Reflection

So, 2009 is coming to a close. I wanted to take the time to reflect on a few things that happened through the year. For me, this year was pretty big in terms of my growth as an automotive enthusiast but more specifically, as a driver.

After spending the past 2-3 years concentrating solely on grip driving, I decided to embark on drifting a lot more about a year ago. I think I only did about 2 grip events this year, while all the rest were drifting events (easily 10 or more in total). I think I got a lot better throughout the year, thanks to help from people like Filipino Alex, Hawaiian Alex, Andy, Johnny Mac, Wes and of course Taka. With their confidence inspiring words (minus the Hawaiian, because he always tells me Corollas are "ghey" and I should buy a Z) I actually entered my first drifting competition. As you read in one of my older blogs I didn't do too well, but it certainly was a growing and learning experience for me. So much so that in my 2nd competition ever (at Primm) I placed 4th, which out of a field of about 10-12 driver's isn't too bad at all.

I also had a realization this year that I've never had before: I don't really need any more parts for my car right now. My car is pretty well built with the most tested and reliable parts in racing, and I have the best people in the industry to help me when I need it. My money hasn't been going towards specific parts, but only when things are in need of repair. With the money saved there, I can put it towards tires and events, which I did.

I finally got a tow vehicle, so I'm no longer so fatigued before and after events from driving a super loud, punishing, and super illegal vehicle. Towing is the bees knees for sure.

I also started realizing how lucky I am to have the above people to help me out. From reading Club4ag on a regular basis, I get frustrated with how the most unrespected, most unreliable people are giving the newbs information and opinions, and probably shaping their thoughts and beliefs. That's truly unfortunate, so I'm fortunate to have such well seasoned and educated friends help me on my journey. Not everybody has professional racing drivers, mechanics, fabricators and lunatics to shape their outlook and opinions on things (the lunatic is again, the Hawaiian).

So all in all, a pretty good 2009. I want a better showing in the next all AE86 drift comp that will hopefully happen next year, and I hope to break 1:30 at SOW too!

Hotties in NASCAR?

Ooohhhhweee its been a while since I updated this thing. The 4AG time attack was a few weeks ago, but beyond that, there hasn't really been anything automotive related going on with me. I've chosen to spend my time in another way, which has been quite awsome!

Anyhow, onto this week's big big story. Danica has finally signed with NASCAR. She'll be competing with Dale Earnhardt Jr's company, but will start in a lower league in order to earn her license to run with the big boys. There's a lot of controversy as to whether or not she'll be competative, and whether or not its a good career move. She's earing a pretty good salary and is relatively competative in INDY, but looking at other INDY driver's histories (whom have been better than her) you'll notice that none of them have done well. As a matter of fact, the only open wheel racer who has started to climb the ranks is Juan Pablo Montoya, but I consider him to be a different class of driver since he'd done Formula 1. Anyhow there's no doubt that Danica will continue to hog the limelight and plenty of redneck fanboys will think she's cute, but how well will it be recieved to have such a high profile female driver in NASCAR? I'm sure there's other women in NASCAR at the moment, but I don't and chanes are that you don't know who they are. Two things are certain, however. 1, Danica has some twangy redneck music now on her website (http://www.danicaracing.com0/ and 2, I will watch maybe 1 full lower league NASCAR race this year, just to see how she's doing.

Fantastic Video!

Club4AG Las Vegas drift event!!! from Robert Strohmeyer on Vimeo.

Live and Learn

I've had to put driving on the backburner. With Jesse's wedding and Jason's bachelor party, I didn't have much time to do any events, or any money to do them for that manner. Since those events passed (and were tons of fun!) I was able to concentrate on getting ready for the 4AG drift competition at Primm (stateline Nevada). I told Naoki I'd do it if he towed me, and he agreed.

The car was down for a bit because it simply wouldn't start. Eventually I traced it down to the starter, and luckily I had a spare I bought about 4 years ago. I knew I'd use it someday! Anyhow once I got it running, I changed the engine oil and filer and just loaded the car up.

