We just got back from two days of racing the Porsche 944 sp1 in an SCCA ITS class. The car isn't competitive in ITS but it is fun to race with Spec miatas etc. The fastest car in ITS did a 2:42 and I was managing 2:55s. Mark Repka has the record in a 944 sp1 and he managed a 2:46 which I haven't a prayer of doing for now. But, most of the Miatas were around my pace so while class racing is out, the SM guys are lots of fun to race with.
The weekend was 4 sessions. A qualifying and a race each day. The race is 10 laps and qualifying was 40 minutes. First qualifying went well, I did a 2:55 which is 8 seconds faster than 3 weeks ago and I put that down to line adjustments and a fresh set of tires which had a lot more grip. My RA1s from 3 weeks ago are hard and had little or no grip. I ended up 4th in class. Rob had a gravel excursion in Canada corner and banged up his belly pan so we had to straighten that out and reattach to the car.
Saturdays race was fun. The grid procedure was pretty easy and Rob was maybe 6 spots behind me. It was pretty uneventful for myself, I managed a 2:57 in the race mainly because of traffic. Rob had a spin trying to pass me in to T5 and then wrecked the car in Canada when he was brake checked by another car, he put his outside wheels off the track and it looped him and threw him in to the inside wall and then he bounced across to hit the outside wall also. The car is bent and is a parts car now. He went to hospital with a sore neck and was released later that day and cleared to race.
Sunday was the same format. My qualifying was disappointing, I was hoping to do a 2:52/3 but I got held up by a car and only managed a 2:57 in the end. That moved me down the grid for the race but I had a lot of fun racing and did a 2:55.4 in the race which was quicker than the previous day. I'll post video when I get it all updated.
Overall, aside from Robs bad luck, it was a great weekend and I've two more races in the bag.
Monday, June 1. 2009
3 weeks ago at Road America I noticed my water temperatures were about 2/3s (late dash) and my oil pressures were between 2 and 2.5 sometimes which made me nervious enough to pit and check things. I bought some DEI Header wrap and wrapped the front and rear headers. I also used DEI cool tape on the fuel lines which cross over the 3 header in my car.
I was back at Road America this weekend racing with SCCA. The water temperaturs were about 1/3 in more or less similar driving conditions and the oil pressure was around 3 mostly so the tape looks to definitely improve things.
