Street Stocks at South Boston

Last Thursday night, May 5, I participated in the Week 1 Street Stock event at South Boston. My week had been a little busy, so I didn’t get as much practice or tape review time as I hoped for the track, but from testing I knew I could drive a clean line and from open practice sessions I knew I could pass and be passed cleanly on this track by taking it a little easy in traffic.

When I logged in for the race, I was slotted in 10th place in a field of 10, which put me right where I wanted to be. I knew my lap times would likely be slower than the faster drivers in the race, so starting at the back would give me a chance to let the fast guys get away and then I could deal with any slower traffic once the field got strung out and the race got going.

The race began smoothly and the field kept a pretty good formation for the first couple of laps. In fact we were staying two wide at the back of the pack throughout the entire first two laps, until we came to the front stretch to begin the third lap. Then we saw smoke ahead and I realized that somewhere up in the front of the field there had been a crash or spin. There were two cars involved that I could see down on the inside of the track, and since I had a nose in front, Mark Herbert in the #8 car inside of me backed off and tucked in behind me, while Andras Roos in the #4 on the inside lane slotted himself in front of me, and we passed the carnage without any incident. When I crossed the stripe, I was now running in sixth place, and everything seemed to be going well. Nice clean racing with you, Mark and Andras.

On Lap 5, the #8 got a little loose in Turn 2 trying to pass me down low, and unfortunately for them, both the #3 of Eric Seely and the #5 of Brian McCormick thought they maybe could thread the needle between us and tried to do it simultaneously. The #5 got the worst end of that deal, spinning and going nose first into the inside wall along the back stretch. The #8 recovered and was able to pull ahead of me along the back and the #3 used the hole he was making to pull up alongside me as we entered Turn 3.

I maintained the high line and lost only one position to 7th by the end of that lap, but going into Turn 1 on Lap 6, the #3 was able to complete the pass and then I was able to slot in behind both of those other cars as we were going through Turn 2. Coming off Turn 2 on Lap 6, the #3 car pushed up high and got into the back of the #8, and sent both of them spinning down the back stretch, with me closing in fast from behind. Fortunately the banking of the track took them down to the inside wall and I just stayed high and managed to pass them both without picking up any incident points or scraping the wall.

So when I started Lap 7, I was back in 6th place with lots of open racetrack ahead of me and behind me, and I just settled in to log laps for a while. Then something happened on Lap 14 involving the #4 of Andras Roos and the #1 of Clint Woolbright. As I came around to the front stretch, I passed the #4 as he was getting under way again and started Lap 15 in 5th place, with the #1 just ahead of me, and I wasn’t sure as yet if he had enough damage to make him a slower car or if he would be able to resume his previous pace.

As Lap 16 was ending, the #4 managed to get past me coming off Turn 4 and retook 5th place, and the #8 car (several laps down due to an extended pit stop to repair earlier crash damage) was hot on his heels and I gave him plenty of room to get by as well, so I dropped back to 6th place to begin Lap 17.

By Lap 20, the #5 car had caught up with me again after his earlier spin, and going through Turns 3 and 4 he made a clean pass and I dropped back to 7th place. Then on Lap 25, the leader in the #1 car passed me through Turns 1 and 2 to put me one lap down, so unfortunately I knew I wouldn’t get  a lead lap finish for this race.

On Lap 37, Jake Goodwin in the #10 was the second car to put me a lap down as we headed through Turns 3 and 4. He was being hotly pursued by third place Jason Miller in the #6, so I let both of them go to avoid affecting their battle for position and then slotted in behind them. And that’s how we ended. The #10 held off the #6 for second, and I finished in 7th place one lap down.

The best thing about this race was that I managed to run it without picking up any incident points, so I got a good boost on my SR of +0.22 to bring my Oval license to a 3.51. However, finishing a lap down gave me a hit on my iRating of -21, dropping it to a 1261. My fast lap of the race was only an 18.428, which is a little over a half-second off the fastest fast lap recorded in the field. I definitely need more work at this track, and one thing I need to do is figure out if I should be using the brakes to set the car for entering the corners or not. So far I’ve been tapping the brakes just a hair as I prepare to turn in to the corners in order to keep the car following the line I want and not washing up the race track as I enter Turn 1 and Turn 3.

All in all I’ll say the night had mixed results. My primary objective was achieved of driving a clean race, but I wasn’t able to finish on the lead lap, and while I did gain positions, going a lap down gave me a hit to my iRating. Hopefully we can improve on this for next week’s race.

And that’s the rookie report from South Boston, Virginia for the race that was held May 5, 2011.

