Mid-Ohio - Memorial Day Weekend

Saturday and Sunday were host to a Northern Ohio Chapter BMWCCA Driving School and Club Race and Monday and Tuesday were a Chin Motorsports Driving School. I brought up my Z4 3.0si Coupe to use while instructing, but had also scored myself a co-drive for the club race enduro on Sunday.

Saturday and Sunday, I was instructing my friend Eric Keller, of Enthusiast Auto. He and his brother had brought down a pair of E36 M3’s, Eric’s having a Vortec supercharger on it. Nice car, but it only lasted 1 session before the head gasket let go. He drove his customer’s E46 M3, which had about $30k worth of performance-enhancing work done to it. This car was nasty in the best way possible. The owner, Kirk, had me take him out for a session in it. It was fast, but very well balanced and very easy to drive quickly. We had a blast, but the video camera he was running didn’t take… Aw, nuts. He made me do it again on Sunday ; ) That time I took Eric’s brother Evan for a ride. At the end of the day on Saturday, Eric took my friend Scott’s truck and trailer back down to his shop and exchanged his M3 for an S54 2001 Z3 M Coupe, which he would use on Sunday. Its really tough instructing students with such crappy cars ; )


Video of my session in Kirk’s M3.

I ended up switching co-drives for the enduro from my former nemesis / current friend, John Negus’s K-Prepared E30 (the class I used to race), to my friend Mario Meise’s I-Prepared E36 M3. Mario had never been to Mid-Ohio before and there were more cars in class, so it stood to reason that there was more benefit to both of us for me to run with him. I took out his car in the instructor session on Saturday so I could get a feel for it. Traffic was heavy and my closing speeds on other cars were often scary. Despite that, I ran a 1:40.6, whereas the fastest I’d run in my car was a 1:44.5. Nice = )


Video of my practice session in Mario's IP M3.

Saturday night was a hoot, as a bunch of the racers and some others went out for dinner, then hit up the go-karts at Bucks. We paid off the kids working there to just let us run as we wished, and they even joined in at times. They showed us how to reach back and pull the governor to increase our speed, and I have many bruises on my arm from doing that! There were about 15 of us and 2 12 year old girls out there, and were generally drove like we wanted to kill each other. Spinning each other out whenever possible, etc. The highlight, though, was when John Negus was spun around and proceeded to drive FULL SPEED IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION! The look on the kid’s face who was running it was priceless! We all survived to race another day, though…

On Sunday, Mario qualified the car and started the race. We weighed the car before qualifying and found that, with me in the car, we would be about 60 lbs under weight (there’s 75 lbs between Mario and I!). So, we ensured that we would run with a full tank of gas and threw a spare tire in the trunk.



Mario ran the first half of the race, hanging with Jeff Negus’ pace (John’s son, who races IP), 10 seconds behind him on the track. My friend Scott and I awaited Mario to come in for the mandatory 5-minute pit stop. I started the stopwatch on my wrist watch, thinking that it was only as a back-up. Well, it turned out that it was our only source of timing. I looked at my watch and noticed that my minute hand had not started on 0, and I didn’t know how many minutes we were into the stop. I tried to count the minutes, but was off, because I went out on the 4-minute mark instead of the 5-minute mark. D’oh!

I launched out of the pits, thinking I was in hot pursuit of Jeff Negus (when I was actually a minute ahead of him on the track by mistake). It was a major mental load to go from chilling out in the pits to immediately driving flat out with no warm up. I ran the remaining 30 minutes and caught and passed 2 I-Prepared cars in the process. Mario’s car was lots of fun and much less frustrating than my car, as it has about 50% more power. During the race, I had pulled off a 1:39.14, which was the second fastest of the ~10 in class. The fastest guy has a big-money build, though, and is, himself, going Grand Am Cup racing this month. I didn’t feel too bad about that at all for my first time in the car = ) A huge thanks to Mario for giving me the opportunity. I can’t wait to do it again, next time with more than 30 minutes of preparation!



The remainder of the Duct Tape Motorsports folks rolled in on Sunday. I instructed our friend Dan, in a very pretty white 911. We had a great time and I got to drive a plethora of fun stuff. I took out Scott’s ’84 911 and had fun tossing that car around, took a few laps in Dan’s car, took Scott’s student out in his own brand new E92 M3 (and scared him), and took another guy, John, out in his S50-powered E30 (that’s a 3.0L E36 M3 motor in an E30).


