got a hold of Andy today...seems like they were only able to get one practice session in today due to weather conditions,
im happy to say that Andy set the fastest lap of the day with an unofficial 1.42 and Kiwi was right behind him with a !.43

west coast kicked *** for the day, cant wait till tomorrow to see if they keep it up

oh yeah on a sad note Derek Stevens blew the K20A in practice today proving once more that the K20A isnt all its hyped up to be!

 

come on EAST COAST
show those stunnas what we are made of

ECHC

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Dan GSR &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
show those stunnas what we are made of

ECHC </TD></TR></TABLE>


super stunnas' to you

 

I'm up in Cleveland so I don't know if its quite the same, but it is COLD here. Rainy all day, and its low 50s right now. Tomorrow and Sunday are supposed to be high of 70s, and cloudy. Bet the West coast guys weren't prepared for that! Seems like you guys can get no luck at this track, it snowed back on the April weekend. My autocross was cancelled because we got like 4 inches of snow that night.

 

Charleston, I hope you did not forget to bring the lap top so that we could read your reports on the on going East vs West race and maybe get some feedback from westcoast drivers themselves.

Joe , glad you and Andy made it there the tank/SUV lived up to your expectatoins

unofficial 1.42 , cool

 

Come on EC. You guys should SHINE in this shitty weather. Those WC guys never see a day under 80!!!! Rain...what's rain???

 

West Side in the house!

Sorry Guys I have seen Andy drive very impressive times at night and in the rain, with no 4th gear....I think he was happiest in those conditions..

 

Andy hope was #1 qualifier for saturday and sat in first place during the entire race with nobody even coming close to him...

Kofod got lapped so Andy gets a free dinner oh yeah the race was cut short and he still got lapped...

you see kids west coast is the best coast!

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by myke &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Andy hope was #1 qualifier for saturday and sat in first place during the entire race with nobody even coming close to him...

Kofod got lapped so Andy gets a free dinner oh yeah the race was cut short and he still got lapped...

you see kids west coast is the best coast!</TD></TR></TABLE>

DOH! Congrats to Hope!! Better looking car and faster too, no wonder it's the Best Coast?

 

H1 - Andy Hope, Ryan F, James Evans
H2 - Sackdz
H3 - I forget
H4 - Marhefarearka (can't spell it, so butcher it really good!), Botha, Kofod
H5 - Edwards

That track is alot of fun.... great racing by the HC guys

Sean O'Gorman says "hey is that chad? Oh, I didnt recognize him without the Hollister shirt on"

 

How many east coast racers were there?

Any H2?

 

Great Job

How did the Honda R&D TL do?
added in edit: found it. pretty good Jeremy for a 'testing' race.




Modified by civicrr at 10:35 AM 8/22/2004

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by civicrr &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
How did the Honda R&D TL do?
added in edit: found it. pretty good Jeremy for a 'testing' race.
</TD></TR></TABLE>

Yeah, fifth in both days is not bad considering I not sure some of those other cars go 25 hours. I drove Saturday, Brian drove Sunday. May have to rethink the front splitter as it did not make it through race 2, so it probably won't make it through 25 hours.

Car is real hard on tires and brakes as that front end if being asked to do a lot. Finishing position could have been better if we didn't have to start braking 100-150 feet before everyone else! Needs more spring front & rear.

Still can't believe Andy doesn't have an LSD.

 

What happened? I missed today's race, they changed the schedule around apparently, and by the time I got to the track the HC and the GTS races were already done, and there was drifting on the track.

 

Who got 3rd in H1? What kind of times were they running/
What about H2? H4? I thought John Tecce was running? Times?

Paul

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by PaulB &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Who got 3rd in H1? What about H2?
</TD></TR></TABLE>

 

chad called this afternoon and said he finished 3rd today... after starting 14th or something like that

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Hunter &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">chad called this afternoon and said he finished 3rd today... after starting 14th or something like that</TD></TR></TABLE>

Nice! Thanks muthfucka! LMAO

 

"Honor Diversity - Tolerate Hate Crimes"

Scott, who enjoys the irony in our multi-cultural world...Sounds like Great Racing - both On-Track and Off!