Back in the Cockpit Again

Well, I’m back after a long absence from iRacing.

Since last fall a number of things have happened. During college football season my focus on other hobbies pretty much falls off the ledge because of tailgating and following what’s happening with my team (Go UCF Knights) in the news during the week. Then just before we won our conference championship in early December, I was diagnosed with leukemia by my doctor and thrown in the hospital.

I’ve been in and out of the hospital for the last few months and finally completed my bone marrow transplant in early April, and was released near the end of the month. Now I have a few months of recuperating at home to do before they let me go back to work, so I’ve got time to kill and thought it was a good time to re-engage with iRacing.

Tomorrow begins 2011 Season 2, so these past few days I’ve been trying to decide what cars I want to run. I had attained a C-class license in both Oval and Road courses during my previous time in iRacing, but since I’ve been away a while I wanted to drop down a bit to ease back into the sim. So this season I have decided to run the Street Stock cars in Ovals and the Skip Barber cars in Road Courses.

Since this has been the “fun week” — Week 13 between Season 1 and Season 2, I have been practicing these cars and last night finally decided to run my first race. I chose to run the Street Stock car at Thompson International Speedway in a 40-lap event. After some offline testing I jumped into an online practice session, and as I expected found I was a good half-second or more off the pace of the fastest cars. I dove into the pits then scanned the field to watch the fast cars turn laps and saw one thing right away, which was that I was trying to take the corners too tight and hugging the bottom, which the fast drivers seemed to shirk in favor of a line about 2/3 of the way up toward the wall. After getting the line and braking points, I jumped back in the car and began driving this new line, and noticed a little gain in speed, but still found myself in the slow half of the practice pack, but I was satisfied that I could maintain a consistent line and driving in the practice traffic showed me that I could both pass and be passed cleanly and safely without bumping into competitors and knocking anyone out of the race.

Finally I chose a race session and logged in, foregoing the opportunity to run a qualifying lap so I would be gridded near the back of the field and not risk bunching up a lot of faster cars behind me on the start of the race. That part of my strategy worked to perfection, so my #15 Invidia/Club Florida machine was gridded 18th out of 19 cars in my race, which put me as the last car on the outside line, and it meant I could get a nice easy start and not have to worry about holding anyone up.

For me the race started well, but Turn 1, Lap 1 there was a pileup. I made it past the carnage and picked my way through stalled and spun cars without touching anything, and by the time I finished the first lap I had gained four positions to reach 14th place in the field. There were still a lot of cars bunched up together, so I braked a little early for turns and watched the traffic ahead and my mirrors to be sure I wasn’t going to run into anyone or block a faster car recovering from a spin that was coming back up to charge through the field toward the front.

By lap 4, that outside line I had learned in practice began paying off, and I made my first pass of another car, moving up to 13th place by going around the outside of the #3 car driven by William Kirwin. He gave me plenty of room and I stayed up high and we both made it safely without any incident. Nice racing with ya, William.

Down in Turns 3 and 4 on Lap 5 there was another smash-up in the pack ahead of me, and I managed to thread my way around the outside of the spinning and crashing cars without hitting anything, and crossed the line to start Lap 6 up in 10th place.

On Lap 7, that outside groove was working for me again and I passed the #17 of Claude West on the outside coming off Turn 2. And I noticed that the #3 had slotted in behind me and was also using the same groove I was and maintaining pace with me, and he followed me around the outside of the 17 car as well. Again it was some nice clean racing on the part of all drivers–nice racing with you, Claude.

Apparently there was some trouble that I missed elsewhere on the track during that lap as well, and when I came around to finish Lap 7, I had vaulted up into 8th place. Then in Turns 3 and 4 on lap 11, I had my first “oopsie!” of the race. I had been closing in on the sixth place battle between the #10 of Andrew Russell and the #12 of Alex Reis. The 12 car got inside position going into Turn 3, but in the middle of 3 and 4 the 12 and 10 made a little contact and the 12 spun around. I tried to correct a bit to the outside but did not correct enough, and just clipped the rear bumper of the spinning 12 car to “help” him spin out some more as I drove by. Sorry Alex! Needless to say, when I finished lap 11 I had moved up into 7th place, but that’s not the way I like to make a pass for position on someone.

On Lap 14 I passed the #16 car of James Summers who had made contact with the outside wall out of Turn 2, and wound up moving up into 6th place, but this proved the highest point I would get in the field until some of the faster cars involved in earlier incidents began coming up alongside to take those positions back.

