I might not lean so hard if I had more head room, although this might be my nature. I stretch a bit every chance I get, and leaning helps.
I passed on the inside of a turn and the fellow I passed said he was pulling 1G force. Maybe leaning counters some of this. :driving:

:driving:
Saturday for auto-x. Decided to take the Z. Running in class B (with the boys).
Three runs in first heat (daylight). Three runs second heat (under lights).

Run one: alone (no rider/coach). Take it a little easy to learn the course. Not too great on time but not awful imho. No mistakes following the course :tup:
Run two: experienced coach riding w me. I'm pushing it, harder. One more turn and the finish will be right there. Lost my focus i guess. Pretty good straight then a hard 120 degree left turn and Harry breaks loose after i tap the brakes. We slide sideways across the lane, through a grass median and back on the banked portion of the oval. Barely miss timing box in the grass. dust, grass, dirt clods flying up from my right. Crap crap crap. Next up: white concrete wall. Fuuuuu. Nope. Get stopped plenty shy. Goose Harry-squeal tires a bit and off the track i go. :shakes head:
Run three: much more conservative. Not having fun. Headache (prob from stress).
Head home after working my assigned heat:ugh2:

That is how my auto-x went. May be this isn't for me. Re-evaluating.
One more event for the season for my club. Either do it more often so I can get accustomed to or quit totally. Takes me a day and a half recovery every time I auto-x. Not sure what to do. :ugh2:

I say keep with it BC it is like any new skill or sport you try to take up. The people you watch that are good at it have put the time in to get there. You will get there too just keep a good attitude and try to improve everyday/everytime, you don't need to be the best out there just try to beat your own times and improve your skills.

I help my brother with coaching the younger kids in the local lacrosse league he is heavily involved in. We see things like this all the time. Some times when you get over these humps/slumps are when you improve your skills and reach those new milestones :tiphat:

:tiphat: TY for the encouragement :tiphat:

I had a light blue Ferrari 360 or 430 cross in front of me as I left my street to get on the main route. I followed him a mile when he suddenly nailed it at the 55 MPH sign. He pulled momentarily upon me and I recovered at the curve. He did not brake as 99% of other driver needlessly do. He looked back in his rear view and gave a bitter face to see I was still right on him. He slowed and soon we were behind traffic.

He would no longer look at me in the mirror when he thought I could see. But I could. He was embarrassed I suppose.

The Z is a great car all around.

:icon17:

All car no skill many times with those guys

I remember a clover leaf exit off the highway one time with my buddy in his gf's Taurus. A Porsche 911 who had been behind us, accelerated and made several quick lane changes to exit in front of us. My buddy (who is an experienced driver) proceeded to take the same exit 10 mph faster than the Porsche and caught up to him in the clover. You could see the Porsche try to accelerate and the rear end just jerked immediately as traction control kicked in. The guy was trying... he just had no idea what he was doing :shakes head:

Anytime I see that, I think of this:

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The BC20 team on course the last event of the season. I'm glad I went. Came in dead last in my class but had a blast driving. :tup: ty for encouraging me to stick with it guys. My second driving season has come to an end. Who knew I would ever be doing something like this?!

I understand the part about who'd think I'd ever be doing this?

I'm glad you had a blast as this is what it is about. Hopefully you are more confident as a driver every where you drive.

I have one more event at Sonoma next month, then my third season will end as well. This was the year I really put it all together.

Congratulations for doing it. :happydance:

On Monday I was at Thunderhill, TH, and the new five mile track. This is the three mile track, 15 turns, plus two new miles and 13 new turns. I've done the 3 mile 3 times before twice in the wet. Today it was to rain again. I hear rain is very rare and when I mention rain at TH, everyone looks at me and says:

"The last time I was at TH, it was 108 degrees, and I've never heard of rain there." Just lucky I guess.

We did 3 recon laps at low speed then had at it. The Z06 ahead of me gave me fits at Sonoma last month so I hope he will let me bye eventually. He does so in an unorthodox manner.

I had to make up my own driving line as nobody knew the track. The learning curve was a little slow due to the 5 mile distance. instead of being back to the same turn in 2 minutes, is now 4 minutes, so up to 6 laps, before they haul us off the track. A bunch of cars went off track and brought dirt and debris back onto the road with them, with a bit of rain you had mud.

I too had a moment of excitement. I hunted down an Audi R8 then realized two things, 1) I'm not passing him and 2) it is raining too much so back off with these R888's. 10 seconds later at a left kink I must have give a touch of gas as the cars rear stepped out right a tiny bit, I corrected and the car now slid as if on ice back left towards an embankment. As I left the track I was thinking I guess I won't be driving home after all. The car put two wheels off grabbed enough to go straight and a tiny bit of right input put me right back on track. I only lost a few feet over the Audi! My thinking changed quickly from destruction to concern over being black flagged for an off. I did this right in front of a flagger. At the next flag station they were waving the checker to tell you the main checker has been thrown and get off the track before you make another 5 mile cool down lap and have another group come up on you. No penalty. :happydance:

My best time was 4:00.075.

