SCCA 6 hour enduro

[Wirtz]

Hey all,

I know just about everyone is up in DFW, but in case there are some folks in the BCS area, this weekend SCCA will be running it's 6 hour enduro at TWS on the 2.9 mile version of the track. Saturday is a typical Regional race and Sunday is the 6 hour race. I will be again running it with some friends from Dell. If you stop by the track look for the Spec Racer Ford #37 (white with a big red frog decal on it).

Jeff

[hancheyb]

Re: SCCA 6 hour enduro

good luck!

[Shortcutsleeping]

Re: SCCA 6 hour enduro

How'd it go Jeff?

I only ran Saturday...and had a terrible race at that.
http://www.witchdoctormotorsports.com/ch48.htm

Story of the new pups here:
http://www.witchdoctormotorsports.com/ch47.htm

Costas

[Wirtz]

Re: SCCA 6 hour enduro

I knew I saw your car out there, was planning to go find where you were pitted but next thing I knew I saw your trailer driving out. Bummer about the car troubles you had.

Our weekend went really well. I was driving a SRF in the enduro with 2 other Dell guys. Steve (car owner) also ran the Reg on Saturday. Steve ended up setting a personal best on Sat and finished 10th in the race, also his best. Pretty good in the always large SRF field. For the Enduro Dave (2nd driver) ran the session and qualified us 13th out of 59ish cars. But then end the end of the session, we were told he passed under yellow and was being moved to the back of the pack! Luckily, we had our video system running that session, so we find the right incident, and was able to show the flag was not yet displayed when he made the pass, so qual position was reinstated.

The only drama was Dave thought the car was cutting out intermittently during the qual session, so we ran codes, swapped the coil pack and mass air, and then hoped for the best.

Sunday's race went real smooth. Our plan was for 4 pit stops, which really stretches the cars small 6.5 gallon fuel capacity. Steve started and ran a great first stint. Then our first stop put Dave in the car, another perfect pit stop got me in for the 3rd stint. At this point the radios stopped working which was only a hassle, but not a huge issue. Only full yellow in my stint was for a grass fire at T7. At one point, I caught a car that I knew was driven by the Vice President of Dell Notebooks and I passed him going into T1, but then I messed up and dropped the wheel on the outside of T2, I ended up spinning right in front of my VP (career limiting move??), he actually just barely bumped into me while I was spinning backwards. But I think since he hit me I can go report him to Dell HR

I came back in and Dave got back in, then I ran the last stint. A full yellow came out with almost exactly 75 minutes left. By our estimates, the car can make 70 minutes on fuel, after that it is dicey. But we decided to go for it and made the pit stop. I spent most of the last session trying save fuel by short shifting, drafting, rolling out of the throttle early, all the stuff I hear the pros talk about on SpeedTV but have never really had to try. Well, finally I see the starter showing 2 laps to go, and by T3 the car starts to die coming out of the turn! I nursed it as best I could, got all the way around at somewhat decent speed for the 1 to go. But now the car will barely get out of the turns, I just kept the revs low and tried to limp home, I got it all the way around onto the front straight, as just as I exit the esses, the engine turns OFF.... So I stab the clutch and coasted past Start / Finish at like 40 mph. Had to park it in T1 but at least we made the checkered flag. We were all laughing about it and talking about how luckily we got because cars were dying all over the place on the last few laps, and then we found out that we ended up 3rd in class and 4th overall out of 59 cars!! SWEET!

Anyway, we had a blast. Big thanks to Eric Fancher and family, Mike McClure and Todd Farris (as well as several others) for coming out and being our put crew. Todd was on the radio for the whole race and sometimes when he was talking to me, I felt like I was suddenly Cole Trickle in Days of Thunder. "Don't worry boy, I gots ya a special set of matched tarrs on the car"

Jeff