Hehe... nice times guys. See what happens when I give you guys a goal!

Jason, awesome driving my man - well done indeed.
Will, excellent job to be the only sub 44 car on Hoosiers!
Rylan and Aaron - Very nice times on RA1's
Hayashi, awesome job in a basically stock car!

Now, for the record I got a 1:44.6 in December at SpeedtrialUSA on 225 Kumhos (very old ones) all around... that's right, 225's in the rear as well. It's all we had to burn up at the time. And in January, lack of clear traffic kept me to a 1:44.5 with 225/245 Hoosiers. I'm itching to get back there with fresh tires, but I'm not sure what car I'll be able to drive. I feel the need to defend myself!

You guys should try to get a date in December... the yellow car could be called into action then. Can anyone say 43's N/A with Hoosiers?

You guys can keep yer slicks! I don't need 'em to go fast!

In all seriousness... great job to everyone, and well wishes to dave (for a speedy recovery for his car!)

 

Sorry again for the mishap Dave. I hope you'll recover quickly. The files are a little large to send via email so I'll just post them on your behalf.

 

Normally I spend these long ass drives back from the track or autocross to formulate my excuses for why I sucked so bad; this time my mind was pretty much empty. This is still a long story though...

Was up 'till about 3am Tues night finishing the wiring on the wing, got ~4 hours sleep. Didn't finish work on the wing's new "legs" until about 10:45pm Weds. night, but still managed to arrive at the hotel in Monterey @~4:45am Thursday morning, 460 miles and 6 hours later. 2 hours of sleep and a shower, show up at the track and unpack.

Didn't get much practice playing with the wing on the way up - took it up to 120 a couple times, so I felt reasonably sure the whole thing wasn't going to just blow off. Go out the first session and I'm trimming it flat on the exit of 4, back down for 5, flat again on exit, down for 6, flat for the climb up the hill, down for 8 and all the way around through 11, flat for the straight. Unfortunately the extra dynamic of flipping the switch was disctracting from the act of driving (only done Laguna once before, with S2KCA way back when), so my times and lines were shitty.

Next session decided I'd leave it down to focus on normal driving, and only flatten the wing for the main straight. First full lap that session I do a 1:45.2, my best DOT-tired lap of the event. I still hadn't really figured things out yet, and was losing time with the extra drag in places, but it was enough to take the class. A few laps later I remember somebody saying they weren't braking until after the crest before 8, so I try it, mess up, and go straight off at about 25. I surf down through a ditch and the dirt back onto the track and everything seems okay, including the impossibly low-hanging RM splitter. Pull into hot pits, all seems good, go back out, and pull a string of 4 or 5 1:45s, but can't beat the .2. Towards the end of the session the car starts to feel a little loose. Back in the pits I notice the pressure in the right rear is low and dropping fast. Uh-oh. Apparently a piece of gravel made its way through the tire.

Got it plugged by the cool guys at Skip Barber, but considered myself done for the day. Wanted to give the plug its best chance of healing the tire, since I can't afford to throw away a brand new Hoosier after 2 sessions. Had fun doing a few laps in a Miata that afternoon - thanks Ken!

So I get lots of sleep Thurday night, feeling great Friday morning. I try going out in the first session with about a 1/2 tank of gas to save weight, but it turns out to be a bad move as the car is starving on the exit of 2 right off the bat. Best I can manage is a :45.6, but the car is choking and puking for a hundred feet or so between 2 and 3.

So I put 6 or 7 gallons in, and get ready to make my move (I only need 8 tenths at this point!) next session. Going out I get into some traffic and other nonsense, best I can manage is a :45.4, which turned out to be enough to win Production this day as well. The one bad thing I notice towards the end of the session is the tires starting to go off. A speed I had been able to carry through turn 4 in the first session had me using the "extra" track on the exit, all 4 wheels running through the dirt full throttle, Grand Turismo style. It's warmer today and the autocross compound tires just can't take this abuse.