The first one of the these was the #3 car of William Kirwin, who finally got a chance to make a pass coming off Turn 2 as we ran lap 15. He came up alongside cleanly, and we had a tiny little “oopsie!” touching doors as we went down the back stretch, but he was clearly ahead of me before we reached Turn 3, so I braked and gave up the position without fighting since I didn’t want to risk collecting both of us in a stupid incident after we had run so many clean laps with each other.

Next up to take a position back was the #12 of Alex Reis, who also passed me cleanly in Turns 3 and 4 on Lap 17. One thing I have noticed from watching my replay is that I seem to have more trouble braking for Turn 3 than for Turn 1 at this track for some reason, and I think maybe it’s that I use a reference point that’s too close to the turn and I sometimes wind up locking the right front tire going into the corner, which loses grip and steering. When we come back here for a points race in Season 2, I’m going to try to have to find a different reference point for braking into that turn and see if I can get it a little smoother.

On Lap 23, the #6 car driven by Alysson Pacheco used a lapped car as a pick to make a nice clean pass on me as we came off of Turn 2. I had been following the #19 of Colin Taber for a couple of laps trying to find a good place to pass but couldn’t, so the lady finally had enough of me being patient and went storming past both of us. When the 19 moved up to give Alysson room to go by in Turns 3 and 4, I finally was able to follow the 6 car and get around the lapper, but it dropped me back to 9th place in the field. Colin and Alysson–nice clean racing with you there.

On Lap 25 I had my worst “oopsie!” of the race and the one that earned me a few docked points on my SR, as well it should have. The #11 car of Adam Bradford (who was already laps down due to an early incident) got around me cleanly by going low through Turns 1 and 2, but then on the exit of 2 drifted up high and had to wait to put the gas down going on the back stretch. I got my normal line off of 2 and had a good head of steam, so I crossed over and passed him on the inside going down the back stretch, getting up along even with him as we went to brake for Turn 3. Unfortunately, I locked the left front tire braking for Turn 3 and my car slid up the track, and I smacked poor Adam pretty hard in his left front corner and sent him slapping up into the outside wall. That was all completely my fault and I’ve got to own it, even though I know it doesn’t make Adam feel any better, nor would that help his car run any better after taking that kind of damage. If it’s any consolation, Adam, I did take a hit on my SR and I’m really sorry for adding more misery to what already seems like it wasn’t much of a fun night for ya.

After that my race pretty much settled down and there wasn’t very much in question until the last couple of laps when the leader, Diego Ballen in the #5 was starting to close in on me and possibly put me a lap down.

I wasn’t tracking the lap count, so I didn’t try to keep him behind, but when I took the white flag (and he took the checkered) his nose was up alongside my rear wheel, so I managed to finish on the lead lap by less than a car length. But I did finish on the lead lap and climbed 9 positions from the starting grid to get a Top 10 finish so I was pleased with that. The only thing that would have made my night better is if I had managed to avoid knocking that poor #11 car into the wall just after halfway.

My final stat line for the night included collecting 50 championship points and getting a +20 on iRating, taking a -11 hit on my SR, and turning a fast lap for the race of 23.818 (which is admittedly not very fast on this track). My average lap was in the 24.7 range, which was about 0.6 seconds off the average pace of our winner in the #5 car, Diego Ballen, who led from the pole and never trailed in the race. Congratulations, Diego.

And that’s my report from the track for the day!

The Rookie Report: August 14, 2010 – Short and Sweet

Hey all,

I haven’t disappeared; I’ve only been putting out fires in other arenas. This week I haven’t run any official events yet. I’m hoping to get some in this evening. However, due to some increased opportunities to work on some other projects, I’ve decided I need to have a shorter time commitment to iRacing. The trucks and the Star Mazda are fun, but they just require too much practice and testing time for me to get anywhere close to being competitive. So I’m going to go back and run a full season of Advanced Legends and the Spec Ford Racer.

That means each day I should be able to complete some testing and an official event (time trial or race) in under an hour. And that’s really about all the time I can give to iRacing right now. I’ll keep posting about my progress and tweeting when I’m going into an official event for those that have been following this blog.

Later this evening I’ll head over to Oxford Plains Speedway in the Legends car and maybe tonight I’ll run some laps at Lime Rock Park in the SFR.

That’s all for now. Look for the tweets to announce I’m headed onto the track! See you out there!

The Rookie Report: August 10, 2010 – Sebring, Darlington, and Real Life

My life may be getting a lot busier….

Just a quick update on Monday and Tuesday. Monday night I ran some Test and Practice laps at Darlington Raceway and out of all the setups I tried I think I like the default Advanced setup the best. My best time at this track is not going to set any records–it’s in the mid 29.9s, and I’ve seen some laps that nearly crack the 29.000 barrier. But the key at this track is simply going to be survival. Finding a setup that can be fast from the green flag on new tires and doesn’t get so tight it wants to add a new layer to the “Darlington Stripe” every lap is going to be a real challenge.