The event was interesting for several reasons. First, its the second drift competition I'd ever done. Second, it was out of state. Third, I had some friends coming to visit me so it was certainly added pressure to do well.

As usual, we had 3 runs to get it right, and the best of those 3 runs would be our score. I hadn't quite gotten the course down consistently by then, but figured I had nothing to lose. My first two runs were crap, but the third run was okay. I didn't feel too good about any of my runs, but at least I connected the third one. Once the event ended, it turned out that Alex V and white boy Mark took first and second, with another guy I didn't know taking third. Then Taka and John told me I missed third place by a few fractions of a point. I wasn't upset at all, because its still only the 2nd competition I'd ever done.

Really though, how could I be upset? I had a fantastic time in Vegas on Saturday night, I got to hang out with my good friends, and had some amazing visitors as well.

After the comp, John rode with me and helped me work out the course. I ended up with this:


Can't bee too unhappy with the weekend :)

Another in car:

Auto Shows

I dug up this old video I took at the Tokyo Auto Salon a few years ago. They had shows every 30 minutes with cute dancing girls to kickoff the launch of 3 new Mitsubishi vehicles. Yet anothing that that is better in Japan: Auto Shows.

Motorcycle Heaven

So a few weeks ago, I decided to take a trip down to San Diego to visit my good friends, Sid and Desiree. After eating a wonderful Octoberfest lunch, Sid asked me if I'd like to tag along to visit a motorcycle junkyard. While I'm not as familiar with motorcycles as I am with cars, I'm always interested in anything mechanical, so I said I'd love to go! I had no idea what I was in for, but thought it would be an educational experience nevertheless. Here is a brief tour of Stockers!
To say they have exhausts is an understatement.

What's amazing is how well organized everything is. These bins have engine specific parts in them, and there are even some engines lying around, labled and all.

This bin had make and models specific parts in it, but I loved the carbs :)

Sid and his buddy were looking for a gas tank that they could use for a custom project. So, they looked....
....and looked. As you can see, they have a lot of gas tanks. As a matter of fact, they completely line the walls of the entire building.

They also have wheels. I can only imagine if there was an AE86 shop like this somewhere.

More neatly labeled parts bins.

Old school Harley. Maybe someday.

This is more like it!

Where do I begin...

This past month has to be the most stressful time I've had in quite a while. There's a large gap in my posts because I haven't been doing anything really automotive related, or at least motor sport or enhancement related. Instead, I've had crazy other things going on: I recently just moved, been having some lady problems, been trying to purchase a truck, and worst of all my daily driver started to have some issues. The other things aren't automotive related, so we'll just cover the daily driver since its the closest thing automotive I can write about, since I know you guys don't wanna hear about other lame crap going on.

As you can see in the photo above, the pulley is out of my 4-door, thanks to master technician English. Mr. English removed the pulley to find that the keyway is broken, along with the crank key and timing gear. Looks like the pulley bolt came loose at some point and caused havoc, and I've been driving it like this for lord knows how long. This was the biggest snag we ran into with the 4-door while attempting the timing belt change, as there were a few other surprises on the car as well. I guess 175K miles on a car can bring fourth some interesting things.

Luckily for me, I have great friends. I called around to a lot of my local Corolla brethren only to hear that while at one point they did own a replacement pulley which may have worked, they eventually discarded it. I actually used to have one as well before I threw mine away. One nice fellow, has been a photo contributor on here (Wes Hamachi) was kind enough to bring by a silvertop 20v pulley to see if it will work. Unfortunately, it did not. As you can see, the 4AF pulley on the left is shorter than the pulley on the right, (the 20v). It isn't just the number of grooves for the belt, but the spacing was different as well. I still appreciated the gesture, and took Wes out to eat (I owed him some money too from Vegas. Doesn't everybody?)

