Took our first trip to Daytona for an SCCA Enduro yesterday. WOW!
That place is HUGE. We had 80 cars in our group and the track wasn't even crowded. And contrary to our fears, it was not boring. Not even in an ITC car.
We recommend it to anyone that has a chance to try it (the bus stop chicane is now on my list of funnest turns/track sections).

But the weekend was an interesting one, starting Thursday evening.

Woke up Thursday and drove to Atlanta to pick up our new CRX Si shell. Its very clean, rust free, and appears to have never been wrecked. The harness has been hack jobbed for a swap, but the shell was too nice to pass up.
What does this have to do with our Daytona trip...?
Well, after I got home and rolled the CRX off the trailer Thursday evening, I went to start up the Civic to put it on the trailer. The fuel pump made an angry noise and died. Excellent.
So... The CRX that we'd owned for about 5 hours was rolled into the garage and freed of its fuel pump. BTW, the only thing nastier than dropping the gas tank out of a 15 year old car is dropping the gas tanks out of TWO 15 year old cars in the same evening. What made this even better is that we didn't know if the CRX pump worked.
The gamble paid off 4 hours later. At midnight the Civic was running again and ready to race.

Arrived at Daytona at 5pm Friday. Then spent 30 minutes trying to figure out how to get into the damned place. That place is confusing if you've never been there and have to find the ONE open gate for the lowly SCCA folks.
But we got in, registered, teched, and in our NASCAR garage (which was schweet and well worth the $20 rental fee) by 7pm.

We were group 1, so practice for us was at 8am. Went to crank up the car at 7:45 to warm it up and <insert drumroll> the battery was dead. Very dead. I think we might have left the key in the ACC position when we unloaded the car Friday, but I didn't notice when I tried to crank it so I'm not sure.
We borrowed a battery from another competitor and <drumroll> it was dead too. But it had enough juice to get us a bump start, so off Renee went.

Daytona isn't complicated, so she learned it pretty quickly (thanks to Richy's in car video ), then I had to learn the track in qualifying. By my last lap I was doing pretty well, and laid down a time fast enough for the ITC pole over 11 cars. In the meantime Renee headed over to see Manny Moe and Jack about a new battery.

Then came the race. We knew the 3 Spec Miatas behind us were going to jump Renee badly at the start, but the SM in front of her missed a shift to complicate things even further. So with an SM to her right and left, she had no choice but to lift and downshift. By the time she got to turn 1 she'd lost about 10 total positions and was down to 5th in class.
I was.... Concerned. She was in heavy traffic, losing positions, on an unfamiliar and very fast track. Thats a recipe for a driver to get impatient and write a check their *** can't cash.

But she didn't write that check. Instead she stayed calm, concentrated on picking up speed while learning the track, and got progressively faster. Methodically and patiently she tracked down all 4 of those in-class (and a few out-of-class) cars that passed her at the start. At the 35 minute mark she was in 1st place and turning laps faster than my pole qualifying time. I was mighty happy.

Once again she turned the car over in first place. The pit stop went well, so all I had to do was go out and not screw things up. Settled into a quick but safe pace and brought home the win, turning a few quick laps (near track record territory from what I was told in impound) near the end of my stint when I was very comfortable with the track (but I was still leaving a good bit of time out there).
I LOVE the Bus Stop. You can absolutely FLY through the short configuration and I never ran across anyone, not even the front running Miatia, that could get through there any faster than I could. I was actually running all up over many of the cars.

In the end, my right leg hurt from pushing the gas pedal so hard and my face hurt from the grinning. We'll be doing this one again .

Big thanks to Christian for driving down from Jax to crew for us, then he and his lovely wife fed us dinner, then he gave us a motor. What a guy!!!
Only problem is that I think the poor bastard caught the disease once and for all this weekend. Sorry about that.

 

Scott Renee .

Congrats!

 

Nice job Scott

I did the Enduro at Daytona in 98 or 99 in a ITC Rabbit....great place Daytona...just to stand on the grid and look around and think of all the neat stuff that has taken place there floored me.

Yes, I too remember the bus stop ...very cool in an ITC car....just left-right-left....


The warm up lap before the race was an experience too.........Just trying to keep myself off the door was a challenge.....it was banked rather steeply!!!

 

congrats on another fine showing! Girls kick ***!

 

pics/video?

 

Congrats to you Scott & Rene!

I want to see some pics too.

 

Sorry, no pics. We had practice, qualifying, and a 1.5 hour race all in one day so there really never was time to take any pictures. We wanted to do one in the Gatorade Victory Lane with our little piece of wood but the fine folks that run Daytona had announced that the gates would be locked at 5:30, so we were busting *** to pack up and get out of there.

That was the one downside of Daytona. Track management is downright ****-ish on where you can be, where you can park, and what gates you can use (and when you can use them). There is pretty much zero flexibility there.

I've got some video, but I haven't even looked at it yet. If its decent and worth it I'll see if Zsolt will host a few snippets of it.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Maxx44 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Yes, I too remember the bus stop ...very cool in an ITC car....just left-right-left....
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Actually its left-right-right-left Phil. Left-right-left appears to be the Spec Miata line through there though.

 

congrats.....daytona...a new track to add to your list!!

 

Congrats on the win

Once again, thanks for inviting me out to crew for the two of you... it was a blast! And, as you said, the bug has officially bitten me. Luckily, I have a very understanding wife who knew about my addiction before we got married and who supports it fully

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Catch 22 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">That was the one downside of Daytona. Track management is downright ****-ish on where you can be, where you can park, and what gates you can use (and when you can use them). There is pretty much zero flexibility there.
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Yep. Just getting into the track is half the battle. The track is huge with registration on one side and the entrance on the other... what a PITA. Then only 45 minutes from the end of the enduro to "lock down"

Christian, who watched everyone hit the GFCP this weekend but was only close enough for a mild contact high

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Catch 22 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">That was the one downside of Daytona. Track management is downright ****-ish on where you can be, where you can park, and what gates you can use (and when you can use them). There is pretty much zero flexibility there.
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I share the same observations of how the NASCRAP oval guys treat us club racers. Lowes CMS is the same way. Sure, they make more money on a 1/2 acre of their grass parking 2 miles away on Memorial day than they make on a weekend track rental, but that doesn't justify treating their renters like crap.

It is kinda short sighted on their part, a lot of the club racers may also be NASCRAP fans that will no longer blow their cash at the World 600.

 

ahhh very true, now that I think of it, .......left-right-right-left.......sorry for my lapse......

 

Good Job! I was there crewing for one of those Spec Miatas that dropped to the back with Renee on the start. #58. I should have come by and said hey, but never got the chance. I watched her be behind him and pass and pull and pull on him per lap, good job!!!!

-Tom

 

CONGRATS! I told you it was going to fun
Finally, I got some of you Southeastern racers to come down to Florida and leave with some good results

Now, I just have to come up to RA and Roebling to run with you guys!