Last night I headed south to Sebring International Raceway in the Star Mazda and ran some test and practice laps. I’m starting here with the same lap times I ended at Road America–in the 2:10.xxx range, but I found a video from Richard Towler (yes, I know he’s an alien) that was 1:56.xxx so I know I have a long way to go. Richard posted a setup on the forums and I’m going to have to work a lot to drive that. My best times are coming in the default low downforce setup.

Now for the busy part. For the better part of the last few months I’ve been working on a business plan and today I have an opportunity to present to the downtown development commission in my city. It doesn’t mean things are going to change overnight, but it may be another significant step forward in the development of the business, which would mean I have a lot more time I need to dedicate to that endeavor.

I’m glad iRacing is here to provide the diversion. After a long day at work and a few evening hours of crunching numbers, getting a chance to burn some rubber and chase some faster laps is a nice way to cap off the day.

The Rookie Report: Week in Review – August 9, 2010

Here’s a review of my rookie racing misadventures for the week ending August 8, 2010:

This week I ran events in 3 series.

Series: Star Mazda Championship
License: Road
Car: Star Mazda
Track: Road America
Start SR: 2.60
Time Trials: 5
Start TT Rating: 1217
Best TT Lap: 2:11.014
End TT Rating: 1210
Races: 4
Start iRating: 1183
Best Race Lap: 2:10.607
End iRating: 1064
Points Earned: 35
Best Official Lap: 2:10.607
End SR: 2.79

Series: NACAR iRacing Class C
License: Oval
Car: Chevrolet Silverado
Track: Richmond International Raceway
Start SR: 2.95
Time Trials: 2
Start ttRating: 1287
Best TT Lap: 22.664
End ttRating: 1311
Races: 2
Start iRating: 1297
Best Race Lap: 22.559
Points Earned: 54
End iRating: 1261
Best Official Lap: 22.559
End SR: 3.51

Series: SK Modified Weekly Series
License: Oval
Car: SK Modified
Track: Thompson International Speedway
Start SR: 3.51
Time Trials: –
Start ttRating: —-
Best TT Lap: —-
End ttRating: —-
Races: 1
Start iRating: 1261
Best Race Lap: 20.072
Points Earned: 46
End iRating: 1286
Best Official Lap: 20.072
End SR: 3.43

Best Finish: 4th Place – Thompson

Key Link/Resource: The iRacing User Forums: I know this repeats from the last weekly update, but the forums are a great source of information about each series and track.

Most Helpful Tip: Stay to the outside when allowing someone to pass. At Road America, especially, I had to let a lot of faster traffic through in the early laps of races, so picking the best line to be passed was important. The times that I felt forced to the left or right on a short straight and that led me to be on the inside of the next turn while faster traffic was overtaking always made for dicey situations.

And that’s a week of racing in the life of this rookie. Remember: to finish first, first you must finish!

The Rookie Report: August 8, 2010 – Star-Crossed Roadies

Remember that old saying: “Know when to say when…”

As it turns out, my idea that I came up with yesterday was a good one. That was the one where I said after I completed one or two races in my primary C-class series for the week, I would think about racing in lower divisions if I have the car and the track for it. It worked out well with a top-5 finish at Thompson in the SK Modified last night. And we’ll never know how it might have turned out. All we do know is that going back to the Star Mazda at Road America was a mistake.

I had been a bit annoyed I hadn’t been able to break through the 2:10 lap time barrier here, and using some advice I read on the forums this week I tweaked my setup a bit. I found a tiny bit more speed (a couple of tenths; not sub-2:10 yet) and thought I would give the 8:30 race tonight a shot.

The setup tweak involved taking a couple of degrees off the front wing, because in the high-speed kink (Turn 11) at the point where “The Bend” is in the track, the car had a tendency to fishtail and spin out at high speed unless I lifted going into that little kink with the setup I had been driving.

I tested the setup and it worked, allowing me to go full throttle through that curve, but the sacrifice was that I had to be a little easier getting on the throttle through the Carousel because it wouldn’t quite hold to the track at the speed I had been doing previously. Still, it was a net reduction in lap times, so I was happy.

