Administrators Bill Strong Posted April 5, 2010 Administrators Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 Who was that guy? What happened? Why did you go back in?Please say you have in car of that. It would be awesome Not mad or anything. No real damage done to my car. Just have to grind the wheel a bit. But I did feel my HANS do its job. That was a hell of a hit.Anyone get pictures or video of my recovery? oh, and anyone have images or video of my bumper on fire during the first hour?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jer Posted April 5, 2010 Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 We's innocent and I've got the mark-free bumper to prove it! You guys did plenty of farming off Oak Tree without OUR help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsmith2424 Posted April 5, 2010 Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 Who was that guy? What happened? Why did you go back in?Please say you have in car of that. It would be awesome Not mad or anything. No real damage done to my car. Just have to grind the wheel a bit. But I did feel my HANS do its job. That was a hell of a hit.Anyone get pictures or video of my recovery? oh, and anyone have images or video of my bumper on fire during the first hour??That would have been Johan. We broke the steering on the car and was not able to get it fixed to finish the race. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Bill Strong Posted April 5, 2010 Author Administrators Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 oh man, that sucks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsmith2424 Posted April 5, 2010 Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 We don't have any video, but I think what happened (from what driver told me) is he was trying to get by for a few laps and had an opportunity at Oak Tree and thats where the contact happened. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest VKZ24 Posted April 5, 2010 Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 I meant to tell you Bill (I saw you at the awards ceremony) that I had great battle with someone on your team during the 10:00-12:00 night shift. I finally got by but I sure had to work for it. Some great racing for sure.BTW, I was driving the red #0 Honda Prelude with all the blue LED's down the sides and red reflective tape on the rear bumper. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest xsboost90 Posted April 5, 2010 Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 havent watched my videos yet from inside the Dragon but i saw the bumper on fire for a lap or two. Love it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Batman Posted April 5, 2010 Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 Also saw the fire but did not see your end of the wreck contact. However I may have video of the side swipe you gave me in turn 8. All in good fun!! What place did you guys finish. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Bill Strong Posted April 5, 2010 Author Administrators Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 awesome guys. That was one of the most fun races I have ever been in. So many cars were equal in speed.We started out pretty good, then on my last lap the car just shut off on the turn to oak tree. Turns out the ignition coil just quit. What are the odds of that happening? I have been racing since the late 70s and have never had a coil just up and die! Issue is that the coil is built into the distributer, and we did not have a spare. So I drove to my shop north of Lynchburg, VA and found a spare. Drove back and installed it and the car ran flawlessly. sorta.I had some great laps with the red Honda as well. That was one quick car. What did surprise me, and it cause me to spin, was the Fiero, we were walking all over it all day and night, then all of a sudden it found a driver and some speed. I could not get away from it! In my lack of sleep mode my mind told me to go faster while looking in the mirror at the Fiero that was quickly gaining ground... I ended up spinning because I got off line into the marbles because I was in shock! All I could do was laugh at myself. The little things I remember...Racing the Dragon was fun. the 944 and any MR2 with a 5SFE 2200cc engine is a equal match as I have learned over the years. Watching your suspension work overtime going down the hill after turn 1 was awesome. Sorry to the Enterprise driver if I slowed you down, but please know that we were fighting for position you were just a few laps behind us and I know how fast you could catch us. We ended up finishing 18th. The incident at Oak Tree was an accident. I had been trying to stay ahead of him, and my 360 rated tires were just becoming so greasy, I was just trying to get as much speed as I could out of oak tree so he could not get by me on the straight. But I think I went just a bit wide into the turn which gave him the opening. But I am guessing it just was not big enough. It was cool seeing the "oops" look on his face as I spun. I would have given him a thumbs up but I was a bit busy at the time. all in fun. Hope it did not cost you too much. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsmith2424 Posted April 5, 2010 Report Share Posted April 5, 2010 The incident at Oak Tree was an accident. I had been trying to stay ahead of him, and my 360 rated tires were just becoming so greasy, I was just trying to get as much speed as I could out of oak tree so he could not get by me on the straight. But I think I went just a bit wide into the turn which gave him the opening. But I am guessing it just was not big enough. It was cool seeing the "oops" look on his face as I spun. I would have given him a thumbs up but I was a bit busy at the time. all in fun. Hope it did not cost you too much.It didn't cost us to bad I think we ended up 10th we were in 8th at the time. We also had a rear end go at 6 hrs in and got it fixed to run the last 15 minutes before the safety hour. Other than that we just put fuel in all race and changed tires/brakes at the safety break. Our tires were Michelin 17" Preceda's with a 240 treadwear. That setup help optomized the gear ratio's as we could really use 2nd coming out of oak tree. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