After realizing that my deadline was approaching (Mr. English wanted to have the car done by Thursday) I started calling around to local salvage yards that have parts ready to go. They all wanted around $75 for the pulley. While I could have easily driven down there to buy it and not broken a sweat doing it, instead I chose to hit up my local pick your part. The Stanton yard had about 4 different 4AF engines which were the exact ones I could use the pulley from. I also lucked out by finding one that had all of the drive belts already taken off making my job that much easier. After impacting the bolt and prying the pulley off, I left the yard taking some happiness in the fact that i saved about $50 on the pulley over going to the other "ready to go" salvage yard.

So now, the pulley is in Mr. English's hands. I'm moved in, and just bought a can opener today. Life seems to be looking up.

I'd like to try to end my blogs on a happy note, and I think we all know nothing makes me happier than AE86's! (except maybe titties)

Bums!

I'm totally not talking about those souls who've had society turn their back on them. Chances are, they may have not been smart enough to keep themselves clean or make sound financial decisions, but more than likely if they're going sailing in the deep ocean they'd bring a life vest.

I'm talking about the bums at drift events. There's lots of them. The idiots who don't bring tools, spares, or logical things that would more than likely make life easier for them or perhaps get them home.

I used to be all about helping people out, because "drifters" used to be part of a community of people who cared about each other, and who went out of their way to get each other home. You helped someone out when you could, because chances are they'd help you when you needed it. These days, there are more and more people who aren't capable to help anybody, because they can't help themselves. More and more losers who keep asking to borrow my tools. More and more losers to return them no longer functioning, more and more losers to repetitively ask to borrow the same things.

A few weeks ago, I was at a drift event. This kid in an old BMW asks to borrow my air compressor, and I generously let him. I think nothing of it. All I asked is that he return it when he's done. He does (or rather his friend does), then another pit neighbor asks to borrow it as well. He then informers me that its not working. I inspect it, and find that its broken. Seeing as how the second guy to use it couldn't even fire it up, I'm guessing it was the kid with the BMW. Not only were the prongs on the input unit itself bent, but he blew the fuse inside of it.

The reason why guy A sucks:

He broke my compressor and returned it hoping that I wouldn't notice. He left before I could say anything.

The reason why guy B sucks:

He's driving a $35K car but can't afford to bring an air compressor or jack.

Guy A, driving an old E30 BMW (which was basically stock) obviously isn't made of money, but came unprepared. Buy B, who has a lot more money, also came unprepared.

So you see, your financial status has nothing to do with it at all. Bottom line is, if you come to a toga party, bring a f*#@ing TOGA!

It'll never happen to me

I think this photo sort of speaks for itself. For those of you that don't know what this was from, Felipe Massa, a factory Ferrari Formula 1 driver, was recently struck by a stray suspension piece (a spring) during qualifying at the Hungaroring. He was traveling at 150mph. After being struck, he started to lose consciousness but not before applying some pressure to the brakes moments before he crashed into a tire barrier.

This is why I think people who question regulations on safety equipment are morons. Lots of people I run into (unfortunately because I happen to associate with dirty drift people) consistently complain about mandatory SA approved helmets, roll bars, nomex suits, side impact bars, and everything else that could potentially save your life or prevent serious injury. Felipe's incident should convince you that every piece of safety equipment you can use is well worth it. Put up with some discomfort and high cost to give yourself a chance in case something terrible does happen. Remember that most safety equipment isn't there to protect you from common happenings (you don't get hit in the face at 150mph by a spring, do you?), but there to prevent you from uncommon happenings. In cases like these, its always better to have it and never need it, then need it and not have it.

Mind you also, that Felipe Massa is wearing the most advanced, state of the art safety equipment yet it still can't totally prevent catastrophes. If this can happen to him, imagine what would have happened to you if you were wearing your lame helmet?

Formula D Las Vegas, 2009

I've been to every round of Formula D Las Vegas. Its an excuse to make a quick trip out of California and enjoy a nice weekend in sweltering heat, expensive strippers, and $4 steak dinners. This year was sans the expensive strippers, but it was certainly full of other exciting happenings.