When I got to the race session, I was slotted 6th on the grid in a 20-car field with car #13. Being on the outside line for Turns 1 and 2 worked out well, because I was able to brake a bit early and easy for both turns, letting by some faster traffic that hadn’t qualified behind me, and then falling into line. Within the first few laps I had dropped back to 12th, but by lap 10, due to attrition I was back to running 11th. During the race I had a bit of trouble, drifting a bit closer to the edge of the track than I wanted and dropping a wheel off for a one-point incident here, and a one-point there. And then, coming into Turn 4 right after the Toyota walkover bridge, I braked a tad late and spun the car for a 2-point loss of control incident. Nothing was closer than 20 seconds behind me so it didn’t hurt anyone else.

After that, I started pushing, and on Lap 10, I should have known trouble was brewing. That time when I went through the carousel, even though I lifted off the gas more than usual, my car still pushed off the outside of the turn and I had to drive it through the grass and kitty litter to get back on the track. The next lap I made it through that section OK, but because I was pushing, I waited way too late to brake for Turn 12. The car started fishtailing under braking, and then plowed through the sand and into the tire barrier, ending my race.

So the lesson is–know when you’ve had enough. I made it through a race here just fine on Friday and I probably should have left it for that and gone to do something fun like the Skippy at Lime Rock or the SFR at Summit Point. Oh well, live and learn.

And that puts a cap on the first week of Season 3 for this rookie. Tomorrow I’ll post a recap and start practice for the Week Two races. See you on the track!

The Rookie Report: August 7, 2010 – Twisted Thompson

If you told me that and that were gonna happen, I never would have guessed I’d have a Top 5 finish…

Before I get on with the meat of the blog post I have two announcements:

1. I attended my alma mater’s college football practice this afternoon, and the question still remains: can our QB get his head out of spaceland and into his helmet? We have the 6th or 7th least difficult schedule (according to the pollsters) among all D-1 college teams, but we’ll be lucky to win 6 games if he plays like he did in practice today… sheesh…
2. I set up a twitter feed today for the blog, and I’m tweeting as “iRacingRookie”; I got the idea from Trevor over at the iRacing Today podcast, and I shamelessly adopted it for the blog.

Now, back to your regularly scheduled blog post. Today I did something a bit different. I wasn’t sure I wanted to go tackle a full truck race at Richmond again tonight after a pretty full day, and so I started looking at the other oval series I’m qualified to run on my C-license and have the cars to race.

After scrolling through and seeing where they were all racing, I popped into Thompson International Speedway with the SK Modified (even though I said previously I hate that car) and ran a few Practice laps. After taking a few laps to remember there’s that goofy bit coming off Turn 2 on the inside where your car wants to spin out and on the outside where a bit of wall is missing, I settled in to running a long stretch of laps and found that I was actually competitive, turning in a top 10 fast lap time of 19.924 for the session. It was about a half-second off the fastest lap, but less than a tenth out of seventh place, so I didn’t feel too bad about it.

I looked up the next race and saw there would be a 50-lap event in about ten minutes, so I signed up for it and posted a tweet in case any readers wanted to join me as a driver or spectator (I set up a link so tweets will appear on the blog page for anyone that cares). It’s one of the things I’ve seen Trevor start to do, and it looked like a cool way to supplement the longer report posts I’ve been doing.

When the race started I was assigned Car #3 and placed sixth on the grid of 11 drivers since I didn’t have a qualifying time. My race started well enough, but I dropped back a couple of spots to eighth after the third lap when I went a bit low exiting Turn 2 and hit that magic spot that seems to decide it should change the direction your car is traveling by a random increment. I don’t know how realistic that is, but it’s almost like a spot on the track down low in the exit of Turn 2 where there’s a permafrost zone or something, because driving over it has the same effect as driving across a patch of ice on the highway. The car seems to randomly yaw and turn and wants to either drive into the outside wall or down on the grass infield unless you hit the brakes hard to bring it under control and then get going again. If I take my normal line out of Turn 2 which is about a lane higher, the grip stays good and the exit is smooth and silky. But that one little spot is just treacherous.

I kept the car on the track and going the right direction through that, but hitting the brakes meant that seventh and eighth got a good run on me into Turn 3, so I just braked a bit early and ran high to let them go by before settling back in behind them.

The race settled down and a couple of laps later I was able to re-take seventh with a pass in Turns 3 and 4, and then work to see if I could track down sixth place. I never quite got that chance. On Lap 10, I passed the #10 car facing the wrong way along the outside wall of the back stretch. As soon as I cleared him, I saw smoke rising from Turns 3 and 4, and started looking to see what happened. As I approached, I saw two cars stalled up high in the turn with a clear lane below, so I took the low line and entered the turn at more or less a normal pace.