truk41 Posted April 6, 2010 Report Share Posted April 6, 2010 What did surprise me, and it cause me to spin, was the Fiero, we were walking all over it all day and night, then all of a sudden it found a driver and some speed. I could not get away from it! In my lack of sleep mode my mind told me to go faster while looking in the mirror at the Fiero that was quickly gaining ground... I ended up spinning because I got off line into the marbles because I was in shock! All I could do was laugh at myself. The little things I remember...I will take that as a compliment. If I remember correctly that occured in fish hook. The fiero is fast, but very twitchy. I think all the motor mounts are broke and with any quick movement on or off the gas, it would torque steer pretty bad(you guys might have noticed it under braking into T1) The car owner isnt too bad for speed, he has been within 4-6 second a lap of me everywhere we go and to his defense we started the race(first 2 hours) on 4 cylinders(the plug wires got swicthed while fixing a fuel leak). The other two drivers need more seattime and a ride along. So I will say sorry for whoever we got in the way of, and sorry for anything I caused(like shocking someone to spin and I know I contacted 2 cars(sorry, i think), one in oak tree(I was passing inside and I guess he didnt know it), and one in Fish hook(same story). And once again, congrats to Chris and the 11 team......AND THANKS TO VIR Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest xsboost90 Posted April 6, 2010 Report Share Posted April 6, 2010 checked my vids- sorry no footage of the fire- time for me to get a track camera w/ more record time- racing the MR2 was awsome. The last race i did both MR2's were slow, so i figured this one would be no problem. Nice to see one that was running well with all good drivers from what i could tell. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scrowner Posted April 6, 2010 Report Share Posted April 6, 2010 So, #2, not the the #02 Fiero, a Hawaiian BMW 325e, we were sitting in 10th at 9:30am with Endurance Karting, a damn miata, solidly in 9th with about 5 laps ahead of us. When, the Endurance miata pulls off the track with about 20 minutes to go. ???? Sweet. However, since we have a E30....we have fuel starvation at about an hour into racing from a full tank. And at 9:40am we were 10 minutes into starvation. Any right hand turn, car stalls for 3 seconds and then kicks back in. We had an experienced driver in who knew how to wiggle the car on right hand turns. But still, the car is known to completely stall close to 1.5 hours into a full tank of gas. BUT....we could move up a spot, IF Endurance Karting has something serious. We wiggled and slowed our pace down and starting ticking into their lead. We would keep looking over at the miata's pit, but the car was sitting.????? At 4 minutes to 10am we lapped them and ended the race with 2 laps ahead. It was exciting for us because it pushed us even further into top 10. I still do not know why they exited the race. I guess 9th or 10th is about the same but it put a big smile on our faces at the end of the race. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsmith2424 Posted April 7, 2010 Report Share Posted April 7, 2010 So, #2, not the the #02 Fiero, a Hawaiian BMW 325e, we were sitting in 10th at 9:30am with Endurance Karting, a damn miata, solidly in 9th with about 5 laps ahead of us. When, the Endurance miata pulls off the track with about 20 minutes to go. ???? Sweet. However, since we have a E30....we have fuel starvation at about an hour into racing from a full tank. And at 9:40am we were 10 minutes into starvation. Any right hand turn, car stalls for 3 seconds and then kicks back in. We had an experienced driver in who knew how to wiggle the car on right hand turns. But still, the car is known to completely stall close to 1.5 hours into a full tank of gas. BUT....we could move up a spot, IF Endurance Karting has something serious. We wiggled and slowed our pace down and starting ticking into their lead. We would keep looking over at the miata's pit, but the car was sitting.????? At 4 minutes to 10am we lapped them and ended the race with 2 laps ahead. It was exciting for us because it pushed us even further into top 10. I still do not know why they exited the race. I guess 9th or 10th is about the same but it put a big smile on our faces at the end of the race.Steering broke on oue car (63 miata) due to contact with the MR2 at the exit of oak tree. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scrowner Posted April 7, 2010 Report Share Posted April 7, 2010 Steering broke on oue car (63 miata) due to contact with the MR2 at the exit of oak tree.Thanks.....I mean sorry about that...glad we were not in that oak tree mix at that time! You seemed to get to your pit OK - we were paying attention because we were a possibility of moving up. Anyway, that sucks to not get your checker flag in a 24 hour race. I guess we will see you at Summit Point? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsmith2424 Posted April 7, 2010 Report Share Posted April 7, 2010 We got back ok but ruined the right front tire and the steering needs repairHate to say it but we only really run the Southern races and Stafford (car based near there) due to our lead driver and costs. As of right now we are looking at running Roebling and/or Sebring but Sebring is looking like a lock for us though. This was the sixth race on that car (2 Stafford one of them was a win, 3 Kershaw and 1 VIR). We finally had our first major mechanical failure this past race (rear end blew at 2 hrs before safety break). We are still even running the orginal engine in that car since it has been racing (close to 100 hrs now I figure). But for a Miata to win at VIR it would have to been in a 1.8 car as we got a 1.6 and there was no way we could match the big cars as the only advantage we had was in the corners. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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