First and foremost is the news that my friend Alex Pfeiffer is now driving for Tanaka racing in their insane Chevrolet Corvette. Alex tried out for them about a week ago and they immediately offered him the drive. I like many other people have been dying to see him get back in the driver's seat instead of forcing me to drink beer and watch Condorman every weekend. I think I may get a break because this bastard will be setting up the suspension on the car for the upcoming round. Anyhow, for his first time out in the car, he managed to qualify for the second day and even put up a good fight against Sam Hubinette in the Viper. All in all, not a bad first showing.


Another one of my friends who was driving this weekend was Joon, the great Korean hope. Since John Yim is retired and since I'm nowhere near being a professional (anything) Joon single handily carries the flag for all Korean drifters. This particular weekend was semi sweet for him. He qualified well, and even advanced to the round of best 16, where he eventually had to do battle with Tanner Foust. In the head of battle, Joon crashed on entry but after seeing his car in the pits afterwards, the damage didn't look too bad. I hope he can get it right in time for Washington!


Taka didn't have the best weekend either. On Friday practice, he broke an oil cooler and was forced to find a replacement on short notice (who the hell breaks an oil cooler?) but eventually made it back out. He ran quite well, and qualified somewhere around 16th or 17th. He met Ryan Turek in the first round of tandem, and unfortunately fell victim to the increasingly threatening Mobil 1 Solstice. Regardless, the fans still love him and were we see a girl getting Taka to sign her TRD shirt, where she also has Tommy Suell's signature.


Seeing Orido at a Formula D event was quite a surprise. He's one of the D1 celebrities whom I love to see even if he's not driving. The rumor was, he attended the event with the president of Japan's "other" drift series, MSC. If you're not familiar with MSC, I'd recommend going to youtube immediately and watching what they have to offer. I can only guess that their presence there means a possibility of an MSC/Formula D event in the near future. One can really only hope for such awesomeness.

The other cool part about Orido coming for this round, is that he played spotter for Ryuji Miki. It comes as no surprise then, that Ryuji Miki advanced to the finals and ended up finishing second overall that night. It goes to show you that with the right motivation and right coaching, chances of victory are far greater. Having somebody like Orido in your corner helps immensely. Surround yourself with winners and you'll start seeing results.

I also am happy that the man loves Bud Light.


While talking to Pfeiffer I also met this cute girl who has a similar taste in fashion as me!

Another year, another FD vegas trip. I didn't get to do the regular Vegas stuff this time around, so I guess I'll just have to wait till SEMA for debachery.

All photos courtesy of Wes Hamachi!
hamachiboysracing@yahoo.com

Japan ups the ante

Half time entertainment is something I'd think we do the best in the USA. Apparently not in drifting.

Lost the Mojo

I haven't posted in a while because of so much that has been going on. A few weeks ago was the all AE86 drift competition in which I participated. Aside from the fact that it was the first event of its kind, and beside the fact that it brang many of my friends together, it was an event I'd almost rather forget. I drove so poorly that day that I'm sure it was difficult for the photographers to find photos of me that were complimentary.

I'm not really sure what happened. Maybe because it was my first competition and I was not used to the environment, or maybe because I didn't have enough time at the balcony to prepare. Either way, I was quite dissappointed with my performance. In a way, I feel like I let some of my "teachers" down.

To move on past the depressing part, we'll get to some more fun stuff.



This guy, JMAC, finished 4th. He clawed his way all the way through the ranks with a stock red top engine. If there ever was a better example of driver over machine, I dare you to find it.

On top of all that, since he doesn't own an AE86 anymore, he was kind enough to offer me the tires he had left over for the next drift event I do.




Seeing as how I didn't do as well as I would have liked, I was kind of down. I had practiced so much and put so much emphasis on drifting for the past few months and I felt like I had made no strides forward in skill. Pancit Alex suggested I do an event to get my "mojo" back, and after some thinking I felt he was right. The way I looked at it, I could either be upset that I drove poorly, or take any opportunity I could to get back on the horse and try again.