That’s when one of the stalled cars, the #1 machine, decided to back down the banking of the race track to try to get room to resume driving. Just a note to anyone reading–backing up on a race track when the green flag is out is never a good idea. I saw him start to move and slammed on the brakes, but I hit him a ton, throwing his car up into the air and bringing me to a dead stop just in time for the car behind me to plow into me.

Of course the system registered a 4-point incident, and one or both hits mangled the suspension pretty bad, so the car was not going anywhere fast. I called for the tow truck and cooled my heels waiting for the trip to the pits. When the tow was done, I hopped back into the repaired car and exited the pits to rejoin the race. I was three laps down to the leader, but due to the early attrition from the crash that involved me and a couple of others, I was still in eighth place. I also dipped the left-side wheels off the track exiting the pits and picked up a single incident point for that.

From this point my race went pretty smoothly until my lap 27, when I saw smoke coming from Turns 1 and 2 as I crossed the Start/Finish line. This time I was a bit more savvy than before and slowed down substantially more than usual for the entry to Turn 1. It’s a good thing I did because two cars (the #8 and #2) had managed to wreck in the middle of Turns 1 and 2, right in the racing line. There was room up high and down low, but at race speed I would have wrecked into the wall or spun down on the grass and eventually crashed somewhere if I didn’t just plow into them on the track, I’m sure.

How those cars got there was a bit of a story in itself. It stared on the exit of Turn 4 when the 8 bounced off the wall exiting the turn and sideswiped the 5 car trying to pass him low, sending both of them spinning down into the grass. The #8 had a head of steam and just spun all the way down the front stretch and up the banking to slam into the wall in the middle of Turns 1 and 2 when the #2 got there and nailed him good when he bounced back off the wall.

This time because I had slowed more, I picked the high line around the two stalled cars and kept going without making contact with the wall or the cars either one. My race had a nice long quiet uneventful stretch after that, where I eventually climbed to fourth place through the attrition of others. Then on my lap 43 I hit the magic spot down low on the exit of Turn 2. I saved the car again, but not before running a couple of wheels into the infield and getting another 1 point off-track incident point for it. It also brought the leader up to within a second of my rear bumper, so in the next lap or so I gave him room in Turns 3 and 4 and let him go, going down a fourth lap.

And eventually that’s how it ended. I was four laps down, but I finished in fourth place. It was good for my iRating (adding +25 to 1286), but the six incident points I accumulated knocked my SR down (-0.08 to 3.43).

I think as Season 3 unfolds and I find the time to do so, I will likely try to run some of the lower-division races once I have successfully completed one or two full C-Class races in the Silverado or the Star Mazda for the week. While those are the series I am running for the full season and to primarily build my skills with, running shorter races in the lower-division cars that I already own and for the tracks I already have may just help me hone those car control skills and find a bit more speed for use in my two primary series.

And that’s all for tonight. See you on the track!

The Rookie Report: August 6, 2010 – Road (Trip Across) America

What a difference a day makes!

Last time I was at Road America for a race, I really didn’t like this place. That was on Wednesday. Then after a night of running the trucks at Richmond I was back again tonight for another race and I fell in love all over again.

Road America is a fun course, and the Star Mazda is a great little car to drive here. I say “drive” and not “race” because I’m just sorta getting used to the car and I can’t properly claim to be racing with it until I’m completely comfortable. I can also say “drive” because tonight I was actually keeping it under control… mostly…

I ran a bit of practice on a fairly full server this evening when I first logged on just to get re-acquainted with the car and see if I remembered how to turn right as well as left after doing 120 circuits around Richmond last night. The car pretty much stayed in one piece, so I signed up for a race and then did some testing.

When the race server came up, I was slotted in 7th on the grid in Car #12 of a 19-car field. Once again less than half the field had posted a qualifying time, so there were a lot of low numbers toward the back of the grid. I had thought about my race strategy, and I decided to stick with my normal road course plan: after launching and letting the field get a bit settled, if I saw cars stacking up behind me I would just pull to the right on the straights and ease off the gas a bit to let the faster traffic by until I found a good place to slot in.

This strategy worked pretty well, except for one point on about Lap 2 or 3. Some yahoo decided he absolutely had to take it 3-wide between Turns 1 and 2, trying to pass a pair of cars behind me in that short chute. I hit my normal braking marks going into Turn 2 and he ran into the back of me. Fortunately, while it registered a 4-incident hit on me (and I presume on him) it didn’t seem to damage me, and he zipped by with the others on the long straight after Turn 2 and I didn’t see him again, so I think he must have been OK, too.

By lap 5 or so I had dropped all the way back to 12th and I could see there were only 14 of us still running. But by Lap 10, I was back up to 8th without having to pass anyone because of attrition by the cars ahead of me, and that’s pretty much how the race went on from there. I don’t think I saw another car ahead or behind after lap 11, and I finished with a good 25-second bubble on either side of me. Of the 10 cars that finished the race, I was the last one on the lead lap.