Try one more time next session but the tires go to hell after about 2 laps, and I cover the front of Rylan's car in dust (which is bad because it looks like he actually washed it for once!) with another dirt-surfing exit on 4. Have to let lots of people by this session, including Doug, who must've had a double-shot of espresso at lunch, as he's picked up major speed. Looking at the times afterwards, he's dropped 2 full seconds down to a :45.6 - awesome! But wait, what's this I hear? He's using Dave's slicks??? Hmmm....

Didn't take long for the question to be posed, in the interest of science of course - how much faster are slicks than Hoosiers? Doug's dropped 2 seconds - is that consistent for others? So Dave Kennedy, saint of saints (!) lends me his Dunlop slicks on 17" Volk CE-28Ns. I go out in the intermediate group to get used to them, can't get anything resembling a clear lap, and by the time the tires are warmed up (4 laps into it!) a VW blows coolant from the exit of 9 almost to 11... - a few people spun but fortunately no damage.

I pull up beside Doug for the last advanced group of the day, he wants to trail me. I've only got 5 or 6 bars of gas so I'm probably screwed, but I know I can do the time with a clear lap. Right away the car is bogging on the exit of 2, but it's solid everywhere else. I'm starting to get used to the slicks, the grip they provide is absolutlely nuts! About 5 or 6 laps into it I'm way low on gas, and have now just lapped Doug, but we've got lots of clear track ahead - the next two laps were a 43:6 and 43:7, they went something like this:

Cresting the hill at about 104 with the wing trimmed (flat - low drag, no downforce), let car come all the way out to the right. At #5 brake marker, flip the wing switch forward, spoiling it (~10 degrees down - high drag, high downforce). Brake around #3 marker from 114mph down into third, then second, get to within a few feet of the first curbing, let car come out a bit, get hard on the gas, clip the second apex of 2 and drive it out to the exit burm. I was shifting to 3rd gear on the burm itself (quite a bit earlier than before), but right after the shift the fuel starvation catches up and the car bogs for what's probably only a couple seconds but feels like an eternity.

Power's finally back, floored, moving left - quick stab at 1.5 marker for turn 3, turn in right around #1 marker, pretty straightforward. Powering towards 4, just a hair of a lift to 3/4-7/8 throttle, turn in relatively early, and hold 9/10 throttle position most of the way through, rolling on at exit. Was exiting turn 4 at about 86-87. Shift to fourth soon afterwards, trim wing for short straight towards 5.

Spoil wing at #4 marker, brake at 2.5, downshift to 3rd. The slicks made a HUGE difference on the first half of turn 5 - I got through at 74-75, about 5mph faster than I could on Hoosiers. Finally figured out how to use all the exit of 5, after watching Bobcat on his cool-down lap. Trim wing again after the exit is safely made.

6 was tricky, and was the only place I got a little freaked in today. The approach for 6 was this:
upshift to fourth, spoil wing, brake, downshift to third, turn in - all this over the span of about 2 seconds. There were a couple times I neglected to spoil the wing (leaving it in the low drag, NO-downforce position), and it was a seriously ass-clenching experience, going through turn 6 with the wheel turned right. With the wing where it was supposed to be, low-80's was possible through 6.

Wing trimmed on exit of 6, shift to fourth about halfway up, spoil wing as rumble strip on left hand side of track goes away, get turned right. Brake hard and downshift 4-3-2, being careful not to brake too much where the car is light. The extra grip in braking from the slicks was very noticeable here.

Corkscrew is mostly a no-brainer, left turn, find tree (I found checkered trash can was actually better), go full throttle when set, experience major wheelspin as car gets light falling down, upshift to 3 (8A was flat in my car), maintain flat out, and move about 3/4 of the way out. Don't brake but modulate ~3/4 throttle, keep eyes on the apex of 9, and reel the car in to the apex. There were a lot weird rubbing/squealing noises coming from the right rear in this corner, telling me it was loaded up pretty hard.

