mazdaspeedwest

Saturday:
nice and dry, a little on the cool side, but comfortable. I felt the course was fast, especially the first section, a few high speed chicane gates into a 3 cone slalom, 2 more gates, then a 4 cone slalom into a hard right hander with a rather late apex, made for nice drifts.

I had such a hard time "seeing" the first slalom entry...i always hit it wrong...i had some mental block about it or something...then all of a sudden i saw it...kinda strange. Since it was only my 3rd time on a course and the other 2 had cones all around...this time there were "gates" so i had to learn how to "see" them. Not as easy as it sounds when you hit the gates doing about 45mph....at the end of the day during fun runs, the slalom cones got moved a bit, basically making them a straight shot, just a few small twists and you were at the hard right in no time...hit the rev limiter in 2nd....thats about 65mph

Will K and my teammate Art, were battling. They were pulling some fast times...58's 57's and Will hit a 56 to edge it out. I was consistently in the 61's and low 62's....the funny thing is, i drove Art's 92 SE-R Sentra and hit a 62, with a spin!

I rode with DAvid A in his new Altima.....the cushiest autox run ever...gobs of power in that car....it was very nice!

Sunday:
It was overcast, in the morn, but stayed dry for the 1st 3 run groups...of course STS was 4th, so we got the our runs on a wet track. (was even worse for the next run group and we, STS, had to work the course....i was soaked to the bone) Now this made me a bit nervous...i must have adjusted tire pressure 3 times before my first run...i decided to run it like this...1st run - feel it out, 2nd run - ***** out, 3rd run - fast but clean. I was suprised by 2 things...ME and the CAR! wow, i did MUCH better than i expected....never touched a cone, nor did i spin....wasn't lightning fast, but i was clean a smooth. In my 3 runs i ran, 67, 66, 67....i beat out a few Type R's running in the 72's & 73's.
i got second place in STS Novice, got beat by about 3 tenths of a second.... In regular STS, i think i would have placed 13th out of 27 cars. Not bad for a beginner....the upper half is fine with me for now Unoficially of course, the results will be posted soon.
Will K won STS, but i forgot his time. His car handles GREAT with the new suspension set up. (Escort GT) It was a muti driver car this weekend, Will, David and Julie (David's girlfriend) I didn't get to see the times, but i'm sure they were fast.

All in all, i learned alot that i will apply to the next event and hopefully i will be a bit closer to the top runners....i don't expect miracles, so i'm quite happy with my performance so far. Plus, it's the most fun on 4 wheels!!!!

Sorry for the long post....

Davard

Will won with a 59.133, as it was just starting to rain. I was 2nd with a 59.491, in a nice steady drizzle. Julie won the ladies' class by 4.3 secs, with a 61.516, a time that would have placed her 4th in the open class (ahead of Art by 0.9 sec.)

BTW, we just had our 2nd aftershock (small earthquake) while I've been typing this. (edit: they measured 4.2 and 3.9)

mazdaspeedwest

Those are some great times!

Funny, i was watching the news last night at the time the 3.9 hit, i never felt it down here, nor the 4.2.

- Thanks Jesse!