This prompted me to head out the following weekend to Inland Drift again. Luckily, Taka and Yoshie were there to give me some kind words and pointers, so I could begin getting some confidence again. The day ended with an interesting conversation with the owner of Inland Drift. Turns out he's an AE86 fan (and owner I think) and he enjoyed watching me run. He asked if I'd come out to one of their Friday events to help put on a show for the locals by doing some tandem runs. I told him that if I could choose who I went with, I'd do it. Its nice to hear that some people appreciate your driving! His kind words were a nice confidence booster.

Above is a video that I found on youtube from that day, with one of my runs.

Anyhow this upcoming weekend has a competition that Pancit Alex, MarkX and a few other friends will be competing in, so I'll be in the 909 again to cheer them on. Sunday's got another practice drift day for me!

Getting back on the horse is better than sitting in the dirt.

Missing Bolts

The competition is still about two weeks away, but I wanted to get a head start on some of the maintenance and problems with my car. A few weeks ago, Steve from SR Motorcars (http://www.srmotorcars.com/) was kind enought o take a look at my tune, touch it up a bit, and actually gave it a few more ponies and also extended the power band another 500 rpm. Thanks Steve!

This weekend I decided to tackle a missing bolt I saw that usually is there to help secure the alternator bracket. I had a problem with this in the past, and I'd say this is what I get for not thoroughly going over the car at least once a month. Anyhow upon closer inspection, I found out that the alternator bracket was only being held on by one bolt.

I got some replacement bolts from Alex V, but ran into some other odd problems. First, there was an older broken bolt stuck in there which I managed to get out once I removed the entire bracket assembly. Then I noticed that a different bolt was broken and stuck inside the block. I figured it wouldn't be too much of a problem if all 3 edges of the bracket were bolted down. Since the broken bolt was in the center, I wasn't too worried. The problem came however when I tried to tighten down the far ouside bolt. It simply wouldn't thread down all the way to touch the bracket. Once it gets to a certain spot, it just keeps spinning.

After Alex making fun of me for not using my inspection mirror to take a look at the bolt hole, I also found that one of the bolts that holds the motor mount bracket to the block was also missing.

The moral of the story is, if you take your engine to 9,000 rpm often, you should probably check to make sure all the bolts are there. I can only image what would have happened if I just went to the competition like this.

Helmets

I've always been a big fan of custom painted race helmets. I'm researching what I'd potentially like to do with mine, and I came across this video of Robert Kubica (BMW Formula 1 Driver) explaining the features of his F1 helmet. After all, they use the highest quality, most technologically advanced gear on the planet. I use the same gloves he does!

Naoki, you crazy

After looking at Drift Day Naoki's blog, I came across this flyer he made. I thought it was pretty cool. What a cool car! Look how sexy it is! That owner/driver must be the sexiest man alive.

Dirty

I like dirty women. I like dirty cars. I drive dirty.

Looking through someones compilation of the Inland Drift event, I found they actually got a shot of one of my funniest runs. Sit through the video or foreword to 3:16 and you'll see:

Driving through the dirt to try and connect the big sweeper.
Showering the course worker standing there with dirt.
My bumper falling off.

Ahhh Corollas.

Korea in the house!

If it weren't for the fact that some of my good friends are drivers in Formula D, sometimes I feel like I wouldn't pay attention to it. With the obsurdity of the vehicles lately and the seemingly blatant favoritism going on (not within the judging) a huge gap looked to be taking place. The winners in motor sports are usually the teams with the biggest budgets, but every so often a smaller team brings the rain and causes the bigger teams lots of pain. This past round of Formula D happened to have their own Braun GP thing going on, with So-Cal's own Joon Maeng taking 4th place!

This was important for a few reasons. First, Joon is one of the people who I think had one of these coming. He's one of the finest examples of a privateer driver who sincerely does do everything he possibly can to make it out to every event. He is certainly a guy who never gives any excuses and drives his heart out at every event. In addition, since he's a privateer, he doesn't have the funds to build a 900hp car, and instead has to rely on driving his car 100% all the time. That seems like something missing these days in drifting. He's also a sincerely nice guy who is always willing to talk to people and be friendly, but most importantly he's Korean!