Scott Barton's '84 911


Dan Schultz' '93 911


James' E92 M3


John's S50-powered E30

Toyota friends Tom Duesing (Cayman S) and Chase Nelson (G35 Coupe) showed up for Monday and we had a good time tearing it up. Tom brought his father with him, driving a 350Z.Tom and I had a great battle in our last session. With our cars similarly prepared (he on Nitto NT-01-R’s and me on 5-yr old RA-1s, both with Hawk HP+ pads), Tom was already on track with his father riding shotgun. In an effort to reduce any differences, I grabbed my student, Dan, to ride with me and we waited in the pits until Tom came around before heading out after him. I basically held my distance, as we had a car between us, but then a car slowed him down, bringing us together. I had already told Dan, “Make no mistake, we ARE racing right now!” We went nose-to-tail, with me literally a foot off his bumper at 100+mph. I could see him overdriving the car on corner entries and I got a run on him coming onto the front straight. He gave me a point-by, but I waved it off. It was too much fun! We went another 2 laps with the draft keeping me right on his bumper down the back straight, while I was lifting in other sections to keep my position behind him. I finally got such a strong run onto the front straight that I had to go by. I just wish the memory card on the camera hadn’t filled only a lap into it! Tom was a good sport to accept some of the smack-talking in return, but I have to say that having been driving the track for the previous two days certainly helped to warm me up. I’m sure there will be a rematch in the future ; )


A couple minutes of video






The weather prediction for Tuesday was bleak. It suggested rain all day. The track was, in fact, wet in the first 2 sessions, but it dried up and the sun even peeked out from time to time! It was perfect! The benefit to us was that many people didn’t return for Tuesday, and the event was lightly attended to begin with, so there was TONS of open track on Tuesday!

I rode with Chase, Scott, and Ed at other points and I’m simply amazed at how fast all the DTM’ers have gotten! By the end of the event, Scott, Than, Ed, Mike, and myself were all running very close with each other, making for some great times!

I had given John a ride in my race car at this event last year and apparently made enough of an impression that he sold his Mini and went out and bought himself an E30! The fixed-position seat was too far back for me, so I put my racing suit behind me to get pushed forward. That kindof worked, but I lost the lateral support of the seats. It wasn’t easy to drive that way. In any case, we went out to run some hot laps. His big Wilwood brake kit felt great the first time we hit them at the end of the back straight. The second time though, though, they began to smell like they were overheating. I proceeded to ask him what pads they were and he confirmed that they were a race compound… Weird. So, I continued around the next lap and hit them at exactly the same spot as before. Only 100 feet into the braking zone, I knew we weren’t going to be slowed down in time and I told John that we were going off. He responded with a chuckle… I repeated, “No, REALLY, we’re going off.” He replied that it was ok, he had gone off here yesterday. As I questioned why he hadn’t mentioned that to me before, I was trying to pull the car around the turn and had to give up about ¾ of the way through to ensure that I drove straight off and didn’t slide off sideways, which could easily result in rolling the car there. We and the car were fine and we drove back onto the track. I told John that it felt like there was a lot of air in the lines, as the pressure was there (I even tapped the brake on the straight to make sure before I hit them), but the car just wouldn’t slow. Inspection of the brakes revealed heavy scoring of the rotors, pointing to the same thing. John later bled the brakes and confirmed my suspicion. We live and learn, I guess. We’re lucky nothing worse happened and I will definitely be asking more questions about the critical things like tires and brakes before I take someone’s car out again.


John's E30, with Scott in the background

All-in-all, it was a great way to spend 4 days. I wish Katy could have joined us! But, work schedule wouldn’t allow = ( I hope her and all of the DTM’ers who didn’t make it will realize what a great event this is and be sure to join next year!

2008 KP Season Recap

2008 Season Recap - Anthony Magagnoli - #007 KP

While I had a lot of fun last season, I also had an incredible series of bad luck, especially at the end of last season.

I started off the 2008 BMWCCA Club Racing series with a penalty at VIR that I thought would keep me from making a run at the championship. While I didn’t think a 20 point penalty was reasonable for going off by myself in practice and nosing a tire barrier, I’d have to work back from that deficit.

At Oktoberfest at Watkins Glen, our biggest race of the year, I pulled off wins in 2-of-3 races (I broke an axle in the 3rd), among the largest field we've ever seen in K-Prepared, and all the fastest guys were there. The points from those finishes launched me back into contention for the championship.

I went to Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham and just had to finish 1 of the 3 races. I broke a rocker arm in the first qualifying session and spent the day and night replacing it. On the next day, the motor totally blew up 1/2 a lap from counting as a finished race for me. I was 1/2 a freakin lap away from the championship!

