Thunderhill Raceway Park August 4-6, 2006
Someone once said: "The winners in history are usually the ones who write the history we read." Baaahaaaaaaaaa heeeheee. Youve been warned.
Rolling out of ole Sack-O-Tomatoes (Sacramento to you out of towners) Thursday nite, the Delta breeze was coming up and the sun going down. Sweet. I began to cogitate on what the plan would be and what to expect this weekend at the SF double Regional. I had a couple of reasons to feel good: 1) car was running good, hadnt broke nothing in a while (knock wood) and 2) a moon hung in the sky as Credence Clearwater came on the radio doing Bad Moon Rising; always a good sign to a sarcastic old sumbitch like me. On the flipside, I would carry the standard for the Royal Order of the Blue Tire/Backmarkers, not a honor I relished anymore.
Friday was non-descript; I ran some 1:54s in practice on 10 session tires, but couldnt do much better in qualifying on my 4 session specials. The track was just slow. But at least I would start Saturday's race in 6th, just ahead of my new arch-rival (gotta have one) Malcolm Harwood, fellow Dilbert-Engineer/old-fart-extraordinaire.
The track was just slow," you ever hear that? WTF does that mean? Little gnomes in the ground dialed up the gravity coefficient and dialed down friction? Bill Weaver, our FM El Presidente, can usually touch the pavement, sniff the air and predict within a tenth what his next flying lap time would be. So there must be something to the slow mystery when he goes out on stickers expressly to set another track record, lays down a mistake-free lap or 2 (all he needs) and is a full second off what he expected. Too much voodoo; must be the phase of the moon.
My race set up included lowering the rear wing a couple of degrees since T-Hill is our fastest track. Top speed picked up about 4 mph in the 1st practice. Thats good, no? But then in the Friday PM Qual session, the car is getting progressively looser until she spins at the exit of 6 late in the session. Hmmmmmmmmmm loose is not usually my problem. Always on the verge of denial, I figure it must be something simple like over-inflated rears. So I pull in, get out, pop a cold one and plop down in my chair to mull it over. Tire pressures fine. Damn, that rear wing looks flat.must be an illusion. Straight edge and smart level at the ready; Yep, that sucker smashed itself down to 4 degrees.(more hmmmmmmmmms, snooping around) Well, no $hit dippy, you forgot to tighten the locking nuts. One more thing for the checklist.
After this little 5 minute investigation, then 10 minutes of downloading data, fueling and checking oil, water, and nuts, I kicked back in my easy chair and watched the 4 man FA crew next door swarm all over that car. As the curiosity built as what could possibly be so critical as to require all that energy from a bunch of 50-somethings, it occurred to me that I really didnt want to know. As a diversion, I considered making a sandwich, taking a nap or pedaling around the paddock spreading and collecting gossip. Gossip won.
Saturday. In the first race, not much happened. Malcolm hounded me like the trooper he is. Although I made a few mistakes, they came at inopportune times for him, as he wasnt close enough to capitalize. As we soldiered on lap after lap, I could just about feel what he was thinking; Cmon man, dig down deep, just one more timeIm not as good as I once was, but Im as good once as I ever was. Looking racy going into the Turn 3 RH sweeper, he got brave on the dirty, slippery off camber outside line; a place I avoid at all costs. I was sweating as his nose came into my peripheral vision. But as I set up for the T-4 left-hander, I sensed he was gone, but it wasnt until I caught a glimpse of him in my mirror; sideways and going off that I let out a big yeeeeehawww. I immediately backed off 2 clicks and settled into cruise mode until Tim Watson, who had spun earlier, came charging back up about 3 seconds/lap faster to challenge in the last couple of laps. I conjured up enough chicanery to hold him off until he too spun. Ill let them both continue to think I have a James Bond oil spray.
In Saturdays PM qualifying for Sundays race I was just getting some heat in my now 6 session tires when the good Dr. Watson had an off on the backside of Turn 4, and either waited too long in one spot for the field to pass or flicked his cigarette into the golden brown grass. Either way we got a black-flag-all while the crew put out Tims little grass fire. Then, apparently to punish us Group 2 bad boys, they checkered the session with easily 10 minutes to go. So, there I was for Sundays race, stuck behind Malcolm and some other guys I normally see in my mirrors for only a lap or 2 until I motor away.
