"Bman76 (no it doesn't need a WS6 hood) M. Arch" (bman76)
04/29/2019 at 14:32 • Filed to: Miata, Track Day, Track Night in America, Autocross, scca, Women, NA Miata, Mx-5
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"Bman76 (no it doesn't need a WS6 hood) M. Arch" (bman76)
04/29/2019 at 14:32 • Filed to: Miata, Track Day, Track Night in America, Autocross, scca, Women, NA Miata, Mx-5 | 8
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Last week on Thursday I drove 2.5 hours up to Heartland Motorsport Park in Topeka to run my first Track Night in America, beginning my weekend of fun.
While I’m on my 3rd season of AutoX, I’d never been on a track
before. Track Night in America was
a great way to get out there for the first time. At autocross it can be hard to visually see the difference between how power and momentum cars make time. On the track it was hilariously apparent.
S kip to 13:30 to see the red Camaro demonstrate how not to do a point by (and almost cause a wreck)
I had so much fun chasing down all the Camaro SS’s, Mustang GT/Cobras, C63 AMGs, and other Miatas that were out there. The only thing I couldn’t catch was the Viper ACR, and I think I can live with that. The only hiccup I really had was that my left front tire went down towards the end of my second heat, but the leak was slow so I aired it up and ran part of the 3rd heat as w ell.
Friday night my sister drove over from St. Louis so that she could run in our Women’s Autocross Fun Day event. This is the second year for this event in our region (Wichita Region SCCA) and it’s already become a favorite. The idea is to create a fun, non-competition event where women can come try autocross without the “ go go go” urgency of a regular event. We provide coaches if they want in- car instruction, but the intent is just to have “fun with cars”.
She started out in the Trans Am, which she had run in the previous year’s event. She ran most of the morning in that car b ut, after I ran a lap to show her a couple things, the oil pressure dropped a bit and the power steering pump was being loud (typical GM things). Not wanting to hurt the TA, I asked her if she wanted to run the Miata after lunch, “Sure” she said “but you’ll have to teach me how to drive stick, because I’ve never done that”.
So, after a ten minute crash course in how to drive stick, she lined up for her first runs in the Miata...
...and did great.
It took her a second to get used to the immediacy of the Miata’s reaction to inputs compared to the TA, but by the end of the day she had the fastest time out of all the women at the event (not that I was keeping track or anything...)
In fact she was having so much fun that she decided to enter our regular points event on Sunday, at which she put down a pretty impressive run (especially considering she only had half a day’s experience driving stick).
I also had a pretty good day on Sunday, netting a 7th place in raw time and 9th in PAX. The below run would’ve been good for 5th if it wasn’t for a stupid cone:
and through it all the Miata ran like a champ. Never got hot, never had brake fade, didn’t mind my sister riding the clutch at launch or when she missed a 1-2 shift and never lifted off the throttle until she eventually (it felt like an eternity of bouncing off the limiter ) found 2nd.
Good weekend of fun, but I’m glad to have a couple days until RallyX next weekend.
HondoyotaE38: A Japanese and German Collab...wait a minute
> Bman76 (no it doesn't need a WS6 hood) M. Arch
04/29/2019 at 14:51 |
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Sounds like fun, nice.
Deltyn drives a meh car
> Bman76 (no it doesn't need a WS6 hood) M. Arch
04/29/2019 at 14:57 |
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Sounds like a blast! I've done a couple of auto x, but i really want to do a hpde event in the near future.
davesaddiction @ opposite-lock.com
> Bman76 (no it doesn't need a WS6 hood) M. Arch
04/29/2019 at 15:15 |
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You’re my hero.
Holy shit, that Camaro...
Bman76 (hates WS6 hoods, is on his phone and has 4 burners now)
> davesaddiction @ opposite-lock.com
04/29/2019 at 15:38 |
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Definite “oh shit” moment. You can see how squirrelly my car got trying to get it shut down.
Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
> Bman76 (no it doesn't need a WS6 hood) M. Arch
04/29/2019 at 15:42 |
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Yeah cars like that Camaro doing crap like that is why I don't want to run with TNIA. It just seems to bring out more inexperienced people and the organizers don't have the resources to properly educate those outliers. It's always incredibly unsafe to stop on a track, especially in the racing line. But yeah in general that's why I don't want to run with the beginner group with any organization, it just feels safer in the intermediate groups. I can see the draw though, track days are expensive in most places. I'm lucky to have other affordable groups here in Socal.
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davesaddiction @ opposite-lock.com
> Bman76 (hates WS6 hoods, is on his phone and has 4 burners now)
04/29/2019 at 15:45 |
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My only holdup with the Track Night events. I assume this was this guy’s first event, and people are getting out there with minimal instruction with no time to “warm up” and slowly build up speed and comfortable- ness. He got nervous with cars in his mirrors and panicked, and stopped at just about the worst spot.
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davesaddiction @ opposite-lock.com
> Bman76 (hates WS6 hoods, is on his phone and has 4 burners now)
04/29/2019 at 15:48 |
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Nice avoidance, but the way, especially for your first time out.
Target fixation is a real thing.
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Bman76 (hates WS6 hoods, is on his phone and has 4 burners now)
> davesaddiction @ opposite-lock.com
04/29/2019 at 15:53 |
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Yeah, with that incident excluded, everyone behaved pretty well. The only other problem I had was the GTI driver who tailgated everyone he came up behind. Like, bro, I see you back there 2’ off my bumper , I’ll let you by at the next passing zone, back the fuck off.
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Bman76 (hates WS6 hoods, is on his phone and has 4 burners now)
> Wrong Wheel Drive (41%)
04/29/2019 at 15:55 |
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It was a bad moment, but ultimately could have been much worse. I had a great time.