continued from above
After we had finished with the Hot Lap battle we waited for the USCA folks to tally the scores after 3 days of competitions. I remember sitting with Jason in our garage and trying to calm down, and I remember Sofi showing up for a while. Amy and Jason and I tried to figure out how we placed, assuming I might have jumped into 2nd or 3rd overall, based on the guesses of where I ended up on Saturday's Autocross, Speed Stop and Design competitions. They purposefully don't show everyone the rankings for each event in real time, so we tried to have spotters watching times and keeping a running score as we went, as best we could.
While we waited Amy and Brandon set-up a group picture of the 8 Vorshlag entrants and cars, other than Marc's C6 which was already loaded up in the trailer for the tow home. This was the result, below - a great picture! Seven cars and eight local drivers who all had the times of their lives! Every one of them said they had a ton of fun at this event, even the folks not battling to win their class.
Michael Minor's nearly stock Miata did well and tied for 1st in the GT2K class. He lost the tie on the design award score - bummer! Shannon, Heather, Jan, Jon and Jerry were all fighting amongst themselves, and compared their times all weekend. Each of them are HPDE drivers that have since found a new reason to hone their autocross and track skills and each vowed to enter USCA events in the future. Jan, Shannon and Heather got the star treatment and we will likely see their many interviews when this episode of the TV show airs - more likely than we will see mine, heh. Marc was excited to have finished 3rd in the Hot Lap Challenge with a broken brake rotor and on skinnier tires than he wanted to show up on, too. My main regret of the weekend was not finding a car for Amy to enter, as she could have fought hard for a win in GT2K or AWD classes, with a bit of luck.
Event announcer Dennis asked to park all of the cars in front of the Optima trailer for a group picture, so after our Vorshlag group photo we motored on over and parked in a big grid. The crowd of entrants and spectators started to gather and we all anxiously awaited the final event & class results as well as the four coveted Optima/SEMA invites.
Jimi went over the closing announcements of the event and talked a bit about the TV series that would air on MAVTV covering the 10 USCA/Optima qualifiers plus the Vegas Optima Invitational. They gave out the spirit of the event award (1 invite of 4 to be awarded) and then they started the individual class awards (1st-3rd for each competition).
They did the GT2K and AWD classes, handing out winner certificates for each event: Autocross, Speed Stop, Design and Hot Lap. It was here that we found out that our friends Todd and Michael, who had both won 2 of 3 driving competitions in their classes, ended up both losing the overall class wins with TIES for 1st in class - due to their design award scores. Doh! That cost them both invites to SEMA, which was the suck. I figured my design score (which I had no idea of) wouldn't help my overall ranking either.
Next up came GT3K awards: 1st through 3rd place certificates for each event, and most of these were a shock to me. I was awarded 2nd fastest in the Autocross, when I thought I had only scored 4th. A 3rd in the Speed Stop was also a welcome surprise, and that got my hopes up a little. Maybe I will break into the top 3? Then our Design ranking of 4th, yet Hobaugh's badass Camaro wasn't in the top 3?? That was a shock. The BFG Hot Lap Challenge win was already pretty well known, as they had live Race Monitor times up all day. By now Amy, Jason and I were frantically redoing the math - where did we finish?!?!?! Maybe we got 2nd overall, which would be great! They started to call out the overall GT3K class winners.
They called off 3rd place: Brian Hobaugh.
Wait... what?!?! He was third. I figured he was the winner... How in the...
Then they called off 2nd place: Brian Finch.
What in the.... I stood up and looked around at Jason and Amy and silently mouthed, "WTF?" My mind was spinning - we hadn't done the math right. I thought that Hobaugh would be 1st and Finch was 2nd, but we got their order backwards and still left out the actual winner. Who in Hell did we miss?! Did I end up taking 4th here, or did I....
No.
NO WAY!
I looked at Jimi, he cracked a knowing smile, and the only possible conclusion now became clear.
They called the GT3K class winner: Terry Fair.
BOOM! I honestly nearly fell over in shock. This was such an unexpected surprise of epic proportions! I had only won the Hot Lap competition, how did I win the whole event?? I was hoping they wouldn't change their minds while I shoved my stuff into Todd's hands and headed up onto the Optima trailer.
I was still in disbelief as I climbed the stairs. No way this is happening! Jimi Day congratulated me on the overall win and asked me if I'd be in SEMA in Novem... "OH HELL YES!" I didn't even let him finish the question. We would have a lot of work ahead of us to get the Mustang presentable for the SEMA show, tons of testing to fine tune the street tire set-up, and this meant I couldn't sell the car before November, but so be it. The weight of that huge chunk of billet aluminum that the folks at Ridetech CNC machined into the class winner trophies sure felt good in my hands. Its sitting in our lobby and I crack a wide smile every time I see it.
The overall lead was by 7 points, so I could have slipped down a spot in one event and still won. Four solid finishes with steady top 4 placings just added up for the win. The Design Challenge and Hot Lap Challenge scores saved me the most. People were congratulating me below the Optima trailer, but I was speechless. They shuffled the class winners over behind the trailer for more interviews with the TV show's host, Chad.
After a few takes (due to outside noises) we finally got this 20 second interview in the can and I stumbled back to the garage - to see the REAL star of this event, the big red Mustang! I cannot thank our crew here at Vorshlag enough for all of the hard work they put into this car over the past FOUR YEARS to get it where it is today. If a no-talent-hack like me can win against a field with this much talent and top dollar iron, then we must have made one helluva car!