A good exit from 9 is always a little scary, when you realize how close you are to that gutter. Upshift to fourth (!) briefly, than back to third, with a little trail-brake into 10. On my best laps not all the cleanup stuff from the earlier coolant spill had been cleaned, so I was actually a bit slower here than in later laps.

Bounce some limiter approaching 11, brake really hard, relatively early around the #3 marker to ensure a good run out onto the straight. Get on the gas as early as possible, to the edge of the rumble strip, and trim the wing ASAP. Rinse, wash, repeat.

My car has:
Comptech nonadjustable front swaybar
$300 custom single exhaust (weighs 20lbs. and had no problem with sound either day)
RM Racing front splitter (mine's magically invincible!)
225/245 Hoosier A3S03 on stock wheels (autocrossing comes first)
or
225/265 Dunlop SP Sport slicks on 17" Volk CE28N (IMO an unbeatable wheel/tire combo)
black OEM trunklid holding homemade rear wing (a story within itself)
passenger seat removed for wheel/tire cargo space
PFC 97 front pads, Porterfield R4 rear, Wilwood EXP600 fluid, homemade brake ducting

Other than that, the car is 100% stock. >56k on bone stock motor (down to the OEM filter), >50k on original stock shocks. Go Honda engineering!

I owe a lot of people thank yous-
Ken, for taking care of the hotel room, the rides, and for the Miata drive
John (SaintS2k), for lending me and Chris cash for gas and food, and helping again when I ran out of gas
Bitterman - for buying my dinner
Sfphinkter - for buying my lunch (am I broke or what?)
Davepk - HUGE thanks for 15 of the most jaw-dropping, mouth-watering laps of my life
and last but not least,
Jason Saini - for giving us all a time we just had to beat!

The last 2 days have definitely been my favorite 2 of S2000 ownership thus far. My digital camera is on long-term loan to a friend; if anybody has pics of the AABAUWOLWTFOMFGROFLMAO (or whatever it's called these days) wing in the pits or on track, it'd be much appreciated.

 

Yeah, too bad for Davepk's car. My car injury's weren't close to his. I had one spin off after turn 9 as my rr tire went into the gutter and slid me across the track onto the run off which just flat spotted that tire. My best time was 2:01 in my eg blue civic. pretty good in my opinon for a sohc engine. But my upgraded suspension felt good with the 24mm and 22mm front and rear sways. A lot of s2k's there from socal as I ran on Friday only. Suprising though that I didn't have a exhaust violation as I don't have anything in the muffler except for the shell. Even an Itegra Type got a violation for his intake. Gees, my exhaust is loud when you're inside my car but I guess not when you're outside of it. It was definitely amn awesome track and event.
Oh yeah, the ride in my instructor's car was awesome too. Joe Ferragante (instructor) has a 450hp viper stock with slicks, and 5pt harness. That was a sweet deal to ride in there. Although my stomach didn't agree with that after we pulled into the paddocks, I was ok after some liquids came out.

 

Here are some more pics including what is now called by the creator (AABAUWOLWTFOMFGROFLMAO).

 

Ummm I got an 'Is that a picnic table?' out of Juliann. OMG that is one of the funniest things I've ever seen in my entire life. Looks like a great piece of engineering, but there is that whole form following function thing that seems to have been thrown out the window here. Regardless, it definitely looks like it works!

Im ROFL so much that I'm

Thanks for the laugh...

 

Yeah, this being a race-only piece, the engineering team was free to forget subtlety (BAUW 1.0 being a good example of this). Being that it isn't a mass produced piece to be sold to wannabe racers for profit, they also didn't have to worry about appearance of final product. Plus the guys in accounting limited the engineers to a very tight budget, especially compared to that other red S2000 that used to hold the N/A record at Laguna.

