoyed the night racing. Turns out the speed we were going was about what a few of the other teams slowed down to for safety. Every so often, we had somebody to play with for 1-2 corners, that was nice.

Just have to find out what let loose on the old engine and give it the old college try to fix it.

[knate]

I've enjoyed reading your car build and updates and I'm glad you guys made it out there. Thanks for sharing all of this, it has been entertaining. I'm sure with your healthy 125hp engine you should be able to keep up fairly well. For your mirrors one thing you could look into is clearbra material. It is much tougher than packing tape, but you can apply it wet and squeegee out the air bubbles.

[daily driver]

All things being equal, we'd have to be in the same car.

I said drivers being equal...that civic is a good chassis and I have seen what they are capable of. I used to think it was a drag race down the straights but it's really not...you'll see.

You guys were definitely slow which I'm sure surprised a lot of people. Good luck on the motor. With your knowledge and resources I am sure you could destroy the field.

[ABR-Glen]

Also remember that you are less likely to see other cars on the track that are running similar lap times to you, sometimes you're half a lap apart from another car for your whole stint. It's good when someone just a little faster than you gets past and then you can try to keep up.

[Ham Sammich]

For your mirrors one thing you could look into is clearbra material. It is much tougher than packing tape, but you can apply it wet and squeegee out the air bubbles.

Appreciate the tip, found it on eBay, gonna order some up and give it a try.

I said drivers being equal...that civic is a good chassis and I have seen what they are capable of. I used to think it was a drag race down the straights but it's really not...you'll see.

You guys were definitely slow which I'm sure surprised a lot of people. Good luck on the motor. With your knowledge and resources I am sure you could destroy the field.

We'll be faster, I'm sure fresher engine will help (crosses fingers). We're not interested in destroying the field or being the fastest car. That, at least to me, is not as fun, and in the opposite direction we just were, once again, nobody to play with. We want to be EXACTLY the same potential as everybody else, so we can get a good race out of the deal. I don't need the purse money or a trophy to tell me I had a good time. Our ego's and mine, are pretty well in check. I, particularly, just want a good jam. Let me be in the middle of a pack, that's all I want. I'm not one of those guys that has to win to prove anything, or thinks my amazing showing at the chump car race will lead to a NASCAR or IMSA ride, it's not and I get it. Just want to come out and play with the boys. We get the concept. But for us, this time, it wasn't a race, it was just driving, and 95% of the time it was less than highway speed with nobody around us, or just being blown in the weeds. That's not fun for anybody. I think $600 worth of gasgkets and some fresh rings, and we'll be back in the game. (famous last words). But we're not coming back to run that slowly and be in the way, it just wasn't fun. Everybody on our team has racing experience, I've got stacks of out of date helmets, just like I'm sure a lot of others do. So it's on us to (at the very least) get the car up to "average". We talked it over and all of us feel that a fresh engine should be all that's required.

Also remember that you are less likely to see other cars on the track that are running similar lap times to you, sometimes you're half a lap apart from another car for your whole stint. It's good when someone just a little faster than you gets past and then you can try to keep up.

Yea we thought about that, we were thee slowest car though, there was nobody else close to us in "slowness". We were so slow there wasn't anybody even a "little" faster. The difference between somebody averaging 72mph and somebody averaging 77mph is 879 feet every lap. That's losing 7.3 feet per second all the time.

We just want to be "average".

[daily driver]

Makes sense...not everyone is that humble. I can understand not wanting to be the slowest out there and would have never guessed that from a 93 civic Si? For the record Red Square Racing was slower with a 1:55.4 as fastest lap. I hope you guys did still have fun even though as you anticipated a dual 8 would have been better. A freshened up engine should be good for at least 100 hours on track. None of my drivers have previous track experience and I often forget that's not always the case.