I had a new motor built (to SpecE30 regulation, so basically stock) and installed over the next few weeks and went down to Roebling Road, in Savannah, GA, to take one last shot at the national championship. I brought in a soon-to-be pro driver, Mike Skeen, to co-drive with me. I planned to both to learn from him and figured he’d help me out in the enduro. There were a few quick KP cars in presence.

In Friday practice, I felt I had the speed to win, but I had an issue with the motor. It ended up being the Air Flow Meter. I had suspected it before, so I had a spare on hand. When I changed it, I needed to confirm it before qualifying, so I went out on the road with Katy and pulled through a couple gears a few times. It was fixed.

Unfortunately, when I got back to the track, a neighbor had come by, all irate over the noise and the speed at which I went by his house. Keep in mind that my car is street legal, registered, and insured. Well, they somehow came to the conclusion that I should be booted from the track, and there was nothing I could do about it. I couldn't race, and it left me in 2nd place nationally for the season.
What a way to go, huh?

I am the North Central K-Prepared Regional Champion for the 2nd year in a row.
I ended up 2nd in the K-Prepared National Championship, improving from 3rd in 2007.

I looked back on the 2008 season and saw that I had done everything that I had intended to do. My outright wins at Oktoberfest against the fastest guys left me feeling like I had proven myself. Here come the “what if’s?”… If it wasn’t for the penalty at VIR, I would’ve secured the championship after Oktoberfest. If I had blown the motor ½ a lap later, I would’ve secured the championship after Barber. If I hadn’t had a stupid incident at Roebling, well, that would have been some good racing! I was ready to move on…

Thanks for keeping up on my racing this year and thanks to all those who have supported me on and off the track!

-Anthony Magagnoli

Mid-Ohio - Great Pumpkin Race

REVIEW:
If you had asked me anytime between the first race of this year (VIR) and Oktoberfest (Watkins Glen), I probably would’ve told you that I anticipated attending this race at Mid-Ohio just simply for fun. If you’ve been keeping up, you may remember that I incurred a penalty at VIR for hitting a tire wall in practice. That penalty put me on probation for 3 months, took away all my points for that weekend, and docked me 20 points off of my season total points. I didn’t know if it was even possible to recover from that.

The results from Oktoberfest changed things. I had beaten out the biggest field of competitors this year at my home track of Watkins Glen in 2 of the 3 races. The feature race had the only 200% points multiplier of the year and, with up to 10 bonus points for the 12 racers finishing behind me, it added up to be the largest and 2nd largest possible single points finishes possible for the series. Had I not snapped an axle in the 3rd race, I may have been able to hang on to pull off a hat-trick, but alas, the 2 wins put me back in contention for the national championship!

So, going into this race at Mid-Ohio, there ended up being a lot riding on these results. I was going to need a few wins through the remaining races this season in order to pull to the front of the national points race. I was only facing one other competitor in K-Prepared, but he was a formidable opponent. I’ve been battling all year with my nemesis, the #82, John Negus.

THIS RACE:
For this weekend, we would have a 40 minute sprint race and a 60 minute enduro, which requires a pit stop. I had dedicated support in the form of my crew-chief-for-the-weekend, Kevin Kreisa, who is my mechanic/badass fabricator under the name DTR Performance, and my friend Jeff Chiang who, for some reason, had offered to help me out again. Since I had to pamper my voluntary crew, I rented a garage, which we shared with my friend Tim Smith and his co-driver Doug Thoms. You may recall that Tim and I traded paint a couple times at Watkins Glen among some close, hard racing.

I had made some significant upgrades to my car before Oktoberfest and I was expecting them to translate into a decent drop in lap time. I was hoping that Negus would no longer be able to keep up with me, but it turned out that he haad also made some major improvements, too, and not only to his car.

It had been raining at Mid-Ohio for the last day or two and, although it had stopped, it wasn’t even 40 degrees in the morning, so that moisture wasn’t really going anywhere. Practice was wothless for me, as we had experienced some delay in having the car prepared that morning, so I only got a few laps, and in cold and wet conditions at Mid-Ohio, it makes for a pretty treacherous time.

For qualifying, the track was wet and we were on rain tires. I had a decent run, but was taking it somewhat easy in consideration of the conditions. Negus qualified just ahead of me. Well, rain is the great equalizer for horsepower, and we would be starting 6th and 7th out of the entire field! We were definitely going to be needing to watch our mirrors for faster traffic coming through, as the conditions dried up for the race.

