May through July 2004
Summer's Here!
The NSX-Files Lives!


Summer's here, and our daily drivers/occasional track cars are still dead

Yeah, I know, it has been a REALLY long time since the last update.  Things have been pretty busy with the baby and other domestic stuff.  Ever try to concentrate for more than 10 minutes with a 1 year old toddler running around like Halle Berry driving a car?  It is impossible.   I'll try to get back on a more regular schedule. 

The EVO and the S2000 are still dead in the water, both of them need motors.  Both vehicles are sitting at the shop, taking up space.   My wife is threatening to shut down the NSX-Files if I don't go out and make some cash!  If you cheap bastards out there would buy more copies of The NSX-Files Volume IV, we can get our cars fixed, and the website will be updated more frequently! <grin>

May 16, 2004
The Local Huntington Beach Mitsubishi is had a "launch party" for the new EVO VIII RS.  I guess they are going to have a bunch of EVO owners there to check out the this new "lightweight" model.  Wayne and I discussed whether or not we should pull up in the 48 foot trailer, and push Wayne's EVO off the lift there, telling everyone that the motor blew and Mitsubishi will not warranty it.  And also tell them that whenever a service advisor types in Wayne's VIN number, a big "Warranty Denied, Car Abused by Owner" message comes across the screen.  So it looks like Wayne can't sell the car, as the new owner will not have a warranty.  We wimp out, and we don't show up for the launch party.


EVO parts sitting around at the shop

So it looks like Honda isn't supporting people who occassionally track their car.  Mitsubishi isn't helping out EVO people that track their car and is in fact discouraging them from using their car even in cone-dodging events.  Subaru is supposedly doing the same thing with their WRXs.  Unbelievably, it seems like the manufacturer that helps out their customers that occasionally track their car the most is Dodge, with them supporting the Viper guys when a motor blows up. 

Wayne arranges to have someone drop the motor out of the EVO at our shop, and then we can figure out what to do with it.  Since it is all wheel drive, it has to sit on our lift until he gets a motor.  Much like his 944 Turbo was on our lift for about 6 months, it looks like the EVO will be there for quite some time.  


Them triple adjustable Penskes are just dying to get on the road again

=====Political Commentary for the Day===========
Early morning, May 17th, 2004
Gas prices are high. As a nation, we need to figure out how to conserve our oil and gas resource so we are less dependent on middle eastern oil.  There is no reason for us to dabble in middle eastern politics so we can have a steady supply of oil.  It is ridiculous.  There is no logical reason to drill and destroy the natural wildlife of the Artic, the California coast line, or anywhere else for that matter.


Bastards

Late afternoon, May 17th, 2004
I fill up the Ford F350 with diesel, including the 88 gallon external diesel tank.  It takes about 125 gallons at about $2.49 a gallon, which comes up to more than $310 to fill up the truck! THIS IS AN FFING OUTRAGE  It was never more than about $200 bucks to fill up the truck.  Dammit, It is now time to plunder the tundra for oil.  The hell with the seals and polar bears.  We don't eat seal burgers, let's kill them off before the fur traders show up with the baseball bats.   We don't grill bear filets on the barbeque, so let's start drilling in the artic ice for oil.  We need to drill off the California coastline, so what if we kill off a few sand crabs and dirty seagulls.  No matter how many seagulls you kill, there will always be that one that craps on your car when you go to the beach.  And it is time to steal the oil from the middle eastern countries.  After all, they don't use the ffing oil, they don't race, and they don't have fast cars unless their name is preceded by the word "Prince".  And even then, the cars are garishly ugly due to their taste in modify cars. When was the last time you saw a Middle Eastern F1 Driver, Indy Driver, or karting driver?  In fact, they would prefer that Allah rolls back the clock 1000 years, back to when they were the technology leaders, and racing camels brought you status, prestige, and chicks.  Damn it, I need to race, and I need to race cheap.  This is ridiculous.  Pretty soon it is gonna cost more for diesel and race gas than it does slicks for the weekend.  WTF?

