Schaut Speed Racing Blog

BeaveRun - The last time trials of the 2009 One Lap of America.  Going into the day, we are sitting in 12th overall, a mere 90 points back on the top 10.  We are close, but its not going to be easy to break into that top 10. With it being so close, we decided that one person should run both events, since a lot of time can be found during a track session and review of the video.  The decision is for me to run both events today, and Dan will finish out the skid-pad tomorrow.

We woke up to cool weather, overcast skies and a slight chance of rain (luckily it did not).  We arrived very early at the track, found a good spot to unload and then headed out to doa  track walk.  BeaveRun is a very technical course with a few tough corners.  Here we are evaluating the turn-in and apex points for turn 7, a fast down-hill right-hander where the apex point is completely blind at the turn-in point (Basically if you wait until you can see the apex, its WAY too late - and tracks don’t pay racers to mow the grass, which is generally what happens when you miss a turn-in like that).

We have also looked at the tire pressures, dropping down both front and rear to try to get the tire temps more in line.  Out on track, the balance of the car was much improved over earlier in the week.   I was able to put the power down, and carry more speed through the turns.  Still not being sure what the car was going to do, i ran conservative in the morning.  I finished 16th overall and 4th in class, but knew a few areas where I could make a whole bunch of time out on track.  Times were about 3 seconds off of the other Luxury Sedan class.  We took temps and pressures right after the session, and are almost spot on.  Finally getting the set-up right!

Over lunch, we reviewed the track map, notes and video from the morning.  I found a few key areas where I knew what to change out on track.  Based on individual lap times from the morning (my fast lap was close to the others), and the new knowledge from the video review, the goal for the afternoon is a top 10 O/A and 1st in class.

The session felt great, a whole bunch faster.  Here I am coming out of that blind corner #7.  The estimated time for the session showed a lot of improvement.  But since results from the afternoon are not up yet, we have to anxiously wait….

heh, gotta add these results in too….  2nd BeaveRun session I picked up some good time,  finishing 11th overall and 2nd in class, just beating out the factory BMW!  It was a great run, but ultimately didn’t change in class or O/A position.

Since we are on the road to PA right now, with an ETA of 2 am and I need to get behind the wheel in 10 min at the next gas stop, this will be a quick one.  I’ll update later…

2 laps around the BMW performance center test track.  Dan drove to a 14th overall and 4th in class.  This is truly Renner’s home track since he works here and might just drive it daily.  in M3s.  That said, he did awesome out on track, finishing in 3rd overall!  Amazing to see a spectacular car driven so well!

Results page has been updated, through the BMW performance center event.

The weather continued to improve as the afternoon approached, with temps getting into the mid 70’s by the time I lined the M3 up to head out on the track.  We visited this track last year as well, but I did not run it, so this was my first time driving CMP (that’s Carolina Motorsports Park).  And I have to say, what a track!  Quick, good turns with some challenge to them.  Some elevation change and nice scenery round out to make this a fun one!  I’d love to get back here and actually race on it!

So with beautiful weather, a great track to run on, and the engine purring at idle, I strap in, put my helmet on and get ready to head out.   The green flies and I’m off to see what I can do.  Balance of the car is better (we determined that high rear tire pressures were main culprit for the looseness yesterday, needing a much ’softer’ right foot that what I was using…), but I’m still needing to wait for what seems to be an eternity for the rear end to hook up (pressures still too high, with high center temps - we started a few pound lower than Daytona, but the pressure increased more than expected).  Still I made the run with limited drama and sliding for a fairly solid 5:36.0, placing me 14th overall and 4th in class.   The car was still a joy to drive - and man is it fast!  I got into 5th gear on the front straight, which puts me at just over 140 mph. 

Rest of the luxury class (once again, some REALLY close times!):

Babcock in the S4 - 8th overall with a 5:29.96

Renner in the M3 - 9th with a 5:30.13 (told ya it was close…)

Czarney’s M5 in 11th with 5:32.21

Me in14th with 5:36.04

Howard (or Mark? not sure who was driving) in the CTS-v in 24th with a 5:48.81

The Magnum with a 5:55.52 rounded out the group in 29th

Early this morning, we were woken by some SERIOUS thunder!  big storm sounded like it was rolling through, and it did dump on the area early in the morning (maybe 3ish?  5?  I don’t know…).  By the time we woke up (at a normal time), had some breakfast and got to the track, the skies were dry.  But the track was still wet.  1st group went out on the wet track, cloudy skies.  Same story for the 2nd group, but clouds were thinning out.  Dan hit the track in the 3rd run group, and with the sun starting to peak out, the racing line was drying.  But not enough as the track was still slick for the first 2 laps.  Finally started to dry with full sun at on the last lap.  He kept it onthe track and going straight with help from the DSC system (it was almost as slick at Talladega!).  Dan came across the line with about a 6:05 run.

With the sun out full now, the whole track is drying quickly, and the line is almost completely dry.  This really mixes up the overall finish order since the top guys end up running slower on the wet track, and mid-pack cars with a lot of potential can make up the difference with a dry track and grip.  Results from this morning had a car that is normally finishing around 15th pull a 2nd place finish.