I set a new personal best time in the race of a 2:10.899–nothing exciting or special about that, for sure–and after that contact on the second lap I had a single 1-point off at Turn 11 on about lap 15 or 16 because I waited a bit too long to brake and drove through the kitty litter. Finishing in the top half of the field was good for bumping up my iRating by 28 to an 1116, and my SR also got a nice lift by 0.21 to a 2.87.

That’s all for tonight! See you on the track!

The Rookie Report: August 5, 2010 – Rockin’ Richmond

I survived a Truck race to the end, and finished on the lead lap!

OK I just have to say it–the trucks are a blast! Tonight I was spending some quality time with the Silverado, first running a TT, then a Qualifying session, and finally my second attempt at a Richmond race.

I ran some Practice laps to get the feel of the truck again after having spent last night driving the Star Mazda. After 60 laps, I went and did a Time Trial. I ran a couple of sets of laps and my best set was a 22.792 for 10 laps and a best single lap of 22.675. Both of those were pretty dismal, I know and I actually LOST 1 point of TTRating for going under the speed limit, I guess.

Then I went out and did a qualifying run, posting a qualifying time of 22.703. It’s nothing special, but I knew it would put me in the front half of the field for a race, and hopefully away from all the yo-yos causing the wrecks in the back.

Then I cooled my heels waiting for the 8:45 p.m. race. When the race opened I found I was in Truck #9 of a 20-truck field, and due to my qualifying time I was slated to be in 6th place on the grid.

Now I would be lying to you if I said the race was the smoothest thing in the world. Eleven cautions and 55 laps of yellow should be enough to tell you that. But I can tell you that I was not involved nor did I get caught in any of those yellows, so that was a good thing. In fact, my incident meter was unscathed until about lap 85 when I touched the wall avoiding some people trying to wreck and picked up a 2-incident hit, but it didn’t appear to or feel like it did any damage.

Now if I had the talent to bring you the voices of those guys Raj and Reg who do the Metro PCS commercials, I might want to take you all the way through the race. But since I don’t and you probably don’t want to read all of that detail, let me just give you the highlights.

The longest green-flag run we had began with the restart on lap 21 and ended with a yellow on lap 45. My setup was working pretty good because I took that restart in 6th, then I dropped back to 8th in the first couple of laps, but by the time 25 more laps had passed, I had worked my way back up to 5th place and was reeling in 4th by a couple tenths per lap. So my truck was working good on long runs and I hoped that we might get some longer runs in the second half of the race, but alas it was not meant to be.

That yellow on Lap 45 was also where I changed tires for the first time. At each of the first 3 yellow flags (yes, Lap 21 ended the third caution of the race) I checked my tire wear and all of it was in the high 90s still. I came out of the pits in 7th place after that, but that was the lowest position I was in for the rest of the race, I think.

As the laps wore down, I began trying to calculate when the best time would be to get fresh tires for the final time. In the mean time, on Lap 57, I turned in my fast lap of the race, a 22.559.

The real fun started when the lap count got up closer to the century mark. By the restart on Lap 75, I was running in third place, and on the inside line behind a leader that knows how to take a green flag restart. We both had great restarts, and by the time we came off Turn 2 on that lap, I was running second with a full second back to third place. That lasted all the way through that green flag run and until the next restart on Lap 85, when the leader and I were side by side. I had no illusions I could overtake him, but our trucks did seem to be the two that worked best on longer runs, so I thought maybe we would have a chance to pull away and open up a gap if things stayed green.

On that restart, we both got away cleanly again, but this time third place was pretty quick, and within a couple of laps he was breathing down my neck so I gave him the position and then a yellow came out. So I decided to pit to go off-sequence with the rest of the leaders. There would be about 30 laps to go, and if we had a long green run to the end, fresh tires would do me good.

On lap 100 (after a couple of more yellows) I had my first Wowza! moment of the night. I was running fifth and trying to pick my way through a knot of trucks with older tires. Someone ahead checked up and I checked up, and the #2 truck running behind me tried to check up, but not quite enough. He got into me (0-incident contact) enough to turn me, and I had the brake and gas and steering all going at once as I dirt-tracked it through the corner, boiling smoke off my rear tires and probably making everyone around me wonder who I was going to take out when I wrecked. But I didn’t–I never spun it far enough to register a loss of control, and the 2 backed off to give me room to regain control and the party kept going. It gave the crowd a nice show, for sure. I did lose a couple of places back to 7th, though, but I managed to regain 6th before the next yellow, about 3 laps later.