The start of the first race was crazy. There were faster cars slicing up through the field and when we all reached Turn 1, there were 2 IP cars in front that were spinning and sending the rest of the field scattering to avoid them. NO ONE made contact, though! After narrowly sneaking through that, I worked on closing down the gap between me and Negus. It took about half the race, but when I caught him, I tailed him for a lap before finding the opportunity to take him on the inside of T12 (the drop into Thunder Valley). I was able to hang on for the class win!

The Fun Race was rediculous for me, as my car was oversteering horrendously on the practice tires, which I have some theories about... I decided to just have fun and put on a show for those watching, often drifting through many of the turns in a full tail-slide. I even made a trip into China Beach (off the end of the back straight) for them when I had braked a touch late and was still on them as I turned in. The car snapped around and I went off down into the gravel. I missed it... I hadn't been in there yet this year! After several attempts, I made my way out to the cheering of the crowd that was watching from madness. I drifted through the grass, flashing my lights at them, and continued on to the end.













THANK YOU TO ANDY WELTER FOR THE FANTASTIC PHOTOGRAPHY!
http://www.the-welters.com/racing/bmwcca/oct2008/index.html

On Sunday, there were a lot of people who had come to see the race. Not the least of which were Katy and her parents! Just prior to the Feature Enduro, a rainstorm came through that had everyone scrambling on tire choice. Looking at the radar, it looked like it was going to pass, so I stayed with dry’s. That was the right choice. When it came race time, Negus turned on the heat. He qualified several spots ahead of me and was pulling me early in the race. I had Charles Benoit, in an I-Stock E30 M3, pressuring me from behind. I started slowly closing the gap on Negus and had closed about half of it after 5 or 6 laps. But then Benoit took me on the inside of T7 and the side-by-side through 7-8-9 countered the ground I had just made up on Negus. Benoit got by and I had to put my frustration aside and think about what I could do. He was quicker than me in the straights and I figured that if I could stick close enough to him, I could use his draft to help me catch Negus. While doing this, it only took a handful of laps for us to catch him. And, in the meantime, I set my personal best-lap of a 1:44.556. We caught up with Negus and Benoit got by him.





We were at the 40 minute mark and my guy Kevin told me over the radio to "pit on the next lap". I acknowledged this, but I wasn’t going to pit until I had caught Negus and put some pressure on him. If past experience was any indication, all I had to do was get close to him and he would put himself off. I caught him and as we were going into the carousel, he went in a bit hot and had the car sliding around the ouside of the turn. I tucked in under him, but keeping as much distance as I could so that I could either accelerate or brake, depending on what his car did. As soon as I saw the opportunity, I jetted ahead and watched Negus spin off into the gravel behind me. I called in to Kevin that I would, indeed, pit on the next lap. My friend Dave Cochran happened to capture video of the incident!:


The pit stop went smoothly and I headed back out. A lap later, Benoit exited the pits and we had ourselves a great battle to the end of the race, with me crossing the finish line merely inches off his bumper. I could hear Katy and her parents cheering when I pulled into the pits at the end! It was great to have the support of so many people around, sticking out the cold weather!

The results from this race weekend positioned me to need to simply finish one of the 3 races at Barber Motorsports Park in November in order to clinch the K-Prepared National Championship. The Barber write-up is coming next…

BMWCCA Oktoberfest 2008 - Watkins Glen

After hanging out at home in Rochester for a few days, I headed down to Watkins Glen on Wednesday to instruct the driving school for 2 days and get a little practice in. The driving school organizer was joking that I was the most-requested instructor there, as my A-Group student was my student from Mid-Ohio last month who requested me again, and a couple racers who were coming to the Glen for the first time had done the same. My C-group student on Thursday was driving a bone stock 4-cyl automatic Hyundai Sonata. I had the honor of taking him out for a couple of introductory laps in it and immediately overheated the brakes on their first application on my OUT-lap. Instructing him was not bad, actually. He listened well and improved significantly throughout the day. He couldn’t wait to come back once he bought his BMW! The weather was beautiful and it was enjoyable just to be in the middle of the huge Oktoberfest events.


Coming through Turn9, onto the NASCAR straight.

Friday practice went ok. I wasn't the quickest KP car out there, but I had narrow, old practice tires on. They were definitely taking a long time to warm up. While the previous days’ weather had been perfect, Qualifying on Friday afternoon for our race group was fogged out, so we substituted our Saturday no-points Fun Race with a Qualifying session in the morning.

The Qualifying session was very wet, so I took it easy and qualified 4th in a class of 13 and 17th overall (in Race Group 2). I would start the race with KP racer Keith Hammitte right in front of me, while John Negus and Michael Norek were 5 rows ahead. Considering that the other guys were running on Hoosier wet tires and I was on cheap Kumho Ecsta V700’s, going easy, I was satisfied with the result of qualifying. But, I had some ground to make up on these fast guys.