Final results has us in 22nd overall, 5th in class.  The M5 finished 4th overall followed by the M3 (15th), S4 (18th), Caddy (21st) and us in 22nd.

The sun has broke out completely now, track is dry.  It looks to be a beautiful day from here on out.  I’ll be in the car this afternoon, and looking forward to it!

At 12:00 there was an announcement that a parade lap would take place at 12:15.  I figured perfect time to get an extra lap of recon on this huge fast track.  So we jumped in, fired up the car and went to pull out.  At which point the car with all its gadgets spoke up - letting us know the left rear was low.  So we checked it - 15 psi.  This would be the nail.  I cleared with Brock that we might not make it back for the start of the second session, but safety first he said “go fix it!”.  So off to a tire shop.

With the tire fixed and disaster averted, we head back to the track.  I get my gear on, strap in and head to the front of the line, amazingly only a few run groups behind where I should be.  Tire pressures were set as they were in the morning.  Although ambient temps were up another 10 degrees and with all the sun, track temps were up too.

On the recon lap, I noted things were a bit slick, with the balance onthe car shifted to the front - back end was a bit on the loose side.  Not a problem, I thought.  Just need to get things warm…

Green flag flies and I’m off.  Slide a bit in the first few corners, hit the banking and soon I’m north of 150 MPH on the speedometer haulin’ into the “Bus Stop”, a little left right right left chicane to slow down the cars.  Line is good into the chicane, start adding power coming out of the first right.  Then the back end quickly steps out.  Too much power too quickly for how much grip was available…  I counter-steer, but its too late.  I’m going for a bit of a ride!  Nothing like spinning at 90 MPH!  Luckily there is a lot of space there, so nothing to hit.  But now I’m stopped, and have to get back up to speed.  Instead of entering the oval at 100 MPH, I’m starting at ZERO.  Dang.  A mistake like that (We are figuring a total of 16-17 seconds lost on that lap) is not what we need with both overall and in-class posiitons and point battles so close…  I figured that mistake would put me way back in 30th at best.  The video is interesting.  I’ll post it once I figure out how so you can join in on ‘Ben’s wild ride!’

Luckily this car has an awesome motor and a very good top end.  Despite the spin and some additional sliding (grip balance didn’t get any better the rest of the session, and being a bit tail-happy heats up the rear tires even more, reducing grip… tire temps showed we were a few pounds too high in the rear ) I ended up 18th overall with a 7:06.36.  Take away that spin and it would have been a toss-up on which E90 M3 took 13th overall, as Renner was at a 6:48.5.

The M5 took the class win again with a 7th overall in 6:36.4, followed by Babcock who found some more time speed dropping down to 6:38.8 for 9th O/A.  Renner in the other M3 was 13th, the Caddy in 16th with 6:53.6.

Lesson 2 learned.  easy on the throttle, and if grip is off and too much throttle is used, the car will come around; quickly.

Now on to CMP.

Dan ran the morning event (before we found the nail issue), putting down a solid time on a very, very fast track.

Competition in class is as close as ever, and the hunt for the top 10 continues.  Luxury sedan class win for this event went to the M5 with a 6:37.8 for 6th overall (I want to know how fast he was going in that beast!), next was Babcock’s in the S4 with a 6:44.0 and 8th O/A.  The other E90 was 11th with a 6:46.0, Dan in 13th with a 6:47.6, and The Caddy in 17th with a 6:53.2.

We think the speedometer is reading about 8-10 % faster than actual speed, but on the high (very, very high) bank oval portion of Daytona, he was seeign about 170 mph!.  Flying!  Wanna what a BMW looks like on Daytona speedway at 155+?  here ya go.

Its 12:45, cars are lining up for the afternoon session.  And we are where?  Um here…

We picked up a nail in the left rear tire. Currently at a tire shop getting it fixed. Hopefully we won’t get a penalty for running late….

After the drag races last night, we hit the road for a nice short 100 mile drive down to Daytona, allowing us to actually check into the hotel about 10 pm.  We are unaccustomed to such early check in times…  So we had the luxury last night of a good night sleep, a nice sit-down meal and a well deserved beer.

Waking up this morning, we opened the door of the hotel to a beautiful 70 degrees without a cloud in the sky!  Gorgeous!  After a quick breakfast, we headed to the track, unloaded the car.

spot 9 for car 9... perfect!

What a track this is!  HUGE.  Watching NASCAR on TV does not give justice to just how steep those bankings are!  After unloading, we decided to check out the course - about 3.4 miles.  Dan on a bike, me in my running shoes.  Getting to the top of the bank is like climbing a wall.  This should be fun!

Drag racing.  Interesting, and a different kind of fun.  Low e.t. isn’t so exciting, but those bracket drags are interesting!

I ran this event, finishing the low e.t. in a 13.7 seconds.  Good for 21st overall, 3rd in class.  A bit too much wheel spin at the start…

For the bracket, I “dialed in” at a 14.0 second quarter.  Made it through a few rounds, taking down an Evo and a Corvette.  Lost on the 3rd round when I left the line early, “red lighting” with a reaction time of -0.106 second.  if I breathed a bit, I would have won that, since the other guy left early also at -0.088.  Oh well.  with that, we tied with a whole bunch for 4th overall.

Now onto DAYTONA!!!!