Well, how could one sweat the small stuff when the evening presented a bright waxing moon, a gentle breeze, a nice tasty Cohiba, and a chat with long lost Stew Tabek, whom we hadnt seen all year. Stew, back from working too hard, resumed his usual 3rd or 4th spot on the grid. An FM stalwart going back to the mid-90s, hes always tweaking his set-up, a hallmark of NorCal FM racing if there ever was one.
Sundays race for me can be summed up in one word: Mesmerized. Yeah, as in trying too hard with tunnel vision. I had a great start, blowing by Malcolm and a couple of other guys I was sweating and found myself glued to the gearbox of a DSR that qualified at 1:50, way ahead of me. I follow him through 2, 3, 4, & 5, steeling myself for a balls-out-cold-tire charge through 6, the hardest turn, when all of a sudden, Im standing on the brakes, totally dazed and confused. A microsecond later I wake up to the fact this guy is having a mechanical or emotional breakdown and the train is passing me NASCAR style. I fall in behind John, an ex MSR cousin now in an FSCCA car. Malcolm stays tantalizingly within sight, but I cant get around John to save my ass. Nevertheless, we give the T-14 flag man a show for several laps at the end of the back straight until I realized the tires aint got no more to give. We both take it home all neat and tidy with Malcolm still just up ahead. Damn.
Switching gears; lets talk personalities. Like sports shows everywhere, we dont need the facts; we wanna expose the idiosyncrasies and foibles of our sports heroes and goats. Heres the cream from this weeks paddock.
The General
Bill Weaver could be a brigadier or major general in anybodys army; he just looks like the part; his paddock and trailer is always A-J squared away. (Mine looks like a homeless person is racing.) His car is red, white and blue; you just feel like you ought to salute it. You hardly ever see him working on the car (Ive never seen him scale it at the track). But hes got the parts and know-how if he needs it. More than once I listened to the aforementioned scrambling FA crew mumbling; what would Weaver do? Get this; when they stripped down the gear stack for a broken 1st gear and couldnt fit it back in the box; Bill had to point out that the dog ring usually goes in the fork. Im ROFLMAO. Always there, always on time, always in control, he continues to set the FM west coast world on fire. Weve lost track of the records hes set this season. To mere mortals in the back its hard to tell if hes luckier than good, but theres definitely a big helping of both. Whats left? Hes too old for Champ Car, too smart for NASCAR.
The Free Spirit.
Jimbo Mali, a bridesmaid to Bill for years, is a stark contrast to the General. Jims a surfer with hair that dried standing up in a stiff breeze; he just looks like a 60s or 70s hippy war protester. Hes always working on the car, mostly routine stuff, but with his luck somethings usually breaking. After buying some new bodywork he let us know what a Freespirit he really is with a first class paint job. (The 4-year-old artistic prodigy can be seen in the background.) I cautioned that the car needs a warning sign; If you were a tripper in the 1970s; dont stare at this too long. And more like me than Bill, hes usually fashionably late; pulling up to the grid at the 5-minute mark. But to highlight the contrast between the General and the Free Spirit, Ive previously noted that every Mali race report should be entitled If it werent for Bad Luck. Apparently Ive jinxed him good, because in Sundays race, he blew his 5-race motor. Oh well, on the plus side, hes waiting for some big Microsoft deal to sail in, so hes got time to work on the car.
The Clown.
If youre one of the 3 regular readers of Postcards, youll recall past references to our local Paul Tracy wanna-be/look alike boy racer. Well call him PT2. Did you see Tracys move in San Jose where he took out Tagliani? Classic PT, wasnt it? Like Paul, PT2 is often a winner of the bonehead move of the week award and this past weekend was a prime example. May I suggest the SFR Stewards should be testing him for Floyd Landis levels and ratios of testosterone? The guy was all over the place offending just about everybody on track. True to the old saying, we don need no stinkin mirrors, he apparently has no concept of anything or anyone outside of his tunnel vision. In a pro FM, hes about the fastest thing around the track most days, but, like an only child at play or a confused 90 year old, he will change line and speed at will on the track for no apparent reason. Bill wants to give him the benefit of the doubt, but listen to these examples fresh off the weekend and you be the judge:
1. Ken, an FM brother who knows his way around a track (credentials include the Pro series back in the day and racing/teaming with guys like Joey Hand), let PT2 by on the back straightaway, whereupon PT2 slows dramatically in the middle of the track nowhere near the brake zone. Then as Ken passes him on the racing line, PT2 swerves over and punts him off the track. When black-flagged, PT2 had no idea there was any contact at all.