I have run out of time to write.

First session:
First time Thunderhill 5 mile in a Nissan 370Z with bonus rain - YouTube

I forgot to mention fuel starvation. I would fill up and within 15 minutes fuel starvation kicked in. I had 15 and I thought I saw 16 dots, not positive, and the throttle cut out. I checked to make sure it was not VDC on and realized the back half of the new track is very tight and lot's of right handers. After two gallons used it starts. I used 4.3 gal per 30 minutes so that is how I determined the math.

It is now time to look for a solution for fuel starvation.

1/2 lap at Thunderhill in a 370Z - YouTube Before camera died.

Time to call phunk

Got to do VIR Grand Course, today. 4.1 miles. Same one that C&D uses for their Lightning Lap.

Sadly, my GoPro got screwed up until my very last session, but that was probably my fastest anyway. Bonus: I got to do some landscaping, briefly! Video tomorrow.

Unedited footage from my last session yesterday. VIR Grand Course is freaking awesome.

Off-track adventure at ~10:50.

^^ You must be doing 140 MPH+. You handled the off very well.

I'm sure it was an awesome day. :tup:

:iagree:

Sunday was my last HPDE for the year. I met Cossie1600 too. He had his MB 370Z with a tiny trailer for his slicks and assorted goodies. Very nice fellow too. I wanted to talk more but between the little lady and a friend involved in an accident, I had to much too do.


My day was one of disappointment. It was the first November event without rain and in a club of 20 years, no contact between cars ever. This record was not to be maintained.

The first session was curtailed by 20 minutes due to a GTR losing a wheel. It sheered off. No explanation.

The second session was cut in half by a two car accident.

The third session had a 996 GT3 spin and hit the wall out of T6. Then a Miata caught fire. So we lost another half session.

The fourth session was the only uneventful run all day. Fuel starvation hit me at the halfway mark so I really must correct this situation. In the moment my fun time was getting used up.

I still had one session left but the wife was upset by all the carnage and destruction. When I told her I plan to stay till the end she didn't say anything but she was disappointed in my decision. So I rethought the last session, packed up and left.

I need to get a new camera. My Contour has lost too many track sessions. Today I lost two to the green screen of death.

A club member brought his new car to the track. A McLaren P1.
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350Z crashes into Miata at Sonoma Raceway - YouTube Z crashes into Miata
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQIyUmRGoRI Unedited
Sears Point #2 - YouTube Unedited

Yeah that straight is very very fast - I was right around 140. Miss your braking zone by even a few feet and off you're going. Very common to miss that one at VIR, so my "talk" with the crew was obviously not particularly bad.

Looks like you had a lively HPDE there, Tam. Ive had some rough weekends where there were 1-2 wrecks, but a multi-car wreck is particularly bad...

Indeed. The fellow that caused the crash is a polite driver who was pointing the other cars bye.

Woof.

So what caused the wreck? Just zigged when they should have zagged?

Not 100% on this but I suspect the 350Z was pointing and not looking at the surface he was on. All the marbles and junk gets thrown that way so he may have lost grip and put two wheels off or he was looking at the cars he was pointing bye.

With two wheels off he yanked (over corrected) at the steering wheel and spun, right into the Miata.

:tiphat: for allowing for your lady's comfort. I am sure it was much appreciated.

Nice meeting you. You should have asked me about cameras. I had three with me. I did just sell my gopro 3 now I am left with my gopro 4 and contour roam

You guys had a really bad session, I couldn't believe the luck you guys were having. Our session got mellowed out after the crowd thinned out after lunch. Too many cars on track with different experience level is a disaster.

send me an email, i got video of your car coming out of the hairpin

A pleasure meeting you too. I hope your day went better than my own. You have a nice track set up.

I never thought to ask another for a camera. I wish I had too.

:tiphat:

I picked up my 82 year old mom so we could spend Christmas with my sister and her children. While getting on the freeway I accelerated to get up to 65 MPH. I could see this Mercedes coming up on the left side, and he did not want me to pass him as I did. My mom laughed and said he sure was looking over to see who was driving. Then he made a maneuver where he started on my right side, went behind me and then passed with his AMG car on the left. The right lane was wide open so his encirclement made no sense. He takes off and I explain what AMG means. Within 30 seconds his car was pulled off to the side of the freeway broken down.

We both had a good laugh.

I do not know AMG:ugh2:

Lol on his poor german reliability. :ugh2:

Lol again on having a good laugh with mother:tup:

I pulled the cover off the front end of Harry. All kinda :yum: hiding under there.

