Carolina Drivers going to the Nationals...

[MrsVlad]

Holy Moly, your reports & pics are great. I feel like I'm there. Only this is better, I hate getting up before 8am. Especially on a weekday.

[mini37]

Day 6 (Wednesday 27th)
Woke up 5:30 being 1hr and 15 minutes ahead of the alarm. Cloudy with 55F in the morning with winds coming out of the north. Arrived at the site at 8:30AM. This was a much cooler day than yesterday. We swapped courses today. I, Steven Rankins, Jonathan McCallister and Tara Knoll ran the West course and so did GH Sharp. Chuck & Catherine Tegler, David O’Malley and Jun Yang ran the East course. The only trophy awarded to our group was the very much expected trophy for GH Sharp who finished 8th with a time of 51.0 in a very large field of drivers in AS class. Our rising star and hope in Jun Yang momentarily dropped from being trophy contention in 12th position to 28th in BS with a time of 56.3. I improved only one position from 22nd to 21st with a time of 53.8 being 1.8 second off best time in GS. Steven retained his 17th position in STU with a time of 52.3. McCallister dropped two positions to 38th with a time of 53.9. Tara Knoll finished 6th being a few positions outside the trophies in STUL and had a time of 56.4. David O’Malley dropped a couple of positions to 22nd with a time of 55.0. Chuck Tegler retained his 28th position with a time of 57.1. Catherine Tegler maintained her 5th position being just a couple of positions outside the trophies in SML and had a time of 57.4.

There were incredible good drivers at the Nationals and many of them. Post race discussions with Dr. Zimmer I may understand why my rear end of the Mini has been too loose and I will start to change my settings of my Koni shocks. This may help a bit to make the car more competitive, but I believe the majority of the improvement has to come from the driver. This was a great experience and I met many nice people.
We had a banquet tonight with a buffet dinner along the trophy award presentations, hence the delay of this update. There have been many long and tiring days.

At 18:50 tonight the rain drops started to fall, but it appears that the rain will miss the competition as it is expected to be sunny and cold tomorrow. Tomorrow, I will be a spectator and rooting for the remaining drivers from the Carolinas competing AM, FSP, DSP, STS2 CS, HS and HSL if I remember correctly.
Mini 35

[jbyrd]

[jhd11]

Per,
Once again, thanks for your reports. I have enjoyed the photos and the reports. Makes me want to consider the trip. Somebody has to be DFL!! Might as well be me!

Joe Downer
'03 GS Mini Cooper S

[daveoh32]

Great Write-ups Per. It was an awesome time out there, and great to see so many Carolina drivers out there!! You held your own in an incredibly tough G-Stock class! As for Street Mod, (correction, I ran a 53.6 today, not 55.xx) we learned quickly that bringing a knife to a gunfight wasn't the best idea. I had a blast and driving the M3 was awesome!! I hope to be back next year with a more competitive car though.

[caSSino]

West Course
www.scca.com/Event/Result.asp?Ref2=341
East Course
www.scca.com/Event/Result.asp?Ref2=342

Update on NC drivers:

CS:
Eric Peterson is in 8th 1.337 seconds out of first in CS.

FSP:
Geoffrey Zimmer 2nd .658 out of first
Jinx Jordan 3rd .795 out of first
Chris Petersen (Zimmer's co-driver) 16th 1.28 out of trophies
Justin Barbry 17th 1.39 out of trophies

AM:
Todd Bowland 1st
George Bowland 2nd .111 out of first

DSP:
Suzanne Hodges 4th 10.033 out of trophies

[justinb]

I had a great time on course today. I didn't put enough gas in the car to account for the grip of the new r'comps and fuel starved on my first and 3rd runs. The car was running awesomeup to that point, but it cost me 1/2 a second at least just coasting through the straightaway waiting for the gas to get back to the injectors. I've got 1/2 a tank of 100 octane in there right now so I should be in better shape tomorrow.

[DeVoe41]

Justin what are you running? I thought your P5 was dead?

[justinb]

02mazpro5 said:

Justin what are you running? I thought your P5 was dead?

I put a new motor in it last week. That rear strut bar feels great.

[mini37]

Day 7 (Thursday 28th)
Woke up at 04:15 being 2 ½ hours before the alarm. This is way too early. I guess the excitement of being here tells the body to get up even though is just a spectator day. Sunny, cold at 44F and winds from the north. It is expected to get up to low 60’s. Tomorrow is expected to get up to upper 70’s with winds from the south. My new buddy with the GT2 collected three trophies last night. One 1st, one 2nd and one 6th (I think) being a three driver car. I need to find him to see if I can trade measuring wheels with him. Apparently he got it nailed down. Trading cars may be too much to ask for. On seconds thoughts I am not sure I want all that added unsprung weight of his measuring wheel that will slow me down in measuring the courses…