It is amazing how attitudes change when it hits you in the pocket book. 
(note: my real views on the price of oil are somewhere between the two extremes listed above.  Remember, it is humor.  Please keep the suicide bombers away from the Flamemobile, as the free world needs to live vicariously!  Don't try to stifle me so you can take over my audience with The Camel-Files!)

=====End of Political Commentary====

May 20th or so - Heather is born
Wayne is in ramp up mode with Phoneguys, and is attacking the Ebay market for used business phone systems.  He was one of the first guys a few years ago that starting buying and selling phone systems on Ebay.  It became a big chunk of his business.  When he sold the company, the new owner thought that Ebay was not the future, and concentrated more on selling new phone systems like 3Com VOIP type of stuff.  That strategy drove the company into bankruptcy.  Wayne bought it back for one cent for every dollar he sold it for, and started up again on a much smaller scale.


Wayne "Hired" Heather to help with phone sales

Back when Wayne was doing Ebay auctions, he was one of the first taking nice pictures of phone systems, putting in good descriptions, etc.   His competitors then started doing the very same thing, including ripping off his pictures and his descriptions.  So he decided to do a different thing, and came up with a new marketing idea that would let people "chat" with his uh....new assistant "Heather" about buying phone systems.  He included a picture of "Heather" on some of his auctions, and guys would try to IM Heather, and what they were really doing was IMing with either Wayne or his brother on the other side, who were impersonating Heather.   When a person called the office looking for "Heather", Wayne or Bobby would answer the phone saying, "Heather isn't here right now, are there any questions you may have on business phone systems that I can help you with?". It almost borders on kinky transvestite internet sex.  (Thing about that next time you have your wanger in your hand!)

Early June, 2004
Since the S2000 and the EVO are still blown up, we decided to wipe the dust off of our karts and head out to Moran Raceway.  We haven't driven the karts in over a year.  Keith, our main karting mechanic, moved to Arizona, and we didn't know who to get to work on the karts.  I sorta became the karting mechanic, as Wayne is working hard at reviving the Phoneguys.  I figured out how to do basic stuff, like working on brakes, oil changes, minor alignment, change jetting, swap out axles, tie rods, etc.  So that would keep cost down somewhat, as long as we didn't blow a motor.  Although I am itching to do a motor rebuild myself.....but that would probably turn into a disaster.  Hummm...maybe I'll experiment on Wayne's motor.

One of the reasons that we stopped karting was that it was getting too expensive, as we kept blowing up motors every third race or so.  When you blow a motor, it could be the driver, or the mechanic, incorrect jetting, or just a shitty motor.  Knowing us, you be the judge of what is was.

So we go out to Moran Raceway, which is in Beaumont.  It was built by Rocky Moran Sr, and Rocky Moran Jr.  It is a great track, and it is almost as exciting as the Las Vegas karting track.  They require you to run airboxes instead of the simple K&N filter to reduce noise.  So we picked up some airboxes, and headed out there.  We struggled to get into the 1:08's or so our first time there, not having the right jetting and gears on the kart.  We were too lazy to experiment by swapping out gears and jetting. Wayne ran  the faster lap time by .05 seconds.  The next week we went out again (Wayne ditched work), and we are still high 1:07 low 1:08.  The next week we go out there with Jeff L., and in his first time there, Jeff gets down to something like a 1:07.71, beating both of us.   So we are thinking, this is bullshit. How could he beat us his first time there?  We need to take some drastic measures.  Jeff also rags on us about what losers we are for blowing motors in our karts, the 944 Turbo, the EVO, the S2000, the NSX, etc, and brags about how he hasn't blown up a karting motor in 3 years of racing.  About 20 minutes later, Raceaflais appears on right on schedule, and Jeff blows up his Vortex karting motor....so he is out of commission for a little while.