Most of you probably won't care all that much, but I think its pretty cool that there's Korean representation in drifting. The sport is full of cultural representation, but Koreans haven't really found their way to the professional ranks all that often. John Yim carried the flag alone for a few years, but now that flag belongs to Joon.

Join me in congradulationg Joon on his finish!

Training continues...

My training goes on, and on, and on. I've never driven at the balcony before, and considering I'm planning on participating in a competition there, I figured I'd better learn how to do the course. Thanks to Johnny Mac and the rest of the crew, I started to get what to do and became a little more consistant.

Funny thing, I also tried tandem for the first time. Before you know it, we were doing 3 car tandem. Pretty scary:



I do think though that I may not totally embarass myself now at the competition. I nailed down a few runs that looked pretty good, so I'm a little more confident now. Third gear entry is pretty fun.
Balcony


Can't wait for next month's competition!

More nerdgasm!

As an autmotive fan, modifying my car for better performance has been at the center of my being for the past 8 years. I don't think there's a day that goes by where I don't think about racing technology, safety equipment or something related. Little did i know people are that way about flashlights.

Being the nerd of technology and "customization" that I am, I found this forum all about flashlights and the cool ways to modify them. http://www.candlepowerforums.com/ is yet another site that is equivalent to garage journal and bob is the oil guy. Some photos below are the types of things people do. Some look like high tech sex toys, and some look like light sabers. You could argue light sabres look like high tech sex toys.

I thought my nerdism was bad.

In Photos, Anyone Can Look Good!

Found some extra photos from the Inland event. I've never had photos of me drifting before, so I think its kind of cool!

Enjoy here: http://everythingdrift.com/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=20067&g2_page=4

So I've been drifting a lot lately. Truth is, I'm interested in running in the all AE86 competition in the next month or so, but I've never been that consistent with my drifting. I'm trying to get in as much practice as possible so I can guage for myself whether or not I'll be ready. Hopefully I make some big strides soon, so I can look like I know what I'm doing at the competition!

Inland Drift: Perris, CA

4/25/2009 was the grand opening of a new drift venue and organization: Inland Drift. Located at the Lake Perris fairgrounds, this brand new venue was open to all. I was invited to attend by Mark Sanchez, one of the event organizers and former AE86 drifter extraordinaire!

I've been attending drift events and open track events for years, but this was the first time I was faced with a new challenge: drifting with walls. The first initiation point was basically facing a wall, and it did not sit too well with me in the morning. During my first few laps I struggled as I tried to initiate early to avoid the wall. My runs were definitely not good. Luckily one of my teachers and friends Mr. Taka Aono was there to give me the verbal kick in the ass and told me to go faster and initiate like a man (message delivered via Colin Frost, thank you Colin). After finally building up enough confidence, I did as told. Boy did it make a world of difference. Before I knew it, the course all came together, and I was running right up next to the wall, going flat out. What felt really good was looking over toward the crowd, mid drift, and seeing Taka and my friends cheering me on. The wall might be a small obstacle for some, but a big hurdle for me to overcome!

Needless to say I had a great time, and Inland Drift is definitely going to be a venue I'm going to enjoy for a long time! Thank you to Mark and everybody at Inland Drift!

Its a shame they don't do imports

Because that's one funny/cool sticker! How come no import shops here have cool stuff like this?

Or how about this?

Autobuff

Awsomeness. Seriously, why doesn't a magazine for the "Adult Auto Enthusiast" still exist?

Got one!

I'm a nerd.....I know. But I found a local dealer (http://www.shamrocksupply.com/). They're cheaper than anywhere online, and have just about the most friendly staff anywhere. Considering these things are pretty hard to find in the US, I'd say its a score!

Tools! Tools! More Tools!