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Hunter &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">chad called this afternoon and said he finished 3rd today... after starting 14th or something like that</TD></TR></TABLE>

Nice Chad.

damn you wchc'ers!

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by 743power &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

damn you wchc'ers!</TD></TR></TABLE>

There's no call for that...Muthafucker!

Scott, who hopes the race video will include the human drama..."thrill of victory / agony of defeat"...you know...

 

... more details please! Race details....

What bout' Dudek, Curpier, Evans, Burner on Sunday?

Can anyone hook a brotha up with a final standings sheet?

John- whos lookin' foward to seeing the EC H1 Boyz at Summit.

 

the weekend was fun, but all screwed up.......

Saturday....there were big delays due to the big bore race having accidents or something..... so instead of running 18 laps we ran somthing like 15...we had a big meeting telling us TWO warm up laps then we would go green with a rolling start........ and..... normally at grid they give 5 minutes (or more) when they tell you 5 minutes..... but since everything was so delayed the 5 minutes was more like 2 and I didn't even get my gear on....so I got put to the back of the field........and then got dusted at the start since we went green in 1 lap....bla bla bla... I had only qualified 8th anyway.......... I basically passed all the slower H1 guys....(sorry slower H1 guys)....and H2,h3,h4,h5 but had zero chance of catching the fast H1 guys.... somehow i thought i finished 7th in Hondas, so someone must have broken.??? i can't remember now.....

Sunday..... we started about 5 wide into turn 2 of the first lap..... then I think there was oil on the track I went off and so did Kiwi (the guy driving from the wrong side of the car) into turn 3.... luckily I stayed off, but he came back on and tagged Kevin Helms, who was then hit by 2 other cars. (ed sackz and Jon Kofold).....(all were out of the race within 30 seconds of the start)......so somehow we run a full lap and re-arrive at those same cars (no full course yellows at this point)........there were 2 flag stations waving yellow.....then we got black flag...... then different crew people were working on some peoples cars in the black flag parking...which apparently is not legal, but... since it involved some of the big guys it was just a "warning" (I got DQ'd for passing under Yellow at VIR, but everyone got warnings this weekend..... also at VIR Matt Bookler got put in the rear due to passing under yellow in qualifiying but this weekend it was ok to do??? cough cough...acura TL)........ anyway...... so eventually we get back out there, but no one tells us that it is now a 8 lap (or 9 I forget) lap race.... so all the sudden the white flag is out and you now basically have 12 corners to try to make your 10+ remaining laps worth of passing.......bla bla bla... i finished 6th

Chad had a nice race and finished 3rd on sunday....... After they blew a hole in the piston on saturday, The R&D guys performered one of their Patented "Danny, grab some pistons and drive 12 hours to get here at 1:00am, then we'll work on the car from 2:00am until 4:30am" tricks..... it worked!!!!!!

James Evan's had quickly swapped engines between qualifiying and the race today, but it leaked oil all over the track (and my car) and eventually he had to retire...but it was fun to watch when he retired...although i couldn't see anything through all of the smoke......... he did finish 3rd on saturday though......

What did I forget..... o ya... the west coast guys kicked some ***.....and Andy Hope was a pretty good guy........I thought he was aisan though. Andy and Ryan are definately fast! The weather was perfect saturday and sunday....

- Peter Cupier finished 4th today and had a great race ..broke a timing belt yesterday so did not even race....
-Matt dudec dropped out mid race today with an engine problem. I think he finished 4th or 5th on saturday...
- Mike pendola (white S2000)- finished 6th on saturday and 7th on sunday.

I should be a journalist this was such a good quality post.....and I have now edited it at least 5 times to make it this good.....



Modified by Scot at 6:19 PM 8/22/2004

 

What a dismal weekend for us at Mid Ohio. ( pull up a chair- this is gonna be long)

Rain was so bad on Friday afternoon, I shifted from 2nd to 5th to not get any wheel spin....session was black flagged due to extrememly high winds and excessively heavy rain.

