sean
Probationary Member
- 27
- 0
- Aug 12, 2002
-
Knoxville,
Tennessee
The East Tennessee Reagion SCCA held its third autocross on Sunday at Smokey's Stadium in Kodak, TN. There was a decent turnout with 80 entries, but only 4 people running in my class (STX).
I attended a local school on March 25th and had to miss the test-n-tune on the 26th due to a slipping clutch which also caused me to miss the 2nd autox of the season on April 9.
With a barely broken in clutch, and freshly removed a/c, I showed up to Smokey's Stadium around 8am to prepare for the day. A fellow student, and former co-worker, also followed me there for his first race (in his Toyota Matrix). I was a little excited to see a 2g Eclipse on site just to find out they were only there to spectate.
My competition today are the local standards in the class. Two WRX's, each of which have done well in the SE Divisional's, and a Mini S. The condition of the lot required a bit of an interesting course design with a decreasing right hander, a long downhill straight into a hairpin left to a long uphill straight into a left-right S turn which ended into an offset-four cone slalom through the finish. After the second set of runs I was in a surprising first place, due mostly to coning and DNF's of my competitors, just to drop off to second in the third run, third in the fourth run and finally fourth for the fifth and sixth runs. I did finish over a second closer to first than I did in my last event. I found myself having a difficult time with braking. Letting off the gas and coasting a bit before applying the brakes made it difficult for me to keep up with my competition.
The good news is the stock replacement clutch held up just fine, next is to solve the issue with my rear camber.
I attended a local school on March 25th and had to miss the test-n-tune on the 26th due to a slipping clutch which also caused me to miss the 2nd autox of the season on April 9.
With a barely broken in clutch, and freshly removed a/c, I showed up to Smokey's Stadium around 8am to prepare for the day. A fellow student, and former co-worker, also followed me there for his first race (in his Toyota Matrix). I was a little excited to see a 2g Eclipse on site just to find out they were only there to spectate.
My competition today are the local standards in the class. Two WRX's, each of which have done well in the SE Divisional's, and a Mini S. The condition of the lot required a bit of an interesting course design with a decreasing right hander, a long downhill straight into a hairpin left to a long uphill straight into a left-right S turn which ended into an offset-four cone slalom through the finish. After the second set of runs I was in a surprising first place, due mostly to coning and DNF's of my competitors, just to drop off to second in the third run, third in the fourth run and finally fourth for the fifth and sixth runs. I did finish over a second closer to first than I did in my last event. I found myself having a difficult time with braking. Letting off the gas and coasting a bit before applying the brakes made it difficult for me to keep up with my competition.
The good news is the stock replacement clutch held up just fine, next is to solve the issue with my rear camber.
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