Rob Bodle and I teamed up again for an endurance race in the 05 Steeda
Mustang. The guys at Ponder Racing had completed the repairs after my
big accident at Road Atlanta's Turn 12 during the very wet NASA 3 hour
enduro.

Luckily the impact with the tire wall didn't damage the
suspension and the repairs were limited to some light body and paint
work, replacing the windshield and power steering cooler -- and removing
several pounds of rocks from the gravel trap. The windshield was cracked
from a rock striking it on the inside!

Rob ran the car during the Friday test day and reported a lack of grip
from the Toyo Proxe tires. The tires were not the new Proxes R888
competition DOT radials. Instead they were last year's RA1 model. Toyos
are required for NASA events; however, in SCCA we can run any DOT-legal
tire. At last year's ARRC race, I was able to run consistent laps in the
low 1:39s on BFG tires. Rob chose to run the RA1s this weekend because
he already had them.

This weekend the ECR and ProIT races were fillers for Formula D pro
drifting. I qualified the car Saturday morning. The track was very dirty
because of heavy rains overnight. Several areas of the track were
covered in fine sand and Georgia red clay. In particular, turns 3, 4
(the esses) and 10b were very dirty. Several cars spun during
qualifying. I couldn't use the full torque of the V8 because I would
simply spin the rear tires. Our goal was to get down into the low 1:40s
to insure that we qualified in front of the ITR, ITS and Spec Miata
competitors. I really struggled on the Toyos and with the dirty track --
finally posting a lap time of 1:42.359 to qualify 3rd in class, 4th
overall, behind the ITO #53 Viper GTS driven by Tom Wilson (1:36.791)
and ITO #7 driven by Brion Gluck (1:37.305). I pitted and we switched
drivers. Rob went out for the rest of the qualifying session.

We knew we couldn't beat the Viper. It was up to 8 seconds a lap faster
than our Mustang. The SCCA ITO class is a catch-all class. You never
know what you will be running against. The Viper was originally a
Motorola Cup endurance racer. It was a trick piece and sounds awesome.
The #7 Mustang was extremely fast on the straights. However, they have
had reliability problems in the past. Our strategy was to push them hard
from the start and hope they broke something. Rumors in the paddock
reported that the Viper could not go full speed for the full 90 minutes
and would have to lap times closer to what we could do. So going into
the race 2nd place looked promising and 1st looked like a remote
possibility. I would started the race and Rob would finish it.

We filled the Mustang's fuel cell up and reported to the grid. After 2
pace laps, I got a good start and moved into 3rd position passing the
#79 ITR driven by Taylor and Ben Robertson. Torque is a good thing! The
goal was to push the #7 Mustang into a mistake or break. However, the
Toyo tires were very difficult to drive. I was able to keep in touch
with the Mustang; however, the #79 ITR was able to stay with me through
the esses and some other corners. Our lap times were very similar. I'd
pull out a big lead down the back stretch and he'd catch me in the
esses. We yo-yo'ed like this for a couple of laps. I was frustrated
because I wanted to push harder to run down the yellow 'stang but the
Toyos wouldn't perform. Finally I found that I could make the car come
down to the apex and not push out like a pig if I broke the rear end
loose on entry. A light lift of the throttle, massive turn-in and then
feed power back in. Big understeer followed by light oversteer. Hey, I
was drifting!

Well, this worked great for a couple of laps. Then my tires started to
get over heated. Entering turn 10A my drifting talented failed me and I
did a perfect 180 degree spin. Was lucky have kept all 4 wheels on the
pavement. Grabbed 1st gear, did a nice 180 degree burn out and resumed
in 4th place.

The middle of the race was a big experiment. How could I make these Toyo
tires work? The drifting technique was the fastest method but the tires
could only handle this for 5-6 laps. So I had to cool them down
periodically. I started running 4th gear through turn 1. This is pretty
difficult as you are carrying more speed to the apex but aren't driving
as hard as when you run 3rd gear. Several times the car washed out
mid-corner and I had to catch it before it left the track.

The new brakes were great. I was able to pass 1 or 2 Spec Miatas under
braking for turn 10a at the end of the long straight. A big heavy car
like the Mustang shouldn't be able to out brake a light-weight Miata!
Those brakes ruled! One fella driving an ITC Honda asked after the race
is we could leave a little more room between the cars when we passed
him. The closing speed had to be at least 50MPH. Evidentially we were
moving his little car around with our air wake.

The #7 Mustang made a couple of pit stops to fix problems. Back into
3rd! Finally I caught the #79 ITR and passed him on lap 20. 2nd! The
rumors about the Viper's fuel mileage were totally false. He was running
1:36s and blew by me on lap 29.

At the ARRC 3 hour race, we were able to run about 1:30 minutes on a
tank of fuel. So we had planned to dump 5 gallons in the car during our
pitstop. SCCA requires the car to be stationary for 5 minutes and the
driver must be out of the car during refueling. This rule is to maximize
safety (we aren't Formula 1) and to reduce costs. Teams don't have to
buy very expensive refueling rigs and can use ordinary dump cans and
funnels.

Well, we didn't get the 1 hour mark. On lap 34 while heading into turn
1, the car stumbled. Glancing over at the fuel pressure gauge I could
see that we were out of gas. The Mustang has a fuel cell with a central
reservoir. Fuel is pulled from the corners of the tank into this
reservoir and then pumped to the engine. This arrangement allows every
drop of fuel to be pulled from the cell. Why were we out of gas at 60
minutes when we ran 90 before?? I could probably make it back to the
pits if I conserved fuel for 2.5 miles. In the middle of every corner
the car would stumbled. On the back straight it laid down. Coasted into
10A, refired and got in to the pits! I jumped out, PRS crew refueled the
car and Rob got back in. Five minutes up and Rob rejoined the race. We
only had 5 gallons in the pits so it was obviously that we wouldn't make
it to the finish without another fuel stop. Arg!

Rob did a great job during his stint keeping the car in 2nd overall.
However, on lap 49 the car was again starving for fuel and Rob had to
make a dash to the pits. Driver out, fuel in, driver in, resume race.
The track announcer wondered why on earth we were changing drivers so
late in the race! We weren't! We needed fuel.

At the 90 minute mark, Rob took the checker flag in 3rd overall, 2nd in
ITO behind the awesome Viper. Our fast lap was 1:41.208. The Viper's was
1:36.113. Turns out the Viper had a 30+ gallon fuel cell installed. 2nd
overall went to #8 ITS BMW driven by Matt Reppert.

A good weekend overall. I'm frustrated by the Toyo tire performance, or
lack thereof. However, we achieved our goal of finishing 2nd in class
behind the Viper.

Till the next race,
Dwight Kelly