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To lift, or
not to lift, that is the question. When the vista from your
windshield reveals the lush greens of grass and trees surrounding
beautiful Road Atlanta, you slowly realize that exiting turn five
you should be looking at the pavement going up the hill, not the
grass beside it.
But, I
digress.
Its
Saturday morning, the sky is blue, with a few high clouds, but
already you can tell it’s going to be a hot one. Since we have
never been on this track, I ask Andrew, (my son) if he wants to ride
in the pickup truck for an ‘orientation’ lap. (note to self…it’s a
pickup truck, not a race car…sloooooow down.) Well, we squeal the
tires on the second turn, so we REALLLLY slow down, and take the
scenic tour, and pull into the pits before we go under the bridge…I
think we better stick with the racecar.
The first
mile of this track is all up and down…the elevation change is
tremendous. The local drivers tell me you’re supposed to ‘jump’
the gators for turn #3, and hammer down all the way thru the ‘esses’.
Turn #5, my personal favorite, looks fast, slick, up hill,
and leads to the short chute before turns #6 and #7.
The back
side is fairly flat, with a long straight, a little kink to
the down hill into turn #10, and as you come around 11 you remember
the locals told you to aim for the painted yellow flag on the bridge
above, shoot under that, and keep the go pedal down… the… road…
will… be…there… finally… you can see the ground again, a little dip
to let you know you are in the grove, and you’re going around the
off-camber turn #12 down the front straight… time to breathe, hit
the brakes at the end of the pit wall, turn right up the hill, carry
a lot of speed, hope this thing grips ‘cause I just noticed
there is a wall real close to the track out for turn #1
…rinse and repeat.
But I
digress.
For
qualifying, the local hot shoes turn some fast laps around 1:52.4.
Hmmm, these guys are fast; I’m going to have to step it up. With
qualifying over, I pull off the track, pour myself out of the car,
man this pavement’s hot, even under the canopy, peel out of the race
suit, and I do mean peel…toss your stuff into the back of the
truck. What’s this? DARK CLOUDS bearing down on the paddock?
What’s that gray stuff over there, and why can’t you see Dave
Ellingsworth’s trailer, he’s only 200 feet away. Oh..oh…WHAM…grab
the canopy, and hold on…it’s a MONSOON! As you ponder how high in
the air you’ll get before you remember to turn loose of the canopy,
you realize you are now soaking wet from head to toe, quite cool,
and not so worried about heat stroke.
Always
remember to fuel the car…completely. Guessing that you use about a
gallon for every ten minutes of track time is not a good idea.
Instead, go ahead and spill $.42 worth of fuel and fill it till
it runs out the overflow! Just because you can get away with
guessing on Saturday, does not mean you will guess correctly
on Sunday.
But I
digress.
On Sunday,
Tim Betteridge #117 and John Harris #9 arrive, and qualify for the
944Cup. For the Small Bore Race, I started outside Bill
Vanderford’s Miata, (we had a fun run several months ago at CMP).
Two cars up there’s J. Harris’s #9, and up another 2 there’s J.
Bell’s #59. Tim Betteridge and Tim Pruitt qualified way up
front. We’re ready to go and the field starts accelerating at turn
10. Under the bridge, side-by-side, Bill stays in the gas down the
hill, and stays inside for turn 12, onto the front straight. Up
ahead there’s plenty of smoke from the front of the field at turn 1,
several cars are locking it up…still two wide up the hill, I
get along side of Bill’s out of 3, but he sneaks back around going
into the esses, now we’re single file…and around the track we go.
Lap #2:
Still on
Bill’s bumper, past the start finish line, to turn one back up and
over the hill, back down thru the esses, and up into turn 5…brakes,
let off the brake, turn left…whoa… too much… the back end is
sliding out... feather the throttle, don’t lift, but don’t spin the
tires, it snaps back to the right… aimed right at the gravel trap,
bam… into the gravel, out to wall…THE WALL?…I forgot about
the WALL… let’s try a little steering, a little throttle, see if we
can get some grip on the little strip of pavement they call a
service road…YES ! … back over the gators, Whump…thru
the grass, and back on the track.
But I
digress. |