Ok so I've been on a real tool kick as of late. I've always been geeky about other things, so it naturally followed that my geekdom (which knows no bounds, except "Magic the Gathering") would eventually lead me to tools. For maybe the past 2 years or so I've been putting together a set for home with some of the nicer stuff, and a set for the track with some less spectacular items. However the track toolbox has to be filled with items that are functional, because after all, you don't ever want to strip a nut or bolt and having good tools, or the right tools helps avoid catastrophes. Anyways I have a "dealer" who normally hooks me up with ridiculous deals on Snap On and MAC, but he's been MIA for the past few weeks. In his absence I've done some research, shopping, and engaged in some general nerd-like-behavior. The first thing I want to share is Factory Gear Magazine.

For the ultimate tool geek, there is Factory Gear magazine. Its referred to as a "mook" because its a magazine format, but more generously sized like a book. It has beautiful full color photos, detailed interviews with manufacturers and mechanics. The latter two I cannot decipher since I don't read or speak Japanese, but its still awesome nevertheless. This year's issue covers some interesting new things (which I will show you in a bit) and also dives into the toolboxes of Indy, WRC, and Toyota service mechanics. You'd be surprised at what you'd see in their toolboxes!

I hunted all throughout southern California for this thing....and eventually found it at the Torrance Mitsuya.

This is my new hangout. Club4ag is so boring with the same idiots being idiots, and most other car websites are losing my interest. This site however has so much to interest the casual and hardcore fan of tools and garage equipment. One could spend hours just looking at the photos alone of the beautiful garages that some of these guys put together, and learning the intricacies of some of the tools and their companies intrigues me to no end. I feel about this website how I felt about "Bob is the oil guy" a few years ago. I was mesmerized and captivated. Go here if you want to see how geeky that some of these guys get.

As promised, one of the most badass things I've seen. It is certainly my next purchase, and I've already found a local shop that sells them. As someone else has already said it, "its like Sci-Fi meets tools".

Redline Time Attack '09: Buttonwillow

Boy was last week tough. I thought I blew the ECU in my car when two wires touched the cover the computer and caused smoke to come out, eventually resulting in my car not starting. Usually there's a light that comes on in the ECU, and that wasn't working so I was worried. Luckily Dr. Alex came by and did some troubleshooting to find that it was only a blown fuseable link on the battery side.

Anyways Andy Yen and I decided to drive at the practice day on Saturday, while Dr. Alex was nice enough to tow my car up there. Driving to Buttonwillow in a loud, stiff and hot car is not something I like to do. I did it once, and it sucked. This time around we went all luxury by renting a hotel room for 2 nights (a hotel by the way which doesn't believe in shampoo) and capping off the weekend with a wonderful dinner at Willow Ranch. Their BBQ combo is probably the best ever!

I had fun during my sessions. It took me a while to get back to being comfortable with that track, since the last time I drove there was Redline 2 years ago. I always put off Buttonwillow because its so far, but it is my favorite track. There are so many elevation changes, off camber turns, sweeping turns and genral chaos, that you've got to love it. I didn't hook up my transponder for this event, but during out last session Andy and I ran together. He ran a 2:14 which probably means on that day, i was capable of somewhere around 2:12-2:10. I had to let off about three times on the straights because I was closing in on him too fast.

The thing about American time attack is that the cars are relatively bland looking with lots of home made body parts and tacked on stickers. I usually find them pretty boring but there are a few that are pretty awsome. The Factor X NSX is one of the more awsome machines out there. Its a full blown race car with incredibly sexy body lines.

This 350Z was also pretty awsome. Its running a naturally aspirated VQ engine and sounds absolutely devilish.

As expected, the Crawford car was there as well. I knew it was fast, but didn't really think that much of it untill it showed up in my rungroup. I was rounding turn 1 when I saw it entering from the pits. I wondered if he was going to take it slow so he could warm up his tires (which he probably did) but as I started to get closer to him, I got completely blown away. That car at 75% is rediculous.

All in all, a very fun weekend. There are few things that are better to do during your weekend then drive at the track with friends.