Huge gambling hot streak in June
I have been really disgusted with the Lakers for quite some time.  During the Western Conference finals, I started betting against the Lakers, since:

1.  They fight among themselves like crybabies.  They act like they are four years old.

2.  Shaq can't make his free throws

3.  They get too many technical fouls called on them

4.  Kobe takes too many wild shots

So I started betting that the Lakers could not beat the point spread, and sure enough, they went eight games in a row without beating the point spread. (there was one tie).  True, I got lucky on a couple of last second shots on a couple of games, but the net-net of all this is that I was up $1600 betting on the Team that Couldn't Play Together.  Bill P. from the LA Times summarized the Laker season in a great article.  To see the Kreskin-like prediction on the Lakers-Detroit series, read this thread.  If I wasn't a wuss, I should have double my winning bet every time, as I woulda/coulda/shoulda been up about $16,000.  But if that would have happened, the bookie probably would have disappeared, and I would get nothing.   I'm not betting again on sports until the World Series, or the Super Bowl.  I can't WAIT until the new NBA season starts, as the Laker's ain't going anywhere with just Kobe and his supporting cast of guys that won't get the damn ball!  I think there is money to be made against all the morons who want to bet that Kobe can beat the point spread.

On the other hand....I think I can make some cash betting on the presidential elections.  I'll wait until it gets close to November before I start taking bets.

 
The Pistons used hard work, team play, self sacrifice, and hustle to win the NBA title

With the money I won, I went out and bought one of those Mychron Gold Plus timing units for the Kart, and a box of tires.  Wayne picked up a Mychron also.  Terry has been raving about these Mychron units for a year or so, and he said that they are helping him with his Spec Miata and with his Rotax Max kart.  He overlays his data graphically on a laptop with his other racing buddies, and they figure out who is faster in what turns, what the person is doing different, etc.  And then they all get faster together.  The Mychrons keeps track of speed, RPM, what gear you are in, g forces, temperatures, automatically draws a track map for you to reference your data points, etc. 

We also scheduled a private lesson with Rocky Moran Jr., figuring we need a couple of tips on getting faster at Moran.  Or maybe we just need tips on getting faster, period.  Anyways, we figure that with our cars more or less broken, no cash to fix the cars, we would start karting again until we blew up a motor.  


The new Mychron Plus Gold data screen

 

June 21st, 2004
We signup for the half day lesson at Moran, and we walk the course with Rocky Moran Jr., talk about all the turns, etc.  Rocky said that we can look at all the graphical data from the Mychron that is downloaded into my laptop, and he will help us read and interpret what it means, and show us how to compare our segments so we can learn from each other on where we can get to be faster. 

Rocky gets in our karts and drives them around for about 7 laps, and proclaims that our karts are uhhhh...."less than par".  He is running about 1:06.9 in them, saying that they aren't aligned right, one is pulling slightly to the left, motors are less than optimal, the brakes suck, etc.  He said if we can get to within a second of his time, we are doing okay.  After the lesson, we are running about 1:07.7, which is within one second of Rocky's time.   So we figure we aren't doing too bad, we just need more seat time, screw around with the jetting more, etc, and perhaps get a full tuneup on the karts.  Rocky also says, "What's with these itty bitty radiators on your karts?".  He said that you need to keep the temps down to 130 or so, and we are at 130 degrees in 75 degree weather.  Once summer hits and it gets 90-100 degrees, we will be screwed, and could blow a motor.  Damn....we have been running these radiators for four years....

June 22nd, 2004
Sports Compact Car comes out with their Time Attack cover issue.  They devote a lot of pages to it, and there is a picture of yours truly, helping to strap in either Mas or Randy Chase.  The entrants for this event were lucky the Flamemobile wasn't there to crush everyone!


Prepping David Vespremi's MR2.  Bryan checking tires, me checking the driver

June 25, 2004 - Speedventures at California Speedway
The Speedventures guys had an event at California Speedway.  I figure I'll pull out the NSX, and run it in their race group.   Rumor has it that lot of people will be there, including the Viper guys, and a bunch of Radicals.  Ken A. will be there in his Radical, and he was under the impression that I run 1:52's there, and he is running 1:47's.  I look at a couple of old chapters from the NSX-Files, and find that I ran a 1:46.x there last time, and I didn't have the AEM stuff on it then.  So I'm thinking I can sneak in and beat everyone at the event.....

