first win

[austra]

just to tell the people who might care i got my first class win yesterday it was in my ITA bmw. here in portland oregon for the Rose Cup races group H. here is a link to last half of the race. YouTube - rose cup race 2008 group H part 2 just after a full course caution for oil on the front strech. the its 944's were right in front of me i wanted to pass one real bad.

[nondescript]

Congratulations!

For what RE01R's cost; why don't you have a Toyo or even a V710 or something on your shoes?

[austra]

i have a set of NTO1s sitting and waiting for me to install. ill never learn how to drive it fast if the tires hide my mistakes. and i dont have a set of rims for practice tire yet.

[nondescript]

Makes sense; get a set of ugly nasties for $300 and call those the practice rims.

although FWIW I found that hosiers gave me a comfort level with pushing the car that unlocked a whole different level of vehicle control... Since stock BMW's understeer like a freight train I sorta pigeon holed myself into thinking that I could only do X before the tires would give up (which was true) and that I'd have to change the car suspension to fix it... Where X is when the front tires give up grip... Turns out that even going back to street tires now I know how to toss the car more; and carry WAY more speed (and throttle) into corner entry (call it 3X) into a corner so the rear tires will give up at about the same rate as the fronts... I know that a better setup suspension (if the rules allowed it) would fix this; but my point is that unless you have a perfectly setup car you are probably doing some level of backing off to compensate; when the same can be achieved by pushing forward; you just have to have the comfort to find how/where to do that pushing... FWIW.

BTW; lines look good although from the fixed camera angle (and no look ahead) it's hard to tell if you are late apexing on purpose; or just late in that quick right left section. ??

[austra]

.... the right left after the straight(slow speed)? or the left right after the long right strech (high speed) from the stands that look down on the slow corners other drivers usually come and tell how much they love my line though there. and to put the high speed ones in context the quick left right at the end of the back strech im doing about 90-92 (my students settle on about 65) when alone and every other full body car ive driven against not one goes though there as fast as i do(most are aroung 85-90) the closest was the pro mx-5 cup driver. at this point i know what you speak of understeer but im already backing the car in to every corner even the fast ones. if i can find them ill post up the pics of the slip angle im going though most corners.

[austra]

its proving harder than i thought to find the right angle of the pic that you can see the good slip angles. most just look like im late apexing and not sliding. every turn here at PIR is a late apex turn but when your sliding and you cant see the tire tracks it look like your off line.

[nondescript]

Yeah; I was referring to the right left after the straight (slow speed)... As I said; it's hard to tell what is going on there with out the bonus of looking ahead, so there is probably a method to the madness... It almost seems like slow steering rack rate might be a factor - can you swap to an e36 rack in ITA? (I havn't checked rules in forever for anything beyond SCCA solo)...

I guess my point is; after a few events on "real" rubber that same car with that same understeer is doing this:



on street tires or r-comps.... due to a change in the driver. to me that's not bad for a bitch of an understeering pig.

[austra]

thats a good pic. i could probly put the e36 rack in there but its not legal. as of right now i am lifting the inside tire just not very high from the fact i still have the stock shocks and no straps keeping the unloaded travel down. in the slow right hander its a 90* turn follwed by 120* left if you apex normal for one you then have to slow down again for 2 which alot of racers do but it not faster it more for defending your line. from wear you have to brake to make the corners that way. if i push T1 i could break about 300ft from 105mph but then would have to hit the brakes again down to about 35 for T2 if i brake at 350 from 104 then i can be on throttle around T2 at 40

[nondescript]

Originally Posted by austra

in the slow right hander its a 90* turn follwed by 120* left if you apex normal for one you then have to slow down again for 2 which alot of racers do but it not faster it more for defending your line.

That makes sense...

[Thomas]

Hi, i have seen your Video, great job ... =)

Can you tell more about this race class, i'm from Germany and like to know which Cars are allowed to race in these group.
There are some VW GOLF or Audi 50 ?!?

mfg Thomas

[austra]

the vw rabbits you saw run in the same group on track as i do but not in my class. there are so many cars allowed in my class ITA (improved touring class A) that i would fill half a page of just car names but here are a few acura integra, audi GT coupe, mercesdes 190E 2.3 8V, honda CRX, mazda miata, nissan 240sx, bmw 325e, bmw 318, dodge neon, toyota celica, toyota carolla "AE86" VW GTI 2.0, those were the ones off the top of my head. for the most part motor has to remain stock, exhaust is free you can do what you want, cant touch the intake, suspension you can do what you want as long as you dont have resivors. stock brakes with racing pads. and go have fun

[TheTunerSource]

Good work man!