My second and final Wowza! moment came after the final restart. The #7 truck and I had had some close battles all night, and I was behind him in fifth place, a little faster, but he was driving in his mirrors and determined to do everything he could to block me. On lap 119 I got underneath him going into Turn 1, but through 1 and 2 he came down the track on me, making contact and nudging me down onto the apron. That threatened to spin me, but I somehow managed to keep from picking up any contact points or loss of control points for an incident and got the truck going again, losing ground only to a couple of lapped trucks. I finished the race in 5th, and it was so much fun that I really couldn’t be mad at the #7 for driving a little rough to hold on to his position.

So I finished the race in fifth, adding 48 to my iRating (to a 1261) and +0.59 to my SR (to a 3.51). The race was over an hour long, so I’m not sure I’ll try one again before Darlington–I may not have time to spare. This week my alma mater’s college football team reported for fall camp, and I’m going to try to catch some practices over the weekend to get a look at a couple of transfers and freshmen players we picked up during the summer.

So it was a fun night, and a good result. I’m looking forward to the rest of the season, and I hope to see you on the track!

The Rookie Report: August 4, 2010 – Driving Like a Rookie

It’s not starting off to be a good week…

Tonight I went road racing at Road America in the Star Mazda. Actually I had a Time Trial, a Qualifying session, and a Race. The Time Trial went OK… I found out something interesting: that you can actually gain SR in a Time Trial even if you don’t put official laps in. I was working on a slight modification to the default low downforce setup and did manage to find a tiny bit more speed today; I turned in a still less-than-impressive 2:11.922 for a fast lap, but never managed to put 5 clean laps together. I finished 8 laps and gained .03 to my SR, giving me a new rating of 2.67.

After the Time Trial I ran a qualifying session and turned in a 2:11.987, and added .02 to my SR to bring it to a 2.69. Then I entered a race session. In my split I was actually slotted 2nd on the grid and I was in Car #3. For some reason even though my times are not very good in the splits that I’m getting into so far for races I’m put pretty far up the grid and in a low-number vehicle.

I got a good start, and actually got ahead of the pole sitter on the run into Turn 1. However, I never got clear of him, so I braked a little early and gave him the corner, then slotted in behind him since nobody was right on our tails yet. By the end of the first lap I had dropped back to fourth, giving a couple of places to faster cars that were coming up on me from further down the grid where nobody qualified (I think only 3 of us had qualifying times). I dropped farther back on Lap 2, to sixth, and by the end of Lap 3, I was running in eighth place.

On Lap 4 I made what is probably my best save so far in iRacing. I was following 7th down the long high-speed stretch toward Turn 12, with 9th place closing behind me. Since 9th was less than a second back, I planned to brake early and give him the position for the turn. However, he didn’t realize I was planning that so he over drove into the turn and wound up spinning his car as he went through Turn 12. I saw the open track to the inside and started by, when he tried a power spin to try to turn his car back in the right direction, and I zipped past him as he was spinning circles throwing up clouds of smoke. I don’t know what happened to him, because by the time I got to the Pit Straight there was open track for 20 seconds behind me according to my F3 panel.

I was feeling pretty smug about making it through that–and of course for me, that should always be a danger sign. On the next lap, two drivers who had managed to crash each other out decided to start debating who was at fault in text chat, and that kept popping up at the top of my screen, and like an idiot I started reading it instead of paying attention to where I was going. So coming into Turn 14 on lap 5, I completely missed my braking point, and went shooting off the track, through the gravel and slammed into the tire barrier.

After Richmond last night I didn’t expect any favors, but I called for a tow truck and waited. Sure enough when I got back in the car after the tow, the steering and front were still all messed up, so I retired without leaving Pit Road since the car was undriveable in any kind of safe condition. I finished in 9th place, and lost a bit of iRating (-30 to an 1153) but managed to gain 0.01 of SR (even with 3 incident points) to give me an even 2.70.

I’m going to give myself 2 weeks to get through a complete race in Class C on both the Oval and Road sides. However, if I can’t manage finishing a complete race (regardless of iRating or SR gains and losses) after the first two weeks, I will strongly consider dropping down to run the D-class Late Model in Ovals or the D-Class Skip Barber on the Road side to see if I can gain a little more consistent results. I’m thinking that perhaps I just skipped too much in going all the way from Rookie to C-Class in these first few weeks since I joined iRacing, and I may need to back it off to D-Class and let my skill catch up with my license level. Oh well, we’ll see how it goes.

And that’s all for today’s rookie report. See you on the track!