As usual, the NSX wasn't ready until the last minute.  Wayne had some EVO guys dropping his motor out of his car on our lift at the shop.  Erik was late as usual, and starting to replace all the broken parts from the OTC on the front suspension.  It took him a week or so to re-machine all the trick suspension parts, and he was going to put everyone together the night before the event, and re-align it.  Unfortunately, at 11 p.m. the night before the event, it seemed that the tie-rod ends that I ordered came with two right side tie rod ends, and no left.  Damn.  Looks like we ain't gonna make it to the event tomorrow, despite taking about 3 days of prepping the car and trailer.  Oh well.....

Erik says don't worry about it, just take the NSX to California Speedway in the morning, park it in the garage, and he will drop by Autowave in the morning, as he is sure they have spare parts lying around.  He said he would get up in the morning, borrow Wayne's motorcycle, get the part from Autowave, and white line it all the way to California Speedway, so he should get there about 9:30 a.m., and it will take about 10 minutes to put the part on.


Click here for a bigger view of a Race Analyst screen for the kart

So I wake up at 4:30 a.m., take a shower, head to California Speedway, and I am the first guy there at 6:20 a.m.  This way, I can get a good garage, good parking for the trailer, unload the NSX into the garage, put it up on jack stands, and wait for the tie rod end to get there, and hopefully it uh....will get there and this won't be a gigantic waste of time......

9:00 a.m. - Red group is on the track, and I am still waiting for my part.  Erik pulls up at 9:15, throws the part on, and I figure I'll just go in the white group (intermediate) and warm up the car, make sure it feels right.  I only run a 1:58 or so, as I don't want to terrorize people in the intermediate group by dive bombing on them.  Next session is qualifying, and then the session after that is the race.    The rest of the guys are running 1:49ish or so, so I think I got pole locked up in the next group......

In the qualifying session, sure enough, I run a 1:47.8, outqualifying all seven of the Radicals, assorted Vipers/Porsches/S2000/whatever.   Losers!  Heh.  This should be easy in the race.  (note:  John Morris ran a 1:42.x in practice in one of the new Turbo Radicals.  Now that is smoking!)

Final Race:
I'm gridded on pole, with a field of about 15 cars behind me.  The green flag drops, and we are off!  Within one lap, the Radicals guys are all over my ass.  I give them a little bit more racing room than normal, as I haven't raced with these guys before, and I don't want to accidentally run over these itty bitty 1300 lbs cars like my NSX was a Monster Truck.  They immediately take advantage of it, and two of Radicals pass me in the infield.  Damn!  In another lap or so there are about 4 Radicals in front of me, and two of them behind me on my ass.  Damn!  They musta put some new tires on, or were sandbagging in qualifying.  Anyways, I'm thinking I need them to make a big mistake in order to get the lead back.  After about 4 laps, the race is redflagged due to fluid on the track, so the race is aborted. Looks like I finish about 5th or so, behind a bunch of Radicals.  Next time....I'll be ready for those Fagitcals!

==========


New radiator is a lot thicker than the old one

July 2nd or so
Next time out after me doing an alignment, oil change, brake bleeding, and jetting change on both karts, we are now in the 1:06.9 range.  Hey, getting faster.  We are using the Mychron data, figuring out how fast we are in each turn, who is faster where, who is braking earlier/later, whose motor is running stronger down the straight, etc.  If one of us seems to have better acceleration down the straight, we can lean it out and use the jetting parameters from the faster kart. 