Saturday's early race began with everyone on wet tires. My Ecsta V700’s are not very good rain tires, but it turned out that they were pretty good intermediates! The weather had cleared and the track was merely damp by the time the green flag dropped.

On the race start, with Steve Shardt (founder of Forgeline Wheels) on the radio, I got a huge jump on the field. I was on the gas well before the green flag and I got a run past Hammitte in front of me, practically scraping my passenger side mirror down the pit wall in the process. We must’ve been 5-wide on the front straight! I had gotten all the way up to Norek by Turn 1 and went in side-by-side. I had picked up something like 8 spots on the start! Over the next several laps, I raced my way by Norek and eventually by Negus.

Just after I got by Negus (my nemesis) between Turns 9 and 10, I defended going into 11, which leads onto the front straight, and I dropped out of my power band. He and Norek got a good run and I saw them coming on our way into Turn 1. Norek was WAY on the inside and I could see by his speed that he was in way too early. Knowing what was about to happen, I backed off, let Norek slide across T1, meanwhile slowing down Negus since they went in together, and I powered out with nearly full exit speed, passing Negus before the top of the esses. On the following lap, though, Negus lost it coming out of the Outer Loop (T5d) and hit the armco, but fortunately was able to continue racing.


Leading Hammitte and Smith into the Toe of the Boot (Turn 7).

In the following laps, my friend Tim Smith, in his Spec E36, attempted a total Hail-Mary pass on me into Turn 1, but I had already committed to the turn, as he didn’t have a bumper on me by my turn-in point. I knew I wasn't leaving him much room (if enough at all) and tried to widen my line as I heard his tires howling next to me. I got a bit of a love tap that didn’t take any more than a brief correction to recover from. It was all good! There was yellow flag a couple laps later, though, that bunched up the field and so I had them behind me again, but the race ended under yellow. Unfortunately, my good friend Vivek had been spun by a KP driver coming out of the bus stop and hit the wall hard, putting him out for the weekend.
Overall I took 1st in class and 7th overall!


Momentarily opening a lead into the Toe of the Boot.

So, that’s where I started for the feature (200% points) race in the later afternoon. I was now running my new Hankook Z214 C51 tires, which I had just heat cycled on Wednesday. Leading the KP pack, when I had won the previous race partially due to lucky tire selection, was daunting, and especially knowing that the guys behind me were on Hoosiers.


Waiting on grid for the start of the Feature Race. Photo by Franco Culietta.


The race was fantastic. I had Hammitte all over the back of my car while I was running with the 2 points leaders in Spec E36 (Tim Smith and Mike Gilbert) through the entire race. The battles went back and forth relentlessly. I didn't want to interfere with the SE36 race, and in-fact had Gilbert motioning to me to leave them alone, but I had my own problems to deal with!! If either of them screwed up and left the door open, I was taking the position. And we swapped several times. The SE36 cars had bit more power, better aero, and could out-brake me, but I was quicker through the turns and their fastest lap times were within .1 sec of my 2:19.118 fastest lap! Hammitte even got by me at least a couple times through the race, but never for long. The back-and-forth was incredibly fun and, at one point, Gilbert even launched so far out into the runoff of T1 that he had to cut straight through the grass, foot flat on the gas, to get back on and keep his position!

Towards the end, a JP and a JS E30 M3 got caught up to us and the JS car made his way by. The JP car was David Hill and he got by me on the back straight, but I forced him to enter the bus stop on the right. He went in too hot, pushed wide to the right, and I passed him back as he drove off into the grass. Hammitte got by him, too. Hill re-passed Hammitte on the next lap and started pressuring me. Steve had been giving me updates on the radio whenever he could and had informed me that we were on the last lap. I frantically waved Hill off, both trying to keep him between me and Hammitte and also hoping he wouldn't try to force a pass that could give Hammitte the opportunity to get by me! Thankfully, he complied and I crossed the finish line 1st in class and 10th overall!! It looks like these Hankook tires really can run with the Hoosiers! Tim Smith also managed to finish in front of Gilbert and take 2nd for SE36, while Fred Furguson had won SE36 with a healthy 28 second lead.


Tailing Tim Smith into Turn 11, onto the front straight.


On Sunday, it was raining again, so I swapped to the rain tires. When I got out on track, I realized that my left rear spring was cocked out of its perch. The car was driving the way you might expect if you had a solid spring in your left rear, but with the addition of some funky noises in right-handers. I figured I had to do the best I could with what I had and just get through the race. I was starting in the lead for KP and knew I wouldn’t be able to fend off the guys on Hoosier Wets, but was hoping to minimize my positions lost.

