Our teammate Howard in Mid-West Series
Here is his race report:
The 2008 Midwest Series kicked off its second half of the season in Racine, WI over the weekend of July 19-20. The Racine Radio Car Club (RRCC) played host to the 4th round of the prestigious Midwest Series. With three events complete, the point standings were one of the closest we have seen in years. Perfect weather and a new facility proved to be a great change for Racine since recent years.
Racine track was very well known as "Technical" and "Challenging"....in my term of wording, that means "SMALL", 'TIGHT" and "BUMPY"..........when I say bumpy, it is really bumpy, like OFF ROAD type bumpy. From what I have heard, this will be the last year of hosting @ this location. There are already plans laying down for next year track location and promised it will be larger and smoother then what we have right now.
I have to miss the SAT qualifier due to family matters, that means, I will miss 4 qualifiers and tons of practice. However, family 1st, I will have to settle with Sunday only qualifier and HOPE will get me to the right crowd of racer. But turned out....SAT was a 1/2 wash...RAIN does washed out 1/2 day of racing. But they managed to ran 2 rounds of qualifier and 2 hours of practice. Since I called ahead for some track information, I realized that I don't need sway bars, need soft tires, and hugh droop setup with tall ride height. And SAT night, I throw away my high speed high traction setup and turn into some OFF ROAD kinda setup that I have never experience before and hope for miracle. I have my TM G4RS set up and left my 1/8th as it was but with bigger tires, hope the bigger tires will get me the ride height to bypass those bumps.
Sunday....arrived the track @ 8am, more rain, not big, but wet enough...........that means, another delay, 1 more qualifier was cutted. That leave me....1 hit wonder, whatever that happened, I will be stuck with the result.
2 hours later...track got better, and computer said, sunshine is heading toward us with zero sign of rain. It is kinda good, but when SUN come up, so does temperature. I knew traction will fade out very fast. And that was exactly what happened to me and the rest of us. We have 30 degree temperature swing within 2 hours. Tires from 42 shores back down to 37s without any time to change tires.
I have about 5 minutes practice for my TM G4RS and after 2 minutes of running, my 1st mistake was....my BLEE powered 353 is a complete waste of this track. This track is tight and small (may be same as PYC in HK size, not 100% sure but not the same as ACO). By not wasting my time on the motor and practice time, I ended up swarping the BLEE NS12 and K-Factory Missle pipe with LONG manifold setting back on the G4RS (good thing I have the whole engine/clutch/pipe set all setup and just need to swarp them in without redoing/remove the clutch and setting). With less then 10 minutes left, I did about 5 minutes of practice and the BLEE NS12 engine is more then perfect for this type of track, totally can MAX out and more (353 will barely shift to the end of straight due to the power). G4RS setup was great, except I have a lot of bouncing thru out the track....thats nothing I can do about it.
On my Serpent 1/8th....is another tourtures....track is too small for 1/8th, and I don't know why they even bother to run 1/8th. It was kinda like running 1/12th @ some mini-z track. However, my Serpent does gave me zero problem at all and I finished my practice with only 1 tank of fuel. 1 thing I know...if I feel my car is OK, I will leave that alone, mains are 30 minutes long each, I don't want to kill the car before even my 1st qualfier.
My only qualifier (both 1/10th and 1/8th...yes, I ran both class almost all the time and most of the time) are within 20 minutes...so I walked around and took some pictures of the track (for the last time).
1st up...1/8th open qualifier...hot laps was 23 5:05 or so...my 2 years old BLEE mod Kangaroo Nova Rossi gave me zero problem whatsoever and I can hang with all those 359 and Corboda...usually that was not the case but because of the size of the track, those 359 has no use for their HP. I ended up 22 lappers @ 5:07 and placed 8 overall. Due to the size of the driver stands and the track, I was forced to miss the A-main by 1 position (1-7 goes to As)....not a big deal cause 1/8th is NOT something I really working on, I did that just because I have the 1/8th. |
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