2. In the Q session for the 2nd race, PT2 was lined up 2nd on the grid. When the green dropped, Bill Weaver, went out first on his typical hotter than $hit-out lap. PT2 follows at Pace car speed (and he may have been doing a little tire scrubbing too) with the plan to let Bill get 15 seconds ahead. Since hes way faster than 98% of the field, no one makes a serious attempt to pass, but lap later the entire field is still held up and shaking their fists. Lots of near collisions. Anybody see a need for that in club racing short sessions? Didnt think so.
3. On two occasions in the 2nd race, on the pace lap and later, under double yellows, hes the lead car, but refuses to catch up to and stay with the pace car. This had the whole field once again shaking their heads in consternation and their fists in frustration. It was like time stood still and even the announcers, trying not to jump to conclusions, were forced to note some skullduggery was going on. When the pace car was safely around the bend into the pits, PT2 floors it and flies around T-15 onto the front straight, clearly racing before the green and getting a jump on the field, contrary to the GCR 9.2.1 (The lead car shall keep pace with the Safety car and shall not balk the fieldDrivers shall maintain the pace established by the Safety Car and shall not improve their positions or begin racing until the green flag) .He should have been met with a black flag and a drive through. The real pisser is that the results have been posted and he got away scot-free.
Well, thats all the fun we have time for this month. This race was our last at Thunderhill this year. Damn, never saw 100F on the grid !!! The next event is the Labor Day regional at Infineon. And then (drum roll), the West Coast Series presented by World Speed and sponsored by Star Mazda and Goodyear re-engages for an exciting 3-way shootout at the last 2 race weekends, both at the newly re-configured and repaved Laguna. See you around the paddock.
Good night and good luck.
Tedward R. Murrow
On a Wing and a Prayer
Bet youd like one more peak at that paint job, huh?
Someone once said: "The winners in history are usually the ones who write the history we read." Baaahaaaaaaaaa heeeheee. Youve been warned.
Rolling out of ole Sack-O-Tomatoes (Sacramento to you out of towners) Thursday nite, the Delta breeze was coming up and the sun going down. Sweet. I began to cogitate on what the plan would be and what to expect this weekend at the SF double Regional. I had a couple of reasons to feel good: 1) car was running good, hadnt broke nothing in a while (knock wood) and 2) a moon hung in the sky as Credence Clearwater came on the radio doing Bad Moon Rising; always a good sign to a sarcastic old sumbitch like me. On the flipside, I would carry the standard for the Royal Order of the Blue Tire/Backmarkers, not a honor I relished anymore.
Friday was non-descript; I ran some 1:54s in practice on 10 session tires, but couldnt do much better in qualifying on my 4 session specials. The track was just slow. But at least I would start Saturday's race in 6th, just ahead of my new arch-rival (gotta have one) Malcolm Harwood, fellow Dilbert-Engineer/old-fart-extraordinaire.
The track was just slow," you ever hear that? WTF does that mean? Little gnomes in the ground dialed up the gravity coefficient and dialed down friction? Bill Weaver, our FM El Presidente, can usually touch the pavement, sniff the air and predict within a tenth what his next flying lap time would be. So there must be something to the slow mystery when he goes out on stickers expressly to set another track record, lays down a mistake-free lap or 2 (all he needs) and is a full second off what he expected. Too much voodoo; must be the phase of the moon.
My race set up included lowering the rear wing a couple of degrees since T-Hill is our fastest track. Top speed picked up about 4 mph in the 1st practice. Thats good, no? But then in the Friday PM Qual session, the car is getting progressively looser until she spins at the exit of 6 late in the session. Hmmmmmmmmmm loose is not usually my problem. Always on the verge of denial, I figure it must be something simple like over-inflated rears. So I pull in, get out, pop a cold one and plop down in my chair to mull it over. Tire pressures fine. Damn, that rear wing looks flat.must be an illusion. Straight edge and smart level at the ready; Yep, that sucker smashed itself down to 4 degrees.(more hmmmmmmmmms, snooping around) Well, no $hit dippy, you forgot to tighten the locking nuts. One more thing for the checklist.
