Here's my 9th of march. I was 4 seconds slower than my best. Why? Lot's of excuses but probably shaken conference. First group out a car hit the wall. Second group out, another car in the wall. Hit the track for practice and WTF! The rear end of my car was way loose. What's going on? Well, I corded my front Hoosiers on the 3rd so I scrambled and found some Hankook Z214's locally. The combination of new fronts and worn rears put me in a place I've never been before.

The video, well I was behind a Honda that wanted to warm up his tires and I didn't push it. When I saw the EVO coming it was past time to pass the Honda. I was spinning the rear tires, or taking extraordinary measures not to in almost every corner. I completely lost traction once which is obvious from the smoke show. Look for it. Low rpm's in second and up in smoke, not even WOT. I'm surprised the video doesn't show more of my struggles. Needless to say, I was entering the corners with extreme caution and waiting for grip to put the power down. I'm super disappointed. New Hoosiers are on order. BTW, I won my category for 2013. Yea! 2014 looks bad. I missed the first event and placed 4th in this one. Well, I post the good and not so good. BTW, the EVO's best lap was 1/2 second faster than mine, because I sucked.


Les

 

We all have days like that Les, at least you learned what tire combination doesn't wok

 

Cheer up !!!
As Thomas Magnum said "One crap day in Paradise is equal to 3 GOOD days stateside"

 

Dennis Grant has a "blog-esque" site called Autocross to Win at FarNorthRacing.com, and one of his quotes is: Tire Wars Suck. Also, tire experimenting sucks -- when it doesn't work as hypothesized. In five years of autocross, I experimented with different tires three of the years, usually with less than podium grinning results. From a scientific method perspective, you do get the opportunity to gather data and see "exactly" how your car and driving style perform with different tire combinations (including alignment, tire pressures, etc) learning from trial and error.

I personally think this is part of the racing experience, right up there with engine mods, weight reduction and working on usually the weakest link: the driver. However, when it comes to tires, if you don't want to play the "Trial By Tire" game, just get Hoosiers.

The first time I rode with someone with racing tires, my only thought was: "My car can't do that". But that ride led me to get a second set of wheels and some used Hoosiers and after one event I joined the track rats hooked on "Purple Crack".

Good Luck Les, keep the posts and videos coming.
Mike

 

Thanks for the vid Les. I live through you and others on this stuff as do not get the opportunity very often to hit the road course.