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 | |  | April 14, 2010 - Welcome to California!
Three days of track time with two drivers, mixing it up with faster cars. It's a good thing this little car is tough.
The first day was sunny and beautiful. The track day was run by the Checkered Flag Racing Association, which is basically a grown-up version of the Red Rock Racers I run in Grand Junction. Sessions were 30 minutes long and full of some very serious machinery. Even the novice group had a Porsche GT3, a fast little Caterham and a couple of Nissan GT-Rs. The Nissans were being driven extremely quickly, and were really in the wrong group. Overall, a very experienced bunch that were good to share the track with.
The goal for the Friday session was for it all to be about Janel. She's spent so long hanging around as I run around at the track it only seemed fair for her to have her own track day. So our friend Rick Weldon offered to give her personal instruction, and I was pit crew.
We started off doing a sound check. The limit was 92 dB, and we went by the meter at 93.3 dB. After a certain amount of chaos on the part of the organizers who all told us different things, we found that by holding 4th gear through turn 5 we tripped the meter at 88 dB. So there's that solved then.
Rick was running behind, so I went out with Janel for the first three sessions. We had a good time and everything seemed to be working fairly well other than a car that was very grouchy when cold. The biggest problem was dealing with the traffic.
Rick showed up just as we left for the third session, so he only got to ride with Janel for a couple of sessions. She was all warmed up and ready to go, though. He's a fantastic instructor and not only helped her with her lines, but also with how to deal with traffic. She's a great learner, and if you tell her to go full throttle through a certain corner without lifting, she'll do it!
I was running a stopwatch, and we saw her times drop by about 12 seconds per lap - partly due to the way that she dealt with faster cars passing her. The big grin is from her last session, when she spent two or three laps holding off a 911 GT3 (really!) before the monster power on the straight finally proved to be too much for the little Miata. She was putting down consistent 2:00 laps with only a few tenths of a second of variation, plus one solid 1:59.28. You can see her session on the video page. After seeing the times, Rick commented that she'd be a great endurance driver. On the way to dinner a couple of nights later, she asked me how you get involved in endurance racing...
Does she look happy to you?
entry 748 - tags: janel, laguna seca, track | | |  | April 14, 2010 - After Janel had so much fun on Friday, it was time to meet the hundreds of Miatas that had come for Miatas at MRLS.
The plan was for me to drive the car in the fastest A group and take people for rides, and Janel would drive in the C group. However, when I first jumped in the car, I discovered that it was very unhappy under part throttle. It was too late for me to do any more tuning on the car, but spending a single session with a laptop jammed under a seat would have made a big difference. Still, it was easy enough to drive around. I also discovered that while my spare rubber was up to pressure, I had the tires on the car about 7 psi low. Whoops. So the car should have been faster on Friday for Janel if I'd been able to take a quick test drive. Sorry!
For the rest of the weekend, the car pounded around and around the track. The other cars from Flyin' Miata were under orders not to run at 10/10ths to ensure they'd last, but that didn't apply to the Targa car. So I ran it pretty hard, and I know Janel did as well. This is one solid little critter, and so much fun.
The new suspension wasn't a big hit with Janel, and it certainly did allow a lot of lean. Still, it put down the power well and seemed friendly enough. I wanted just a bit less understeer but didn't want to mess with it after Janel had spent so long honing things with Rick.
I spent a lot of my time staying out of trouble with the A group, populated with winged beasts and drivers that were considerably faster than me.
Janel had a different problem. She was much faster than everyone in her group, and so she spent most of the time waiting for the slower driver to point her by. It was frustrating. She really should have been in the B group.
Sunday started off cold and looking like rain, and it started to sprinkle fairly early. Janel came into the Corkscrew with the back end of the car quite loose and almost looped it, and I found the grip level changing on every corner. So we parked the car, and shortly afterwards the skies opened. The track was closed early due to the deep water, and we packed up to go home.
A pretty good weekend.
entry 749 - tags: laguna seca, track | | |  | April 14, 2010 - New videos have been uploaded!
There's a video of Janel's fastest session on Friday as well as a couple with me driving in the middle of a fairly entertaining group. Videos
On Saturday, the event organizers gathered a few of us together for a video shoot. There was a hand-held camera in one of the cars, and the rest of us were basically tasked with putting on a good show. Two Spec Miata drivers and a couple of modified super Miatas - and my little rally toy. I was probably the least experienced track driver of the bunch, so I had to pedal pretty hard just to keep up! The extra horsepower of the Targa car let me reel in the Spec Miatas most of the time, but not always.
Still, it was like a little race. One of us would take the lead, then allow someone else to pass. Meanwhile, the camera car was zooming back and forth. I certainly wasn't the fastest driver or car in the group, but I consoled myself with the thought that if there was a speedbump in the middle of the front straight, I was the only person who could take it at full speed!
The Targa Miata is one solid little car. This picture was taken after Janel ran for a full day on Friday, and then she and I both drove the car on Saturday. On Saturday, the car was on the track for 20 minutes, then parked for 20 minutes before it went out again. And that's the state of one of the tires. A tire that we used in the Targa. A week long race, followed by a bunch of local track days, followed by two days at Laguna Seca last year, then repeat the local track days and two more days at Laguna. And it's only about half worn! Amazing.
entry 750 - tags: play, laguna seca, video | | |  | April 25, 2010 - Some pictures from the Laguna event.
More are coming. This is the first session on Saturday (it must be, I'm not wearing my driving suit) and that's John Anker coming down the Corkscrew behind me. He was never behind me for long!
Photo by Mark Booth.
entry 751 - tags: laguna seca | | |  | April 25, 2010 - Mark got a this great shot of Janel at speed.
I'm not sure where it was taken - it's a right hand turn, so I'm thinking it's either turn 4 or 10, and something it telling me it's 4 - but I really like it.
Photo by Mark Booth.
entry 752 - tags: laguna seca | | |  | April 25, 2010 - A shot of our video session from outside turn 2.
I'd just steamed by the whole group on the straight (with their acquiescence, as there's no way I could power by a couple of those cars), and was taking a wide line into 2 to let that Spec Miata run inside me for a cool pass. The camera is in the red car about halfway back. This was fun stuff. The photo was taken right at 2:00 in this video.
Photo by Mark Booth
entry 753 - tags: laguna seca | | |  | April 25, 2010 - Laguna Seca is a pretty track.
Quite a change from the dusty desert. Here's Janel about to dive over the edge into the Corkscrew. Photo by Got Blue Milk.
entry 754 - tags: laguna seca | | |
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