After this little 5 minute investigation, then 10 minutes of downloading data, fueling and checking oil, water, and nuts, I kicked back in my easy chair and watched the 4 man FA crew next door swarm all over that car. As the curiosity built as what could possibly be so critical as to require all that energy from a bunch of 50-somethings, it occurred to me that I really didnt want to know. As a diversion, I considered making a sandwich, taking a nap or pedaling around the paddock spreading and collecting gossip. Gossip won.
Saturday. In the first race, not much happened. Malcolm hounded me like the trooper he is. Although I made a few mistakes, they came at inopportune times for him, as he wasnt close enough to capitalize. As we soldiered on lap after lap, I could just about feel what he was thinking; Cmon man, dig down deep, just one more timeIm not as good as I once was, but Im as good once as I ever was. Looking racy going into the Turn 3 RH sweeper, he got brave on the dirty, slippery off camber outside line; a place I avoid at all costs. I was sweating as his nose came into my peripheral vision. But as I set up for the T-4 left-hander, I sensed he was gone, but it wasnt until I caught a glimpse of him in my mirror; sideways and going off that I let out a big yeeeeehawww. I immediately backed off 2 clicks and settled into cruise mode until Tim Watson, who had spun earlier, came charging back up about 3 seconds/lap faster to challenge in the last couple of laps. I conjured up enough chicanery to hold him off until he too spun. Ill let them both continue to think I have a James Bond oil spray.
In Saturdays PM qualifying for Sundays race I was just getting some heat in my now 6 session tires when the good Dr. Watson had an off on the backside of Turn 4, and either waited too long in one spot for the field to pass or flicked his cigarette into the golden brown grass. Either way we got a black-flag-all while the crew put out Tims little grass fire. Then, apparently to punish us Group 2 bad boys, they checkered the session with easily 10 minutes to go. So, there I was for Sundays race, stuck behind Malcolm and some other guys I normally see in my mirrors for only a lap or 2 until I motor away.
Well, how could one sweat the small stuff when the evening presented a bright waxing moon, a gentle breeze, a nice tasty Cohiba, and a chat with long lost Stew Tabek, whom we hadnt seen all year. Stew, back from working too hard, resumed his usual 3rd or 4th spot on the grid. An FM stalwart going back to the mid-90s, hes always tweaking his set-up, a hallmark of NorCal FM racing if there ever was one.
Sundays race for me can be summed up in one word: Mesmerized. Yeah, as in trying too hard with tunnel vision. I had a great start, blowing by Malcolm and a couple of other guys I was sweating and found myself glued to the gearbox of a DSR that qualified at 1:50, way ahead of me. I follow him through 2, 3, 4, & 5, steeling myself for a balls-out-cold-tire charge through 6, the hardest turn, when all of a sudden, Im standing on the brakes, totally dazed and confused. A microsecond later I wake up to the fact this guy is having a mechanical or emotional breakdown and the train is passing me NASCAR style. I fall in behind John, an ex MSR cousin now in an FSCCA car. Malcolm stays tantalizingly within sight, but I cant get around John to save my ass. Nevertheless, we give the T-14 flag man a show for several laps at the end of the back straight until I realized the tires aint got no more to give. We both take it home all neat and tidy with Malcolm still just up ahead. Damn.
Switching gears; lets talk personalities. Like sports shows everywhere, we dont need the facts; we wanna expose the idiosyncrasies and foibles of our sports heroes and goats. Heres the cream from this weeks paddock.
The General
Bill Weaver could be a brigadier or major general in anybodys army; he just looks like the part; his paddock and trailer is always A-J squared away. (Mine looks like a homeless person is racing.) His car is red, white and blue; you just feel like you ought to salute it. You hardly ever see him working on the car (Ive never seen him scale it at the track). But hes got the parts and know-how if he needs it. More than once I listened to the aforementioned scrambling FA crew mumbling; what would Weaver do? Get this; when they stripped down the gear stack for a broken 1st gear and couldnt fit it back in the box; Bill had to point out that the dog ring usually goes in the fork. Im ROFLMAO. Always there, always on time, always in control, he continues to set the FM west coast world on fire. Weve lost track of the records hes set this season. To mere mortals in the back its hard to tell if hes luckier than good, but theres definitely a big helping of both. Whats left? Hes too old for Champ Car, too smart for NASCAR.