I lost a couple of positions by the 2nd lap, as the lack of compliance in my left rear suspension was compounding the lack of grip of my Kumho tires. As it turned out, the spring was wedged against the CV Axle and the heat being generated snapped the axle on the 2nd lap. I heard the boom and immediately dipped the clutch and put the car in neutral. As I pulled off to the run-off area of T9, I heard a loud clanking and figured I had broken the axle. I watched some of the race from there and was picked up by a flat-bed truck and then towed in when the race finished. I received a DNF for that race, while Michael Norek picked up the KP win with 9 cars in class.


Very wet, trailing behind Hammitte.


Overall, I am hugely satisfied with the 2 hard-fought wins!! It was great to have my family and some friends with me and to come away with the results that evaded me at the Glen last year. The win in the 2nd race resulted in the highest possible points finish in any single race for the season, as Oktoberfest is the BMWCCA’s premier national event (10 points for the win x 200%, plus up to 10 points for cars finishing behind = 30 points). As I’m trying to recover from a 20 point penalty incurred at VIR at the beginning of the year, this result was critical for me. I’m now back in the running for the KP national title with races at Mid-Ohio, Barber, and Roebling Road left to finish off the season. We’ll see what happens!


Pipino, Pipina, Michelle, Christian, Franco, Papa', e Mamma.


Photo by Franco Cutietta.


Motioning about some move made on the track... looks kinda gay, though = P
Photo by Franco Cutietta.

VIR Season Opener

VIRginia International Raceway, BMWCCA Club Race, April 18-20 2008

VIR had its ups and downs, but basically, I was not performing to my expectations. I had to re-learn the track, as I had only been there once (I was driving 911's and an M Roadster when I went last July), and I was having braking issues throughout the weekend. They were very unconvincing and providing little feedback.

On Friday, the initial practice and qualifying were not so bad. I actually qualified 2nd out of 8. The race didn’t go quite as well, though. As I was defending the whole time, I was lured too deep into the braking zones on 2 occasions, which both resulted in me heading off the track. Despite the lost time, I came in 5th out of 8. I was disappointed and frustrated by my mistakes. Oh, as a reminder, I don't have ABS working.

Saturday morning, I was trying to push certain braking zones and one in particular was the right hander before Oak Tree (Turn 11), which required a lot of trailbraking through the turn in order to maximize speed, which is generally dangerous. I made my brake application point later and found myself to have plenty of room to go. The next lap around, I felt like I entered the same way, but the car just wouldn’t slow. I didn’t see any tire smoke from a locked wheel and it felt more like the brakes just weren’t adequately slowing the car. In either case, I went off before making the turn-in for Oak Tree. This time I had an impact. Straight into the tire barrier. The tires did a good job of absorbing the impact and after I bounced off, I was able to drive back along the track and pull out on the back straight pits. There was smoke in the car and I was dreading having to pull my newly installed fire suppression system, as the foam makes a huge mess. It looked like oil was just burning off of the exhaust and I noticed that I was dripping from the front.


Damage from Tire Wall


Oil Cooler Damage from Tire Wall

The damage was mostly mild. The left front fender was a bit mangled and the hood and bumper were scratched, but the lower valance support bracket had punctured my oil cooler. Fortunately, I had a mechanic, Sumpter, from Grass Roots garage (a shop local to VIR who sponsors me) there on Saturday to help me. I pulled the front valence and he pulled the oil cooler while I searched for another one. Miraculously, the first E30 guy I asked said he had one. How much? $50…. Sold! It was at his house… Where was that? Only 5 miles from the track! After a quick drive, I returned and had Sumpter installing another oil cooler! I actually lost no track time and got out for qualifying. Unfortunately, I was now so timid in the braking zones that I had slowed down significantly. I qualified last in class.

That afternoon we had a 60 minute enduro, which paid 150% points. Through the first part of the race, I did well in traffic and picked up several positions. I got crossed up in traffic coming out of Oak Tree, which leads onto the very long back straight, and lost everything I had gained. I fought back and was trying to make a pass stick when I went off in the braking zone of Turn 1. …Again. I got back on and kept going, but was very frustrated that I could not stop as well as the rest of these guys.

The rain was teasing, dropping a few drops here and several there... I was strategizing my mandatory 5-minute pit stop... My plan was to wait for it to downpour and do it then, while everyone would be turning laps 10+ seconds off their pace, hoping that they were doing their stops in the dry. That didn't happen, but a yellow flag did. There was a bad wreck in Turn 7.