I got in a car I never drove before, and qualified 4th in H4 at a 1:47, a far cry from the 1:45's I ran in my old crx, but that was in April when it snowed on us there, Colin botha on saturday ran a 1:43 to sit on pole, Marhefka 1:45 with Kofod doing the same time as Marhefka then me. (forgive for not being specific, lap sheets not in front of me.)

I worked on 7 other cars during the day, and had a slight mishap in the race. The video crew put a camera on my roof, then didn't hit record on the grid. On the opening lap in the keyhole, Lyonel Kent pushed himself too hard, lost it, slammed sideways into a tire wall right in front of me, would have been great footage. The car's rearend left the ground and tires went flyin...awesome stuff, car ok, and Lyonel was ok, but lost 3rd place as a result. I moved up to 3rd place. Then on lap 4 my motor sputterd as I was catching Marhefka and Botha, I looked down and my gas guage showed I was below empty on the fuel guage. Crew never put gas in the car..I had to pit, thus loosing my 3rd place w/ Kofod hot on my tail.
So much was going on, gas was overlooked, dumb mistake on my behalf, just rushing had some new crew guys who tried very hard...thanks for the help, I mean that nicely....

I finished dead last and was 4 laps down, but ran ok lap times before I had to pit for fuel, then I overheated, engine done, didn't start or qual on sunday.

When i pitted for gas, I had to go to the garage area (thank god I rented a garage), and sam myers filled the car, then I had to slowly race through the entire paddock of kids, dogs, specatators, and gophers to make it to pre grid again to allow me back on track. It is an 1/8th mile to grid from the garages, the when I got there, Ray Mason in his BMW was parked in the middle of the bloddy road gridding for the gts race and wouldn't move out of the way, so more time was lost getting back on track....what a mess....there was an entrance to the hot pit right near my garage, but they wouldn't let me on course that way, I had to back up and go ALL THE ******* WAY TO CHINA FIRST....what bullshit....THOSE ARE THE FACTS. Someone on this site only likes to read posts with facts, so there you go, facts, pure and simple....you know who you are.

I just helped all the guys in the series, get things done, answered questions and we had a great trophy presentation with a knock out trophy girl courtesy of GSport who sponsored the Honda Challenge round. I hope pics of her show up so you can all see what you missed.

Colin Botha had left rear trailing arm issues and a cracked subframe on the steering race on his crx after saturdays race. So instead of relaxing on my birthday, I stayed up with Ryan and Jake (his crew guy) till 2 ******* AM fixing his car....NOBODY was up that late...lol

Sunday qualifying, colin says the repair was fine but the trailing arm isn't good, we dismantled the left rear of my borrowed race car to get colin in the race....what a 24hr. ordeal I had with colins car, parts, welding, and so forth...I am flat burnt out.

On sundays race, we had our own run group, standing start. Heavy contact on lap one, half a lap into the race, Hope made contact with someone to get into the lead, but Ryan Flaherty witnessed the "bump" and moved andy to 2nd place at the end of the race. Jeff Owen "kiwi" supposedly caused the major accident with 3 cars being put out of the race on the half of lap 1, a black flag was displayed due to track blockage, and the next lap, Kiwi passed under yellow approached the major accident area is what I was told. So during the black, Kiwi was ejected from the race for not paying attention to consecutive yellows up to the incident.
Kiwi told me he didn't pass anyone, but with out seeing any video I can't say for certain what really happend. The officials (not me), ejected him...tough call it seems...
So andy hope ran the whole race in the lead, but lost in post race inspection for the "bump" and finished 2nd, thus giving the win to Ryan Flaherty.
James Evans blew a motor in qualifying, then at 7:30 this morning, we were told our race time was no longer at 2 pm, but 10:30 WTF??? As usual, Honda Challenge gets screwed so American Iron gets their race in under the Mid Ohio time limit for a 4 pm start....nice.

