We were lining up for our feature race on Saturday when I got to start my car.... it's dead. It was so hot that I forgot I left my fan on in the car. The thing was dead, it wouldn't even start with a battery charger on it. We had to push it and pop the clutch to get it started. There was an incident before us so we had to sit in grid for about 15-20 minutes, the entire time I had to go. I had no idea if I could unbuckle and rebuckle in time so I had to sit and hold it. Half way through the race my battery light comes on. The bracket for the A/C compressor had come loose so the alternator belt went flying off down the front straight.

So here I am, with what was a super dead battery and no alternator to speak of. I'm thinking I'm never going to finish this race. Three laps later my gas light comes on. I'm sure I'm not going to make it now. I figure if I make it on the battery I'll run out of gas, if I have enough gas my battery will die. I start to let up to conserve gas but the two people I passed were starting to close the gap. I decided it was all or nothing and went all out. I managed to keep my place til the finish. We had to weigh the field after so I pulled my car into the line at the scales. I still had to go to the bathroom (BADLY) so I had to shut my car down (to keep it from rolling away). I got back from the bathroom and try to restart... it's completely dead... I barely made it... to the bathroom, on gas and on the battery. Good thing that came out of all of this? I took the A/C compressor out and saved about 25 lbs on weight.

 

I'm suprised you even had the A/C compressor still installed in the first place...

 

Technically I have to have it (and the controls) to run in "I stock" in PCA... I'm going to be taking a loose interpretation of those rules from now on.

 

Well, A/C was an option on the 944 if I remember correctly, therefore it can mysteriously disappear and not disqualify you...

 

I believe all U.S. spec 944s had A/C but it was an option in Europe. You can buy an "A/C" delete braket" that allows you to drop the alternator to where the A/C compressor is located.

 

Sounds like a good project!

Guess no one else is interested in participating here...

 

sounds like you had a hell of a race.. Always use the bathroom!!!! hitting walls with full blatter, NOT GOOD!! Even on slight impacts..

Dead battery and No gass sucks too...

 

Not really crazy, but just sort of weird.

At the party Saturday night, I began talking to some racer (never talked to him before -- I won't give out names ) out of the blue. Near the end of the trophy presentation, this dude just started talking to me.

So we're bench racing and talking cars for maybe 10-15 minutes and all of a sudden out of left field:

Dude: "Have you ever given a foot massage?"

Me: (silence ... blink, blink ... thinking of where the hell this conversation was going) "Don't be tellin' me about foot massages - I'm the foot ******' master."

Dude: "Given a lot of 'em?"

Me: "Shiznit yeah. I got my technique down man, I don't tickle or nothin'."

Dude: "Have you ever given a guy a foot massage?"

Me: "Fawk you."

Dude: "How many?"

Me: "Fawk you."

Dude: "Would you give me a foot massage? I'm kinda tired."

Me: "Man, you best back off, I'm gittin' pissed."

And with that, I threw a telephone book at him and went to get another Coors Light before the H-C crew polished off THAT keg.


[Modified by slowSER, 12:21 PM 6/26/2002]

 

LMAO! It wasn't me... I swear.

 

This was quite startling: While walking back from turn 1 to the paddock during the SCCS race on Sunday, a white (don't remember # or team) stock car came flying up behind my friend and I on the access road; bulldozing the gravel out of the way with its splitter (or whatever) and leaving a trail of oil behind. I think he would have run us down had we not jumped out of the way.


[Modified by 4doorH22, 1:20 PM 6/24/2002]

 

That or no one could possibly beat that story. Geez...

 

craziest thing?

Almost getting hit by the jackass in Ali Arsham's crew who took out a champagne rental Taurus in the novice group on saturday and proceeded to pass without point bys, pass in non passing zones and even in corners. Did I mention it was the novice group?
He had absolutely no care about the car or other peoples car (since his was a rental i guess) and obviously very little on track experience because he didnt even know the line.
When he almost hit me, I was behind a slow miata on the 10-1 straight who then gave me the point by, when I pulled out to pass him the assclown was going to try to pass us both on the right and came within a few feet of rearending me.

Evan
-still pissed about it


[Modified by elgorey, 1:31 PM 6/24/2002]

 

We had so many complaints about this guy that we were told not to even let him out on the track the 2nd day. Honestly I think at least 4 people came up to me in the grid to complain and then go off to find Dan, Jim, or Chris. Apparently the driver got a nice talking to from Chris on Sun morning.

 

Defintaly Not cool, that was the one and only time he was let out. You were not the onlyone he almost hit, trust me, at least one instructor when to Chris I called Control and Grumpy about it.

 

I am beginning to believe this is the way stuff of done out west... Speedtrail's finest from CA did the same thing ..... Is this really how NASA is done out there?

 

I didn't say anything about this guy, cause I figured everybody else would, but he was an idiot. Passed my student(Audi TT) as well as 2 other students in novice, between T2 and T3 on Saturday... and then proceeded to almost slide into the gravel.. all without passing signals.. I hope Chris yelled at him good.

 

Looks like I missed all the on-track fun. The only crazy thing I remember was that nothing crazy happened around me. No spins in front of me. No blown engines nearby. And there were only a couple of the usual tail-gaters when I was at the end of a train, or muscle cars that would point me by and then not back off.

The last session on Sunday I had clear track almost all the time, and finally felt like I was in the groove. I'm sure the corner workers wondered who was screaming "Yahooo" up through 7-8-9.

 

I had an on-track experience in Intermediate that could have gotten ugly, but turned out okay. I was given a late passing signal by a Vette between 9 and 10, which I should have waived off , but I pulled out to try the pass anyway. I don't think he gave me much help, because there was no way I could have tucked back onto the line to setup for 10 properly, so we went into 10 side by side. At this point we were both on the brakes hard, and I slowed down enough to let him take the corner ahead of me. We weren't at risk of a collision, because we were going slow enough, but it was still a "moment".

 

Going 3 wide into turn 10...priceless

[EDIT]with a signal of course [/EDIT]


[Modified by Jason Franza, 2:26 PM 6/25/2002]

 

Which Corvette was it? Was it the red C5 that wasn't a Z06?

 

So many crazy things to pick from:
1) A certain someone insisting they're signed off for solo only to have their instructor show up and request me to have them black flagged since they aren't signed off
2) Big bore trying to change their grid split 5 minutes before they're supposed to grid up
3) Small bore requesting a change in their grid, at least they gave us like 30 min to take care of it, but then changing it again as the cars are gridding up
4) Ambulance coming down grid and taking out a legends car when it's back bumper snagged the rear tire of the legends car - he wasn't able to participate in the race on Sat
And
5) Having my buddy lectured about track etiquette as soon as we pulled in "You see that there white line, this here's a paddock spot. You guys come in here with your @#%$&@ street cars and just park wherever you want. I hope they actually teach you something in that school of yours."

There's plenty more obviously, just the ones that stick out in my mind right now.

 

I hope that fella will be at the rack this weekend...
my track etiquette will include puking in him and offering him a beer.

Will

 

Was this one of the SCCS people? I wasn't getting a good vibe from that entire group.

 

Hmmm... sounds to me that Dude grabbed his lines from American Beauty.

 

Nah not one of the SCCS guys. Don't wanna call him out cause he and I were cool with one another. It was just a bad start considering the problems we'd had just getting into SP.