May NJMP Event....Who is in?

#41

wsl wrote:

yes it is, perfect for our needs

#42

Save some room for our Rv and and Beer pong table! If all goes as planed, should arrive around 4 on friday. See you all down there.

Peter Thibault

#43

Home safely. Two broken rocker arms explained why my car sounded like a tractor and had no power all day. Got my license though…

#44

Peter won today’s race. He even lapped the last 3 SE30’s. :S Followed by Matt Russell and Robert Grace.

I was one of the lapped cars. :blush: From the sounds emanating from the front end I’ll be changing brake pads tomorrow morning.

#45

Is there a schedule someplace. I could not find one on the NASA NE sight. I may come down to spectate but if I do I want to see the SE30 race.

#46

mahoneyj wrote:

No schedule posted, but if tomorrow’s schedule is the same as today, look for the single race group, including the E30’s, to go green at around 2:30.

Great track, can’t wait to get out there. BTW, it was nice meeting you today Dwight, look forward to racing with you and your roller’d car in the near future. :wink:

#47

Not sure which creates more awe, my paint rolling abilities or my unique choice of tow rig.
:laugh:
Was a good day today. Too drunk from the beer now that I’m home to post details. Suffice to say I didn’t win. I think I need to become younger since all the hot shoes are substantially lower in age.

#48

ddavidv wrote:

[quote]Not sure which creates more awe, my paint rolling abilities or my unique choice of tow rig.
[/quote]

Both are pretty cool in my book.

#49

mahoneyj wrote:

[quote]

Both are pretty cool in my book.[/quote]

Neither will get you in the lead pack of 6 cars though. :lol:

#50

If you cant win, look good trying :wink:

#51

Great weekend with my Northeast brethren! Well, mediocre results but a great bunch of guys who race clean and hard!

I have to give special props to Sean Curran and Frans Hansen for an absolute hammer-and-tongs battle on Sunday. Due to slow registrations, the race director set the schedule with one combined race group which gave us 60-ish cars running from 1:09s to 1:30+ with Spec E30s in the low 1:20s and a new track record in the 19s.

I had the pleasure to spend some more time with Andrew Zimmermann and Johnny Allen - the Drive Gear crew. Frans has skills for sure, but that rental car is strong. I picked up a tranny for IndyJim (his name was Bubbles, but whatever floats Jim’s boat) and picked up a transmission for him, too. If Andrew’s rebuilds are half as clean on the inside as they are on the outside, you don’t need to look any further for a trans.

Good to meet Robert Grace and his dad, Seth. That guy is from the Skeen school of quiet, confident, FAST!!! If it weren’t for mechanical problems he would have been battling for the top step both days.

Pete Thibault is a wheel man for sure, but I think he is even better at paddock partying than driving. Dwight Varnes: cool guy, cool truck, cool paint roller skillz. Sorry to see that Rick Mariani and Greg Sterman both had motor problems but at least they caught them before they air conditioned their motors. Bob Ott, great to meet you. Mahoney and Pereda tied for the “WTF are you doing at the track but not racing” award. :wink:

Sorry if I am forgetting anyone.

Here is my race video from Sunday. There’s not much to say about Saturday (I finished 6th in honor of Geegar’s Spec E30 retirement). Traffic factored in huge on both days, but Sunday worked out a little better. I was NOT sleeping on the start for once and was able to hang on to the lead pack until the top 3 checked out and Frans, Curran and I started battling. Great fun. Thanks to a GTS2 E30 who wanted to get racy, I was able to get by Curran and come within 0.1 of 3rd place, but Frans definitely deserved the podium!

http://vimeo.com/12189092

I’ll try to post the Saturday highlights soon - may just be video of the Viper passing me, spinning, then me coming this close to t-boning him.

#52

I can’t even win that, the best I can do is Tie.

It was nice to meet you Steve. Wish I could have stuck around.

The Field size looked insane, I could only imagine the traffic out there.

Here are a few pics from Sat, sorry I didnt bring the good camera. http://picasaweb.google.com/dpereda/20100529?feat=directlink

#53

Good video Steve. Nice to see what it looks like with other E30s around. :laugh:
I was particularly interested in seeing your use of brakes and the downshift through the esses. Seems like everyone does it their own way and I don’t know that one way is faster than another.

Pretty clear in the vid that Curran had a grip issue as he mentioned to me afterward.

#54

It was cool meeting some of you, hopefully I get to race with you in the near future. I’ve got a lead on a new head that I’ll be picking up and throwing on soon. Then I’ll be ready to roll and see what the back of the pack feels like!

#55

Got a glimpse of the results by reading DeVinney’s story, but where is/are the other stories and actual finish positions?

Come on guys, it’s tough to live through your racing without the race stories.

Regards, Robert Patton

#56

All I know is Steve needs to update his signature to “The 6th most mediocre driver in NJ - 2010”

#57

My races were so lackluster and battle-free they aren’t really worth mentioning. Though if you want to hear the 3/4 Hawk front pad story I can tell that.

#58

I wish I had more to report Patton. Saturday practice was the first time I had been on this track, I felt decent in quali although the car was breaking up a little bit above 5,000 rpm. I didn’t think too much of it at the time because it wasn’t that bad…Started P3 behind Frans in the Drivegear car and Pete Thibault who both turned 1:19:415, Frans just did it 3 laps before Pete so he took Pole. I got by Frans on lap one and when the pack entered the Lightbulb turn that leads onto the straight we were mostly two wide…nascar style in the nascar turn. I was on the outside of Pete getting overly excited about taking the lead and a strange thing happened, at track out the track completely disappeared and I was 4 off. The pack was so close still at this point that I fell all the way to sixth place. I worked all the way back up to P2 but the problem above 5,000 rpm (which I latter found out was the mass air sensor) got worse and worse and I had to shift slightly below 5,000 rpm….as a result I lost P2 to Frans….and then P3 to Matt. Finished P4.
With great help from Pete (who had great help from Jonny) we were able to fix the problem with the mass air flow meter. I was excited to have a car that was running properly for Sunday. I only went out for qualifying briefly as I didn’t want to cord my tires before the race even started (these things would be in the trash for most racers but I figured I would save the good stuff for Mid-Atlantic and get a lesson in overste3r). I was actually very impressed how well the RA1s held up, they still felt competitive. After quali I was set to start P3 behind Matt Russell P1, and Sean Curran P2. Within the first lap or so I got by Sean and began chasing down Matt…after a good battle I got by Matt and started to pull out a little lead. I began hearing a little noise which sounded like the exhaust had been pinched or knocked up onto the underside of the car, there was no vibration so I kept going…about a lap later it got pretty loud coming through the light bulb turn onto the straight, it was right about here that I thought mayyybe this is more than an exhaust issue…roughly a second and a half later that suspicion was confirmed. She dun broke and I went from the lead to the flagger stand and had to watch the second half of the race from the sideline.
Someone once told me that Virginia was lovers and New Jersey was for garbage…turns out that South Jersey is pretty nice and if you haven’t been to NJMP you should check it out. No good results but certainly an educational weekend…and on the bright side this wasn’t a points weekend for me.

#59

Robert, what done broke?

Rod knock?
Thanks for the report.

Regards, Robert Patton

#60

No the motor is fine. It was a driveline failure, the guibo let go and the drivshaft destroyed everything within its reach.