Evan's crew pulled off the ***** of all deals and swapped a borrowed block into his car between 8:30 and the 10:30 grid of the HC group...they made it, but blew off the chore of adding tranny fluid for fear of loosing the 4th place grid position he earned....he made it 5 laps, before the smoke came pouring out, and he spun into the muddy grass on front stretch, tough break for a crew that kicked *** to swap a motor that fast...what a great thrash, nice job guys.

In H4, Ian Carpenter- echc, pulled his teammate Kofods trick from Beaver Run earlier this year and left his hood pins out to start a race, CRUNCH, there goes the glass....under the black flag on lap 1 all cars sitting on pit lane, I inspected his windscreen and dq'd the car thus ending his day.
At the restart, Andy and Ryan took off pretty much uncontested, El Pollo Diablo in his B powered Civic developed a nasty vibration, loose lug nuts, ending his run for a top spot in H1. Colin Botha blew a head gasket in turn one thus "oiling " the line and Jim from Kansas City in his crx was the first to find the slippery stuff, spining his crx to the inside of the exit of turn one and into the tire wall and concrete, giving his rf wheel about 40 degrees of negative camber, race over.

The H4 field suffered more losses this weekend than H1, I have never seen that before. I blew a motor, Gene Hancock had oiling issues, Sam Myers in H5 had a rod punch through his block on Friday practice on a slow pace lap, Ben Bricker lost 5th gear on saturday, but found it worked again if he pushed in the clutch 3 times...Ben came from Arkansas, and Jim wrecked on sunday (from kansas city), Matt filkins was the only guy in my street n track camp to finish both races....all i did was change his oil for him....ummmm...odd..lol

Out of 11 cars in H4 saturday, 6 finished on sunday....we lost half the field.

So all in all, the officiating of incidents was attrotious, no pit lane representatives to discuss the incidents under black flag conditions...rediculous. Everyone came to me to ask what is going on....I told them they needed to voice their opinions after the race to the officials that run the event, I am powerless to make those decisions. Lawrence Mansier is the man to talk to...."where is he during our race?"
was the common question I always got.. If I had a radio to contact him that would have made great sense...but, no....sorry to those of you who looked to me to aid you in some way during the races.

I was deeply upset at how the event was run. On saturday a major pileup in the american iron race put them under black for nearly 25 minutes to clear up the incident..then we (hc) had to follow that group,,,,we go from 18 laps to 15 laps ON THE GRID....alot of guys didn't know the race length was shortened, they changed from two pace laps under yellow, to only one when the green flag flew, this wasn't covered in the drivers meeting. The pack was not a pack at the drop of the green, we were all strung out for the rolling start. Should have waived off the start...what bs....

We had a split start with the sports racers, ps classes and others starting behind us....the green shouldn't have been thrown after one pace lap, everyone was counting on two. NOPE....changes on the grid don't cut it for a professional race we were hoping for.

Jon Marhefka and I ran our asses off all weekend to help out the hc group, thanks all of you who traveled long and far to attend this race. Jon and I were not privy to any of the changes that came down from "race control" aka Lawrence Mansier.
What a poor weekend, alot of guys were upset, communication was poor at best, we look to improve this next year so that it goes much smoother...
Thanks for comming guys, I hope I was able to help you in some way.
It was nice meeting some of you whom I chatted with several times on the net.

It was nice to have Ryan Flaherty there to demonstrate the level of tech, officiating, and communication skills that a real NASA official should demonstrate towards honda challenge competitors, very impressive!!
Thanks Ryan, I hope you return next year.





Modified by Roadracejunkie at 3:35 AM 8/23/2004

 

I concur...... I am not sure how much better I personally would have done anyway, but it did seem like we were all sort of left out guessing what the hell was going on...

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Roadracejunkie &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
What a poor weekend, alot of guys were upset, communication was poor at best</TD></TR></TABLE>

i had a good amount of fun in today's race.....that is because my car is still in one piece..... hopefully everyone who's cars got damaged can get some parts for cheap....especially ED!!!!

O ya...and the most exciting thing of the weekend.... I got to meet .RJ... .