I had learned (the hard way) at Watkins Glen that I couldn't pit under yellow, but as far as I knew, once the green flag dropped, the pits were open. 4 of the 6 cars ahead of me were in my class and so as soon as the flag dropped, I didn't head for the start/finish line, but pulled straight to the pits. I had nothing to lose. I figured that they all had a slow run onto the front straight and were battling each other out for the next 2 laps, so they’d be slowing each other down significantly. A couple laps after I came out of the pits, I saw the previous KP leader... 2 turns behind me! It worked!! Every time from then on, when I approached the start/finish line, I was praying for the checkered flag! It didn't come soon enough and the leader closed in on me quick. First it was a gained distance. Then he was only 1 turn behind. Then in my rear view, then on my bumper, then he got by me cleanly on the back straight when I missed a shift to 5th. I was able to hold off the next guy until the checkered, though, so I got 2nd overall.

It was a great finish for me, as I certainly wasn’t the 2nd fastest car. I got a good points payoff, which was the purpose of attending this particular race, and I get $150 towards more Hankook tires through their contingency program. While I certainly wasn't the 2nd fastest guy, I may have been the 2nd smartest on this day ; ) Bimmerworld hosted a biergarten (beer garden) that evening that brought everyone together for a good time. The highlight was probably one of the racers challenged to sit in a trash can filled with ice water for as long as possible… Yeah, some of these guys are pretty crazy. He was in there for somewhere between 5-10 minutes!

Sunday wasn't really eventful for me, which was probably a good thing. I was trying to get a fast Bimmerworld guy to drive my car, but it kept not working out. During practice, I warmed up the car and brought it in for Dave White to take it out. As soon as he got buckled in, the checkered flag dropped. Then in qualifying, I ran 4 qualifying laps and turned it over to him. He got an out-lap and an in-lap, as the checkered flew his first time around. On top of that, the data acquisition equipment didn’t record anything and my video camera ran out of tape as soon as he had gotten in the car!!

It turned out that part of the braking problem was actually OVER-cooling, since VIR has such long stretches with no brake application. Needing to keep my pads up in their temperature range, I taped over the cooling ducts and it helped out. I was gradually getting a little better in the braking zones, but I still have a lot of work to do. I need to simply re-learn how to brake and get the most out of a non-ABS setup. I’m not going to cop out and fix the ABS.

The race went ok. I picked up a couple positions by midway, but then lost them again in the braking zones. I finished 5th out of 6, but I was glad to be able to take an only mildly-damaged car home. There were MANY totaled cars through the weekend. A fellow K-Prepared racer smashed up his car in Sunday Qualifying and my friend who I traveled with smashed up his Spec E36 in the last race. I guess it was party due to the fact that the weekend started out with a 90 car field, it was the first race for many people for the year, there were 2 150% points races, and it brought out a lot of the bid dogs, pushing everyone to drive harder. For my incident with the tire barrier, I received a 3-month probation. While many of us don’t like the penalties assessed for single-car incidents with an impact, that’s the way it is. It seems like its kicking someone while their down, though. Since part of my incident could be attributed to a mechanical issue, I decided to appeal the decision. I’ll have to wait to hear what the final verdict is, but I hope its overturned, as I have 2 races in the next 3 months and another incident would result in suspension ; )

Roebling Road race weekend, season finale

Roebling Road Raceway, outside Savannah, GA
BMWCCA Club Race 12/7-9/2007



First, I did not gain enough points this weekend to secure the national championship.
I will finish my rookie season in 3rd place Nationaly in BMWCCA Club Racing K-Prepared, while winning the North Central Regional Championship.

I arrived at Roebling Road around 1pm on Friday and we had a practice session at 4. The entire weekend was coinciding not with a DE, but SVRA Vintage Racing. There was some beautiful machinery there. Overall impression of the track: There is very little room for error. Most of the turns are of decreasing radius or tighten up into another turn. So, if you enter a bit hot, you don't get a chance to recover because the turn tightens even further. 4 laps into the practice session, as I’m trying to learn the track, I was coming out of a very fast (90+ mph) turn 3 when the car in front of me blew its $10k motor (he had JUST installed it!). I was immediately blinded by the smoke and just trying to dodge his car. I slid in his oil off to the inside of turn 4, watching him spin back and forth ahead of me and to my left. As I was sliding, I did what little I could to guide my car between his, a dirt berm on my right, and an upcoming tire wall. I narrowly escaped 3 big collisions. Unfortunately, the rest of the session was cancelled in order to clean up. I hadn’t even had time to determine my shift points.