Another bonus is that we have figured out how to beat the notorious Southern California traffic on our karting days.  Wayne ditches work on Friday at 11:30 p.m. (despite protests from his brother Bobby, who is left running the show at Phoneguys), and white lines his motorcycle to Moran and meets me there.  We practice until 5:30 p.m., pack up, and get on the road by 6:00 p.m. or so.  I fire up the laptop, put in the Sprint PCS wireless card, and I check www.sigalert.com to plot the fastest way home.  Miraculously, since we are going against traffic, I can make the 81 mile trip home in about 75 minutes by picking the correct freeway to take home!  Last month, we were trying to get the track at 9:30 a.m. and leaving at 3 p.m., but that was taking me 2 to 2.5 hours to get back home in traffic. Screw that!


Wayne's kart with the radiator mounted

July 6th
Jason (Trumps) and Roger picked up Wayne's EVO motor last week.  After a thorough inspection, it appears that his rod bearing failed due to an oiling problem.  They said the bottom end looked like it had 100,000 miles on it, not the 2,000 that are actually on the car.  So it looks like Jason and Roger are going to rebuild the EVO motor, and try to make the bottom end a little stronger, along with an accusump.  Weird.  The S2000 motor loses a rod, and a couple months later Wayne's EVO is doing the same thing. 

July 9th or so
We realize that we have a bunch of different heads for the karts.  Unfortunately, I have a newer cylinder than Wayne so these different heads won't fit on my kart.  We put the "D" head on Wayne's kart, which I think is the fast head, but we had to take it off to race with the KRC guys.  Wayne immediately breaks into the 1:05's, running a 1:05.97.  He's kicking my ass by a good 4/10ths of a second, but my kart motor doesn't seem as strong as his.  We switch karts, and his kart seems to handle a lot better, as he is kicking my ass down the straightaway by a good 3 mph.  His kart is turning in better, and his motor seems peppier, so he is launching down the straight a lot stronger.  I guess I need to lean out my motor some more, and work on the alignment.  We check the laptimes for the local kart racing series, and it seems that the winners are running in high 1:02/low 1:03 range, and the mid packers are 1:05.   The weather is hotter now, track is dusty, so we figure we could be 1:04 guys under similar conditions. 


We have to cut into the sidepods to make space for the radiator

Greg has warned us that he thinks the key to keeping an ICC Vortex motor running without blowing up is frequent top end rebuilds.  So we figure we are due for a rebuild, and Greg recommends Extreme Karting in Anaheim.  We use to race with Greg at the KRC Cup races, and he was always in the top 4.  He said that Extreme Karting is doing trackside mechanic support for Alex Speed, who is running the pro-karting races and finishing in the top 3.  Summer is now here, it is 90 degrees, and the kart temps are at 150 degrees.  Uh oh...we need bigger radiators, and Extreme Karting sells some mondo giganto radiator that they use in all their pro races.  Only problem is that the radiator cost $500, and the mounting bracket cost $129.  That's more than a radiator for my damn NSX.  We think about picking up a $369 Champion radiator, but the Extreme guys said that people with the Champion radiators were overheating at some national meet in Oklahoma.  Since Moran is sort of in the middle of the desert, we might as well get the big ass radiator so we don't blow a motor.  I'll consider it an...uh...investment.

We drop the karts off at Extreme, and have them do a cylinder rebuild, radiator, alignment, and tune up the karts.   Extreme takes a look at our karts, and then calls Greg, telling him that our karts are shit, they look like old lawnmowers, and they need a lot of work, and who are these yahoos named Wayne and Doug?  


The uniform.  Same pants for the last 8 years (250+ games)  Kneepads are worn in the game

July 21, 2004. Summer Softball Season ends.
Well, we were seeded in Coed C3 this year, which is the third highest coed league in the Huntington Beach softball league.  We ended up doing pretty good this year, going 6-4, and taking 2nd place.  The first place team went 9-1, and there was little chance we could beat them.  It seemed like they had guys that could run 50 yards to make diving catches against us, as well as hit the ball 350 feet.  Since they took first place, they should be bumped up a league to C2, and hopefully we can win C3 next year.  I almost had my best hitting streak in probably six years this year, getting on 17 times in a row, and ending with an on base percentage of .895.  Damn....just one hit away from hitting .900!   We start up again on August 24 or so for the Winter League.