Not sure if serious...

Dead.

Must be something obvious I am missing.

Now I look stupid.

:o

:confused: someone dead??
this thread took a confusing turn...........

AMG is Mercedes Benz in-house performance arm. Think like SRT, or M-cars.

I have a lot of experience, so I have a list of what to bring and what not to bring (wife :icon18:)

It has been like summer here the last few days. It was 70 degrees on my cars' thermometer yesterday.

Both drives to and from work were wonderful. for whatever reason I was "ON". I made every apex and got on the gas fast but without wheel spin or VDC. It was just one of those drives that put's a smile on your face without even being aware that it is there.

I hope everyone is having a good Z time too.

:happydance: good to see you enjoy your Z. :tiphat:

On Valentines day the weather was beyond perfect. 70 degrees in February. What could go wrong? Everybody under the sun seemed to have gone for a drive that day. My 6 minute fast drive or 10 minute commute to work, took 60 minutes due to traffic. Imagine being stuck on a hill for most of the time, clutch in, hand brake engaged, clutch and hand brake release, go ten feet and stop. Although annoying just creeping along, this is such an easy clutch to engage without wearing myself out.

But the day is not over yet, as it is Valentines, my honey and I had reservations just ten minutes away. so all those folks that had enjoyed the day were now heading home. It took 40 minutes to get to the restaurant. After a wonderful evening, a mere 7 minutes home. My lane was empty but the headlights opposite, were lined up nearly 4 miles waiting for a stoplight. It had gotten worse.

I was trapped the rest of the weekend when it actually got worse on Presidents Day with a "Free" admission day into the national monument.

Living in paradise has it's limitations.

You just reminded me of when I got stuck in some awful traffic on my way home on my motorcycle. There's a very long, rather steep bridge near my house that wasn't stop and go (it would have been better if it was). Slipping a clutch on a motorcycle for 30-40 minutes straight can be rather exhausting, FWIW...

Saturday I am having an awful day. Domestic strife. I closed my shop early and went for a drive. Immediately a young girl (maybe 20) in the back of a stopped car, going the other direction, smiles to me and I am flattered. I smile and look away. I look back just as the light turns green and she is waving too me. Again super flattered I try smile and give a nod and drive off. This is by far a most unusual thing. When you are not happy with your girl, do not talk to other girls.

On the way I drove next to a Ferarri 430. The sound track was outstanding.
I drove to a friends slot car race and could not keep my mind on driving but on strife. I had had a huge adreneline rush earlier that wore off leaving me exhausted. I could not focus properly. After a three month series of races, all I had to do was my usual. Too bad I could not do it. After many races it all came down to 2.5 feet and I failed. Oh well.

Driving home I saw an Aston Martin Vantage just like the slot car I had used. I held it up to the driver who responded with a thumbs up. Passing the gas station on the way home had perhaps a 30 minute wait so I resolved to get gas Monday. After all I was at 4 dots. Does anybody see where this is going? After following a slow truck I had a possible open road ahead of me. With VDC swithched off I went around the hair pin turn hard to the right. While going up hill I had the stutter of fuel starvation. This had occured once before and I managed to stay on the gas until I crested the hill and the fuel returned. Well not today. On the very crest I stalled out. I rolled the car back one wheel off the road while the gas drained to the right. The car restarted but in order to get out of the dirt and gravel I would use up all the gas and it stalled out all three times. A young man came along and we pushed the car and when I hopped in to steer another fellow started helping. The car rolled down hill with multiple attempts to get her going. I just drove into a pull out and got ready to walk home.

Now I could have called the woman with whom all this strife was about, and she would have helped. I had zero intention of that. I figured I'd walk home a mile, get a can of gas, and fill the car. Bye the way, I still had 51 miles range according to the display. Instead one of the pushing fellows offered me a ride home and back. I only accepted the ride home. I can walk and not inconvieniece him any more.

So I opened up the garage fired up the XKE and put a 5 gallon can in the back and set off. This took about 10 minutes to get the Jag warmed up and properly choked.

As I pull up to the Z, the sun has now just set and rain keeps threatening with a few drops here and there. I start pouring the fuel just as a fellow car enthusiast arrives to say what a beautiful car. Then confused asks which car is mine. When I said both he needed an explanation. He and his girlfriend were taking XKE pictures and I said do you want to get in and have your picture taken together? Then they offered me a caravan service. He'd drive one of my cars while she follwed in theirs. I said sure, which car do you want to drive. He said "Of course the Jag" so with a complete stranger driving my car he followed me home. I knew it would be just fine as his girlfriend made a gesture with two hands to say thank you for letting him drive his dream car, and all ended well.

The domestic strife slowly seemed to peter out by Monday, so life is getting back on track.

Which fuel starvation solutions are available?