Queue Chicago's "You're the inspiration"


I'm thankful the ambulance and on-track medical team don't staff a psychiatrist.

 

I wanna thank my GONADS for returning to their warm, wrinkled
place....i think i'll reward them today if my comatose exhaustion fully recovers.

I believe in divine serendipity and gush thanks to Rylan for him strolling by the Sfphinktermobile Sun. AM, as i was finding negligible air in my braklines....it went like this;

Sfphinkt, seeing no air, postulates cause of crappy brakes(R4 pads suck, even if used only on the rears 'cause nothing else is handy), eyes up Rylan walking innocently behind, i throw up the most improbable Hail Mary: "hey, any one got any HAWK rear Blues?",
to my utter disablief, Rylan says in a typical surfer nonchalance:
"sure, they're used but in great shape, be right back" TADAHHHH!
ok,i say to myself, time for some asskicking....i swear i only said it to myself. Hey i hope those RA-1's i tossed your way are even half as useful.

also, thanks Jason Rhoads for proper tyre pressures and the actual air in the Hoosiers.....now asskicking could commence.
just because i can afford fancy Hoosiers, i thought they would come properly inflated for what they charge.

Furthermore, anyone considering hiring a playboy, redneck
Crew Chief from Texas thru Arkansas....don't do it.....can you say
EXCRUCIATING..but he actually did help me, painfully so, so thanks.

It goes like this: you drive around real fast until meatballed
for excess dB. the trick is to lull them into complacency with quiet exhaust(89.xdB), and then uncork 'em (94.4dB) and rip off enuff hot laps before they realize, yes that previously very quiet car is the one making that racket. i got an entire session. [one note, i.e. gratuitous blowing my own horn, i was still 1.44.3 with constipated,down on ponies, i'm running rich,
restricted exhaust at ~89dB ]

and GENUINE thanks Jason Saini.....the fiercest competitor who isn't even there, who can put fear in the competitions belly from thousands of miles away.....now that's an awesome driver!

thanks always to DavePK, get that heap fixed soon.

now where's that jumbo marguerita..." I LUV YOU GUYS!!!"

 

Krazik posted my times as Aaron H, which is definately not the case, I'm Aaron B. Aaron H. (strike) might be able to get under 1:50 with a supercharger and slicks.

Ultimately I think Jason Rhoades gets the big applause here for his 1:45.2 on Thurs. and 1:45.5 on Friday with a PRODUCTION class car. (I think those are the right times, they'll be posted on www.speedventures.net when John W. returns from Monterey)

Secondly the applause should go out to me for getting a 1:45.7 on RA1's (no wing, no Hoosiers lik JZR). Thanks everybody. No really.... thank you. Thank you very much.

Thirdly, I think Martin "Will" Sphincter Rauch deserves credit for continuing to encroach upon Dave PK's domination. Will's best Friday time was only 1 second off of Dave's best time on Thurs. and Will was on hoosiers (2 sec. slower than the slicks according to the times posted by Doug and JZR). While Dave always comes on strong later in the event and probably would have busted a 1:41 or 1:40 if his oil filter hadn't come off, he didn't, so I'm hoping Will can continue to chase the leader in UNLIMITED.

I also want to point out that Jason Saini's times are in a car that I believe would be in the UNLIMITED class with DavePK and Sphincketer. Jason, if the King car is in PRODUCTION, correct me. I think to beat Dave and Will, Jason will have to do some more work on the car. I guess we'll find out at TWS, if not sooner.

Finally, "we" have decided to ban slicks from all the lower classes. They're an automatic upgrade to UNLIMITED. And "we" are enforcing this ban retroactively, so Doug's times on the slicks give him a second place in UNLIMITED on Friday, and his PRODUCTION times put him in fourth (I think). Yes, we are invoking the "Hayashi Rule" here on this one. But largely it's all of our faults for not making me put "DOT" in the non-spec tire points for PROD. and MODIFIED.

 

I think I just got insulted!!!!