If you don't bleed from diving and sliding, you ain't trying hard enough

I also decide to go into high gear to sell my beloved F355 GTS F1, since you guys aren't buying the damn Pulp DVD! <grin>.  I had it in the Ferrari Market Letter a couple of months ago for $110,000.  Then I dropped the price to $101,000.  Then I put it in the sportscartrader.com for $99,000.  Then I put it back in the Ferrari Market Letter and Ferrarichat.com for $95,000.  The calls starting coming to inquire about the car.  A couple of people have come to see the car.  So  now I put down the hammer, and I hire one of the best wheeler-dealer auto consignment consultants to get it sold for $95,000.   It's time to get the S2000 fixed and fire up the NSX. 

 


For sale.  1999 F355 GTS F1 with factory carbon fiber seats, painted top, painted calipers
37,500 miles.  $95,000.  All servicing done.  One owner car.  Never wrecked, never painted.
New tires, clutch, tranny seals, motor mounts, pressure plate, catalytics, etc.
Oh....and you'll pickup chicks like you were Tom Cruise/Ben Affleck

July 24, 2004
I pick up the karts at Extreme.  It looks like they tore the karts apart, cleaned them, and put them back together.  Unfortunately, the bill was a little ahh...extreme.   Greg's friend Fernando rents out Moran Raceway today for a corporate event, which ends around 2 p.m., so we have the track to ourselves from 2 to 6 p.m.  It is me, Wayne, Greg, Fernando, and Shane and Tom from Extreme.  Apparently the air is real crappy today, the weather gizmo that Greg takes to the track says that the air is equivalent to 5000 feet today.   So everyone is running slower than normal.  Greg, who is a machinist/ex-motorcycle guy has his kart dialed in.  He says he can run 1:02's in the right conditions, just a few tenths behind what Rocky Moran Jr. can run on the track.  Damn.  He must be about 55-57 years old, and he is just whupping on our ass.  Today he is only running 1:05's, and we are running 1:07's.  Fernando is a second faster than us, and the extreme guys are running about the same times as Greg.  They all have the next generation karts with better motors, frames, brakes, etc.  Our karts are now old school.


New radiators are quite a bit bigger than the old ones (I broke my radiator mount)

Greg says that since he can run 1:02/1:03, and he's in the 1:05's, if we are 1:07, we could be 1:04/1:05 in race conditions.  Or if we upgrade our karts, we might be down to 1:03 or faster.   Either that, or he is sandbagging us so we will enter the race so he can kick our ass again.  Greg tucks in behind the Extreme guys, and gets down to 1:04.4. by the end of the day.  Wayne and I go out for the last session of the day, and we drop a half second to 1:06's.  Wayne turns a 1:06.59, I'm at 1:06.63, and on my last flying lap to become king of the day for our $10 bet, I'm right behind Wayne.  It feels like it is gonna be a 1:06.3 lap.  Wayne slows down, and points me to the inside, then drifts outside.  I'm flying to pass him on the outside, and we crash into each other, screwing up my hot lap.  Some things never change.  We get back to the pit and argue for a half hour about who screwed up the pass.  Fernando was right behind us watching the crash unfold.  I'm sure Greg must have told him, "Watch out for those two morons, they always crash into each other." Meanwhile, I have to cough up 10 bucks.  Damn.

July 25, 2004
Wayne gets an email response to the Ferrari Ebay ad.  It goes like this:
======

From: name_deleted@yahoo.com
Sent: Sunday, July 25, 2004 9:47 PM
To: ebay@phoneguys.com
Subject: Question for item #2485250479 - Ferrari : All Models

 
 
Right-click here to download pictures. To help protect your privacy, Outlook prevented automatic download of this picture from the Internet.
Right-click here to download pictures. To help protect your privacy, Outlook prevented automatic download of this picture from the Internet.
 Question about your item
Right-click here to download pictures. To help protect your privacy, Outlook prevented automatic download of this picture from the Internet.
Right-click here to download pictures. To help protect your privacy, Outlook prevented automatic download of this picture from the Internet.
Right-click here to download pictures. To help protect your privacy, Outlook prevented automatic download of this picture from the Internet.
Dear www-phoneguys-com,

I have no money, i have no life, all I do is read those pulp stories. Could you please tell doug to update his page so I can have something to do!??