Saturday morning was very foggy and our session was delayed, but we still got most of our time in. I was getting a little more comfortable with the track, but not exactly cozy yet. I had been practicing on my Toyo RA-1 tires, but qualified on my Kumho V710 race tires about 1 second faster than the RA-1’s. Before the enduro, I found out that James Clay (owner of Bimmerworld) and Seth Thomas, drivers of the Bimmerworld E90 SPEED Touring Cars, would both be driving Spec E30’s in K-Prepared! The 2 fastest cars (de Haro and Hinkley) were both on Hoosiers. I didn't realize that Hinkley was in the points race, as he had registered last minute...

Come race time, things started out well. Seth got past me and he and James were nose to tail, with me following behind, for a few laps. Then, coming around T3, a Mod car went by me on the outside (clean pass). My inexperience at this track created the following condition: I did not align myself toward the inside of T4, behind the Mod car, because I didn't trust myself and my car to not hit him when we braked as soon as we straightened up. I stayed just to the left and I didn't realize at the time that I had just effectively cut my braking zone in HALF. Needless to say, I went off FAST. Through the grass, the sand did nothing, and I expected to initially crunch into the 3 foot tall berm. I was headed with the left front corner first and when the car started to climb the berm, I then thought I was going over it into the trees. When I rode up the berm but didn't go over, then I thought I'd flip to the right side. When I actually rode back down the berm, I couldn't really believe it. I didn't know if the car was running, but I put it in 2nd and put my foot down... It kept going, so I reentered the track.


Off-Roading

As the race continued, I found myself later behind Nissen in another KP car. We came around T3 and I was on his tail, coming up on him a considerable bit quicker. The car in front of him checked up early, causing him to brake early, and I just didn't leave myself enough reaction time. I tried to dodge him, but I tagged his rear bumper with my right front. I was just thinking that I really hoped that I didn't damage him or cause him to spin. Fortunately, neither of those occurred. I was not so lucky, though. It broke my bumper and caused me to repeat my trip to, up, and down the same berm as before. Coming back on the track, I asked myself if I should just bring it in and call it quits. Maybe some of you would agree... I stayed out, though, and finished the race in 6th of 7. The car was over-steering pretty badly at that point, though. I thought I may have broken something. Also, there was a heavy vibration which I was assuming was my wheel bearing, which was already on its way out, saying “Sayonara”. I was immensely frustrated and regretting having attended.


Broken bumper, missing lower valence.

Saturday night, I happened to be eating with Robert Patton (KP) and telling him what had happened. He informed me that he had a wheel bearing and it was not difficult to replace. With the help of pretty much the entire Bimmerworld team, but especially Dave, I got it replaced in not too much time at all! Unfortunately, the go-karting place shut down early, so Vivek, myself, and most of Bimmerworld ended up just heading downtown. It was fun hanging out and getting to know everyone, at their best (ie, beligerant!).

Sunday’s qualifying left me only more frustrated. The car was over-steering horribly and I was 2 ½ seconds off my pace and there was still a strong vibration, putting me at the back of the pack. Vivek suggested unhooking he rear sway bar in a last ditch effort to get the rear to grip. Bimmerworld Dave was helping me again and we jacked the rear of the car. Well, we discovered that there was no rear sway bar to remove (I bought the car built as-is), but as I caught Dave glance at my tires, I also looked and uttered an “oh, shit.” I had only run these tires in 2 race weekends (quals and race only, no practice) and the right rear was corded 2/3 of the way across, all the way around, and there was a visible patch of belt. I hadn’t even considered that these p.o.s. tires could’ve worn that quickly. They weren’t even that grippy! My only option was to run my practice tires.


Corded V710

Sunday’s race went much better than Saturday’s. I wasn’t going to be in it with Hinkley and de Haro, but I wanted to have a good run. Starting from the back, I was able to work my way up through a bunch of cars. I had some good dices with KP cars and ran the entire second half of the race back and forth with Tom Tice’s SE36, ultimately finishing 3rd in class. At least it was a satisfying finish to a frustrating (and costly) weekend.

"Roebling LOWLIGHTS":


I end up in 3rd overall in KP this year. It’s been a huge learning experience and I’ve been having a blast. I’ve found the range of emotion in this sport to be enormous and I’ve gotten a taste of each end. I hope to be able to build on what I’ve learned this year and make a good run at the KP title next year. Thank you to all of you who have helped me out this year, including GrassRootsGarage.com and especially to Scott and www.MyTrackSchedule.com. MY BEST MEMORIES FROM THIS SEASON ARE THOSE WHEN I’VE HAD MY FRIENDS AND FAMILY WITH ME!


End of the season