The Free Spirit.
Jimbo Mali, a bridesmaid to Bill for years, is a stark contrast to the General. Jims a surfer with hair that dried standing up in a stiff breeze; he just looks like a 60s or 70s hippy war protester. Hes always working on the car, mostly routine stuff, but with his luck somethings usually breaking. After buying some new bodywork he let us know what a Freespirit he really is with a first class paint job. (The 4-year-old artistic prodigy can be seen in the background.) I cautioned that the car needs a warning sign; If you were a tripper in the 1970s; dont stare at this too long. And more like me than Bill, hes usually fashionably late; pulling up to the grid at the 5-minute mark. But to highlight the contrast between the General and the Free Spirit, Ive previously noted that every Mali race report should be entitled If it werent for Bad Luck. Apparently Ive jinxed him good, because in Sundays race, he blew his 5-race motor. Oh well, on the plus side, hes waiting for some big Microsoft deal to sail in, so hes got time to work on the car.
The Clown.
If youre one of the 3 regular readers of Postcards, youll recall past references to our local Paul Tracy wanna-be/look alike boy racer. Well call him PT2. Did you see Tracys move in San Jose where he took out Tagliani? Classic PT, wasnt it? Like Paul, PT2 is often a winner of the bonehead move of the week award and this past weekend was a prime example. May I suggest the SFR Stewards should be testing him for Floyd Landis levels and ratios of testosterone? The guy was all over the place offending just about everybody on track. True to the old saying, we don need no stinkin mirrors, he apparently has no concept of anything or anyone outside of his tunnel vision. In a pro FM, hes about the fastest thing around the track most days, but, like an only child at play or a confused 90 year old, he will change line and speed at will on the track for no apparent reason. Bill wants to give him the benefit of the doubt, but listen to these examples fresh off the weekend and you be the judge:
1. Ken, an FM brother who knows his way around a track (credentials include the Pro series back in the day and racing/teaming with guys like Joey Hand), let PT2 by on the back straightaway, whereupon PT2 slows dramatically in the middle of the track nowhere near the brake zone. Then as Ken passes him on the racing line, PT2 swerves over and punts him off the track. When black-flagged, PT2 had no idea there was any contact at all.
2. In the Q session for the 2nd race, PT2 was lined up 2nd on the grid. When the green dropped, Bill Weaver, went out first on his typical hotter than $hit-out lap. PT2 follows at Pace car speed (and he may have been doing a little tire scrubbing too) with the plan to let Bill get 15 seconds ahead. Since hes way faster than 98% of the field, no one makes a serious attempt to pass, but lap later the entire field is still held up and shaking their fists. Lots of near collisions. Anybody see a need for that in club racing short sessions? Didnt think so.
3. On two occasions in the 2nd race, on the pace lap and later, under double yellows, hes the lead car, but refuses to catch up to and stay with the pace car. This had the whole field once again shaking their heads in consternation and their fists in frustration. It was like time stood still and even the announcers, trying not to jump to conclusions, were forced to note some skullduggery was going on. When the pace car was safely around the bend into the pits, PT2 floors it and flies around T-15 onto the front straight, clearly racing before the green and getting a jump on the field, contrary to the GCR 9.2.1 (The lead car shall keep pace with the Safety car and shall not balk the fieldDrivers shall maintain the pace established by the Safety Car and shall not improve their positions or begin racing until the green flag) .He should have been met with a black flag and a drive through. The real pisser is that the results have been posted and he got away scot-free.
Well, thats all the fun we have time for this month. This race was our last at Thunderhill this year. Damn, never saw 100F on the grid !!! The next event is the Labor Day regional at Infineon. And then (drum roll), the West Coast Series presented by World Speed and sponsored by Star Mazda and Goodyear re-engages for an exciting 3-way shootout at the last 2 race weekends, both at the newly re-configured and repaved Laguna. See you around the paddock.
Good night and good luck.
Tedward R. Murrow
On a Wing and a Prayer
Bet youd like one more peak at that paint job, huh?