========

Okay, I'll get off my ass and finish the update!

Speedventures has an event at the Streets of Willow on this day.  Since my S2000 motor blew up in February, Rylan's S2000 motor blew up, and then Dave Kennedy's motor blew up.  All three cars were more than 3 years old.  All were fine until after the warranty expired.  Rylan is the first to get his motor up and running again, and he runs 1:26.3x at the Streets of Willow, in BOTH direction (CW and CCW). Nice job.  Rylan has the fastest Honda at the Streets.  Looks like I'll have to get the Flamemobile out there and smack him down! <grin>

PMUM Memorial Brick(s) at Laguna Seca
Laguna Seca will be building a brick pathway to the Corkscrew, and you can get memorial bricks engraved.   A bunch of people on Corner Carvers are getting a collection together to do some type of memorial for Paul Mumford at Laguna Seca Raceway.  Here is the thread if you would like to contribute. It would be cool to have a big PMUM brick(s) on the pathway to one of the most famous turns in racing.  And at a track where he kicked ass on all the professional drivers.


The late, great PMUM.  Contribute to the memorial!

Next Event?
The Touring Car Club and the Vintage Auto Racing Association will be at California Speedway next weekend, July 30, 31, August 1.  Race groups only, no time trials/HPDE.  I was going to blow off the event as we were concentrating more on karting.  But the itch started getting stronger.  Sean Irby called me and said he was pulling his Corvette out for the event.  I stopped by International Motorsports, and Martin said that he and his customers are bringing four 360 Challenge cars.  There are rumbling from the Viper camp about people being there.  I am sure that means some of the Porsche drivers will be there.   I already had Autowave do an oil change and quick turn up.  I need to get a front swaybar replaced, along with getting a weld fixed on the body. Erik said that may have been why I thought the rear was feeling a little lose.  So if I fix those two things, I figure I can go through turn 1 full throttle, all the ffing way, at 160 mph. 


Dale Jr.'s car catches fire.  Nomex underwear manufacturers sales increase 500%

After seeing Earnhardt's crash a couple of weeks ago, I ordered some nomex socks, nomex underwear(top and bottom), and nomex face sock.  I already have the HANS device, so I am mentally preparing myself for no lifting whatsoever in turn 1.  And I'll have the video to prove it in another week or so.......

Looks like we only get a couple of practice sessions on Friday, and then on Saturday we qualify in the morning, and then race in the afternoon.  On Sunday, we practice in the morning around 10:00 a.m., and then race again in the afternoon around 3 p.m.  We are group 8 on the schedule.

July 28, 2004  Wednesday night.
Two days before the event starts.  The NSX is already in the trailer, which is parked in front of my house.  The NSX-Files lives! We are going wheel-to-wheel racing.....

July 29, 2004 Thursday afternoon.
I drop the trailer off at California Speedway as soon as the gates open at 2:00.  Except it looks like the gates opened at noon, as there are already about 60 trailers in the pit area.  VARA cheating bastards!  All the garages were reserved way in advance, so I saved about two acres of parking spots using pylons and "Caution" tape for Schley, Joe B., Luc, Haney, Martinez, Lance, and Irby.  About 20 minutes later, Joe B, Luc, and Schley pull in.  I was thinking this would be a fight between Luc, Joe B, and me for podium honors, but I look at the run group, and there are about 50 big boy cars in it, with all the P-Car guys in our run group.  Shit!  The P-Car guys are probably the fastest marque around, and we got about 20 of them RSR/Turbo/Twin Turbo race cars in our group.  This is gonna be a an epic dog fight!