We came up with a package of the right parts that was just easy enough to drive, with a touch of downforce when it mattered and just enough power from the stock 5.0 Coyote engine to get it done. This set-up isn't even remotely perfected for street tires, but I guess it was good enough this time. The Mustang was rock solid reliable all weekend, even when we dumped in E85 ethanol. The brakes worked through 3 days of abuse (after we replaced the very worn front rotors that I let slip by after the last track event), and the Carbotech XP20 compound just laughed at the abuse I threw at them. The stock clutch was solid, and the Vorshlag/Moton/Whiteline suspension handled everything we threw at it and did so with ease.
The most amazing thing was: these 200 treadwear BFG Rival street tires were fast enough that I beat my best GTA time from this track in 2012 when it was on 315mm Hoosiers! Even if you count my un-timed best 39.8 lap from 2012, we were still quicker on the BFG streets here. I guess we have refined the overall suspension and aero package THAT much to overcome a grip deficiency to gumball A6 compound Hoosier race tires. Wow. Sure, I did some damage to the outer tread blocks on the rear 335 Rivals, but most of that was done in the closing "victory" laps of the last session - where I kept the rear tires spinning through most of 3 laps, heh. We flipped these tires on the rear wheels and ran them at another event a few weeks later without a worry. Other than the outer tread wear the tread depth left over after 3 days of brutal abuse was remarkable and I won't bat an eye about using Rivals again at the Optima Invitational. Look for more street tire testing from Vorshlag soon!
When we went to go pull the Mustang back in the trailer after the USCA event on Sunday night the battery to the winch was dead (someone left the interior lights on overnight) so we had to push it up the ramps and a series of moving wood planks we use to keep the splitter from dragging (thanks for the help guys). We've since upgraded to a set of 2-piece foam Race Ramps that are twice as long as before, so the car drives into our rather tallish trailer easily now.
After we were all loaded up the whole Vorshlag contingent of 15+ people met for dinner and Amy and I headed home, utterly exhausted yet elated. There were more events coming up and we had to get ready for them both. We had a new focus for the rest of this year, other than just doing well in NASA TT3: we had to get a second set-up tested and perfected for street tire use in USCA... because we were going to the big Optima Invitational! That is going to be SO much fun. Amy has already reserved a condo with multiple rooms for the week of SEMA and the weekend after. Lots of mods to do, lots to test.
Upcoming Competition Events YOU Can Enter!
Our next events are fast approaching, and some are crucial for testing our TT3 set-up and/or for developing new parts to sell. Click on the links for the events below (in the dates) to see about coming out to watch, or better yet - to enter your own car!
- NASA @ Texas World Speedway April 26-27th. This could be one of the last ever TWS events, as this speedway is slated to be parceled off into residential home plots. We have this NASA event TWS in April and another on October 10-11th to set and lock down TT3 track records for TWS - possibly forever. This track's high speeds are also good testing ground for NASA Nationals at Road Atlanta in August. It will be a BATTLE as we already have a record SEVEN entries in TT3 class! I sure hope that new wing helps...
- GTA at Road Atlanta, May 9-10th. We loved running with the GTA guys in 2012 at TMS and this is the first time we will have had a chance to run with them again, at this East Coast GTA Pro / Drift event. We will be testing a new aero set-up and learning this new-to-me track for NASA Nationals while also trying to win the Unlimited RWD class at the GTA event. There are some serious GTA cars attending so we might be lucky to get into the top 3, who knows?
- SCCA Texas Pro Solo at Mineral Wells, May 2-4. Due to a conflict (below) we cannot be there one day so we did not enter this event, but Vorshlag is hosting the Friday Night Welcome Party. Amy and I will be manning the grill and talking to local and out of state autocrossers that show up for this drag-race-start, side-by-side two day autocross event. If you are local, and even if you're not, PLEASE sign up for this one at the link here.
- 24th Dallas Spring Nationals Classic Car Show hosted by the Sam Pack Ford Auto Group, May 3rd at the Sam Pack Car Museum in Famers Branch, TX. We will be at this event with our Mustang - yes, we're missing a Pro Solo for a car show. BUT... there will be a 2015 Mustang at this show, and we've been promised "a closer look" since we'll be an event sponsor there. This is a recon mission, pure and simple! Come out and see the show, and enter for only $25. More details at this link.
What's Next?
That was a big event post, so thanks for sticking with me on that massive post-race recap. It was the biggest competition win of my life to date, so that might explain the length, heh. Again, we should see the TV episode covering this event around August 15th on MAVTV, and I'll share the YouTube link for the show after its released. I'm STILL pumped about this one...
The new MCS doubles are on and have been run at 2 events already. We also have a new rear wing in the works that we will show at the end of our next update, a massive 14" chord x 72" wide carbon fiber wing made by AJ Hartman Racing (formerly known as Fulcrum Aeroworks). Vorshlag is now a dealer for AJ Hartman aero products and we will be developing wing mounting packages for a number of new cars - starting with the 2010-14 Mustang of course. The set of our S197 Moton Club Sport remote reservoir doubles is also still for sale, and I've lowered the priced a couple hundred bucks. Had some solid bites but nobody took the plunge yet. We've also now got a new rear adjustable height spring platform solution to work for the S197 Mustangs, which can go with this set of Moton shocks or anything from MCS. And yes, the old APR GTC-300 wing and uprights we built will be for sale in our Clearance page soon - I'll post it up when it is ready to be for sale, so stop PMing me about it already!
Tune in next time when I cover the Track Guys HPDE event at TWS, where Amy drove the Mustang over two days. We also competed in a local SCCA autocross on street tires... in a down pour. Lots of splashing and sliding around. And I'll briefly talk about Vorshlag Kart Fight 3 - a karting challenge we hosted recently with 38 entrants one night at Dallas Karting Complex. It was a tough fight for the coveted Kart Fight trophy, but it went to a deserving winner and fellow NASA TT racer.
Until next time,
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