Some tidbits:
Driving straight here from San Diego, leaving at 2:20am for a 12 hour
drive is brutal. Next time I get some sleep first. Thanks to Leslie
Cohen and Mark Duerst who let me nap in their Corvette while Mark drove
my car outside Las Vegas. An hour of sleep was was very good.
I thought I would do this Pro differently than I normally do. I decided
to get there on time to register, tech, and do some practice starts. I
needed to scrub in a brand new set of Hoosiers also. Other than being
tired, it all worked out, except one detail. I neglected to note that
Utah is in a different time zone. Duh!
Also developed an overheating problem that more coolant fixed, at least
for now.
I did squeak in my practice starts. Kind of odd staging without the
prestage light, and the left course had a little seam that caused your
car to roll. None of my rpms worked well, since the car hopped too much
at higher rpms. I ended up decided to launch at about 4500rpms.
The large number of rocks and gravel made things interesting also. They
stuck to the tires, but it sounded like your wheel was falling off. Big
rocks. They were everywhere.
Then came the wind. Temps were reasonable, maybe 90 degrees. Scattered
clouds, and a few minor rains that barely wet the pavement. But the
wind....it was incredible. Anything that was not tied down or very heavy
started to get blown around. I was next to the Elder's paddock spot and
spent 15-20 minutes running after jackets and papers and other items.
Then, I noticed their Jeep was no longer in the same place. A strong
gust was treating it like a sailboat since it's back was open. It was
rolling and accelerating towards another car. Small moment of panic as I
jumped in and got the brake applied 6 feet short of impact.
The wind was so strong, that rocks were being picked up and became
airborne. I mentioned to another driver that the main problem was your
hair started to hurt, from being blown around. Then I noted he was
follically challenged. Oops...
The course was long and quite straight. Not too much turns in this. A
few little kinks, a long slalom, another gate that caught some people,
the turn around, and then it was full out back to the finish with some
minor turns in there. For me, it was 1st to 2nd to 3rd full throttle,
then keep it in 3rd with a small tap of the brakes to get thru the
slalom, hard braking for the turnaround, downshift to 2nd, accelerate
past the the first turn, back to 3rd, full throttle past the finish
lights.
It was a longish course for a Pro, but because it was quick, good times
were in the low 30 seconds, with some cars getting into the 29s. My CS
MR2 was in the 31s.
Today, the weather has mostly been great. Not too hot, scattered clouds
for shade. The wind has not been nuts. No rain. The surface cleaned up
well, but since it starts out pretty sticky, it does not get a lot
better as far as I can tell. The afternoon times were not hugely
improved over the morning times.
Now for Sunday...
Randy Chase
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