My new secretary Mike Cassino did great job breaking out the results for our Carolina drivers saving me some time on this report. Please note while the weather was dry and sunny it was cold with that wind blowing from Canada, so it was really tough for all drivers in particular for the first two run groups, namely HS being in first heat, FSP and DSPL in second heat. Tomorrow will be much better. Adding to MC’s report, in STS2 Scott Sawyer in his CRX Si had a 56.2 good enough for 13th and Justin Mitchell in his Mazda Miata had 57.4 good enough for 18th out of 23 drivers. James Feinberg did not start and apparently did not get his car ready for the Nationals. FSP was fun to watch in particular as we had Dr. Zimmer, Chris P, Jinx and the new raising star Justin Barbry competing in that class. I don’t think anybody can drive a Protégé 5 faster than Justin. Zimmer was sitting in like 20th place having kicked cones on his first two runs before he pulled out a rabbit out his VW Rab… on his third run and moved in to 2nd on his last run. That was awesome to watch. Jinx was on fire and took out seven cones on his first run some before even tripping timer at start. Isn’t he an instructor? However, he did clean things up nicely on his second run. Chris P ran tidy on all his runs compared Zimmer and Jinx. George and Todd Bowland out-muscled all competition in AM where Todd is leading by 0.1 second and both being more than one second ahead of 3rd place. Eric Peterson ran a 51.2 on the West Course in his Mazda Miata in ES and is currently in 8th place trophy position. Jeff Jacobs driving a Mini Cooper in HS placed 4th in trophy position with a time of 55.6 on the East Course. Charles Frank co-driving with Jeff in the Mini of Charleston sponsored Mini place 20th with time of 59.3. Donna Frank co-driving the same Mini in HSL also on the East Course placed nicely in 2nd in trophy position with time of 57.0. Per Schroeder who writes for the Grassroot Magazine running a Mini Cooper in HS placed 9th outside of trophies with a time of 56.1. He and his wife Kimberly co-drives their Mini. A photo will be coming. Per wrote the nice tire test and comparison article of the new Hoosier A6s against Kumho V710 a few months ago. Per will have to rush back to catch a flight to Spain on Sunday to test drive the new 2007 Mini. Unfortunately he could not fit me in his suitcase.

The SS class had a whopping 61 drivers. It was nice to watch all the Lotuses, Z06s and Porsches battling for the top spot on the East Course with Lotus Elise in 1st, Corvette in 2nd and GT3 Porsche in 3rd.

The updated results for GS class showed that Abe Douglas in 13th place had made an official protest against the winning Mini Cooper S who also had co-driver who finished 3rd. The protest claimed that the winning Mini was not stock on a number of points not affecting performance. The protest was upheld and was not contested. Based on the notice it looks like 1st and 3rd place finishes will be disqualified, which also meant that Abe move up in to trophy position and I may get a free ride to 19th place.

We had the Kumho Video Awards party tonight with a lot of fun video clips… A few photos are coming.

I will be watching the race tomorrow for the classes that will run in the morning and then begin to head back to Charlotte in the early afternoon for that 1,047 mile drive. There may be gap in the reporting until I am back in Charlotte and make a final recollection about my first trip to the Nationals to close out this thread that I started. There will most likely be a number of Carolina driver trophies awarded tomorrow.

Mini 35

[jbyrd]

[mini37]

Day 8 (Friday 29th)
Woke up at 5:30AM being only one hour before the alarm. Cloudy at 52F and chilly with that wind blowing from NW. The afternoon warmed up considerably with winds from the south to bring the temperature to upper 70’s. I had plan to watch the Mini Coopers in HS taking on the West Course at 8AM in the 1st Heat and the FSP drivers taking on the East Course in the 2nd Heat just about 10AM and finally the AM drivers led by the Bowlands taking on the East Course in 3rd Heat. I wanted to see more, but it was almost impossible to keep up with parallel heats running both courses at the same time. The pace in which cars were fed on the two courses was very efficient and the wait in grid would typically be no longer than the required five minutes. I missed Susan Hodges running the Neon in the DSPL class in Heat 2 on the West course and Anthony Hodges running in Heat 4 on the West course. I did catch Anthony on film suitably dressed working grid. I had already started my trip back to Huntersville before Heat 4 started. I missed the incredible run by Scott Sawyer in STS2 on the West Course, but I did catch Scott in impound. Scott was jumping up and down of joy and excitement after having had made that incredible 3rd run lifting him up from 13th to 5th. He was the fastest STS2 car on the West course. Congratulations to a great performance in very competitive field. I did manage to get to Scott to stand still for a moment and take a photo of Scott by his lime green CRX Si in impound. JB will post it later.

The Mini Coopers were not as dominant in HS as the Mini Cooper S was in GS. A Mazda 3 nearly got the win. Jeff Jacobs in the Mini of Charleston sponsored Mini dropped from 4th to 6th, but still in the trophies. Photo provided. Joseph Austin in 9th and Per Schroeder in 10th maintained their positions from Thursday just outside of the trophies. Multi driver cars swapped front tires with the rear tires to provide heat for the rear tires for the next runs. Later in HSL Donna Frank dropped one position and finished 3rd just outside the trophies, but her co-driver took 2nd instead. It was a very close race and only 0.2 seconds separated 1st from 3rd. A photo provided with Charles Frank inside the car with Jeff Jacobs and Donna Frank outside.

The big excitement started when I walked over to Dr. Zimmer warming up his Supper Rabbit in grid with only five minutes to go before start. I was assisting with one additional Hoosier decal when the motor suddenly went dead. Panic started to spread and the Rabbit refused to start when cranked. I made a modest suggestion that perhaps the tank was empty. My comment was ignored, wires were checked and instruments were brought out to see if there spark, etc. No trouble was found and finally it was discovered there were no gas in the tank. Having the well equipped service van parked next to grid a can gas was brought out to pour in whatever was left in the can. I was tasked to run over to the Tech Center to buy 93 octane gas only to find the lowest octane was 100, next up was 110, and then 112. I settled for two gallons of 100 Octane priced at $6.50 a gallon. Rushed back. This was an unnerving start, but as Geoff said he was glad it happened in grid and not on the course. I did take a photo of Geoff before the motor stalled. However, this bad start did set the tone for the day. Geoff sitting in 2nd after the first day and in good position. Unfortunately he spun on this 1st run resulting in a DNF. Finding grip for the rear tires in this chilly weather was very difficult. Geoff 2nd run was okay not great, but he also kicked a cone. Like the day earlier, Geoff was now down to his last run to save the day. Unfortunately all rabbits were gone and again having grip problems Geoff went off course resulting in a DNF. Geoff dropped from 2nd to 12th. If the cone had been avoided in the 2nd run Geoff would have finished 5th and in the trophies. Co-driver Chris Petersen did stay on course and was steady, but dropped a few positions from 16th to 20th. Jinx drove well perhaps not as fast as he had wanted and finished 4th. Great job. Justin Barbry was very impressive with three solid runs and climbed from 17th to 16th. Excellent performance with the fastest Protégé 5 at the Nationals. I could not believe how fast that winning VW Scirocco was piloted by Kevin Wenzel winning by 1.2 seconds.

Finally AM were Bowlands took 1st and 2nd positions outperforming everything else in sight. Todd edged his father George by 1.6 seconds. Congratulations to the Bowlands to this year and years to come. I can not anybody else beating their open wheel racer with wings that are larger than the car itself. I did catch a photo of Todd being interviewed in the impound area by Sport Car magazine reporter I presume. JB will post photo. As I was walking to my car I saw this bright orange BMW MZ4 Coupe with carbon fiber body pieces built by TCKline Racing… I never saw it race. Nobody was near the car. I just wished I had known earlier.

Reflections:
I will definitely try to go back next year. I enjoyed every moment of it. Anybody who has been reading this thread and have not yet been to the Nationals, make sure you make it at least once. You don’t need to be on top of your game, just be there and be a part of the excitement and experience is well worth it. While I did not have any expectations, I had hoped to be in the top half and did not quite make it. I will make that a goal next year provided I can make the event.

I will definitely consider having a co-driver next time. Having a good co-driver can be very helpful in providing excellent feed back to each others, plus in cold weather conditions helps keeping the tires warm. The top Minis had four drivers each, two for the open class and two for the ladies class. Despite all the slipping and sliding trying to find grip I did only hit one cone in my six runs. This means I was too tentative and was not firing as I would like to do when I have grip. I will also consider arriving earlier to participate in the Pro Solo event on the same surface which gives a great chance to get right touch and feel with the surface leading up to the Nationals. This is what many did. The surface and I never bonded. I have forward to JB a final photo of the Mini on the course during 3rd run on Tuesday. As you can see I can simply not get any closer to the cone without taking them out…

I will bring winter jacket, mittens and other things to keep warm. That wind chilled down everything in seconds. A car cover to protect the car from all that filthy dust blowing around in the air.

I am not sure what to say about the stock class rules other than they are a set of rules that should perhaps be revised. It must be hearth breaking to be protested sitting in first place on minor details that has nothing to do with performance. I do think rules needs to be followed, but why not make “stock” stock. Don’t allow replacing shocks, don’t allow R-compound tires, don’t allow sway bar, etc. Keep it bone stock along with enforcement of all rules. I am sure this has been debated a lot and will still be debated for years to come… A photo has been forwarded to JB of the fastest Mini that finished 1st and 3rd.

Travel stats:
Volvo XC90 V8 traveled 2,396 miles (3,824km) using 141.35 gallons (535.1 liters) of premium fuel at an average of 16.8 miles per gallon. Total cost of fuel: $333.46.
Mini Cooper S traveled approx. 6 miles using approximately 3 gallons (11.3 liters) of premium fuel at an average of 2 miles per gallon.

This is my last post on this thread.

Mini 37 and 35

[jbyrd]

The End

[damnyankee]

Great report Per.

Thanks for your insight. Your reports have been very informative for a novice (newbie). I feel like I've lived your experience, minus the adrenaline.

Great Job!!!

Exalt, again