2013 SCCA Runoffs

[Jason@SportsCar]

Just getting ready to start the 2000+ mile trip to Road America for the 50th running of the SCCA National Championship - the winner takes all championship event has more than 700 racers entered in 28 classes. We are putting the Tundra to the test, towing out H Prod Yaris and E Prod RX-7 on the big trailer.

Practice on 9-16, followed by three days of qual. The H Prod race looks to be about 31 cars strong, and takes place at 4:00pm (Wisconsin time) on Friday the 20th. Our E Prod car races on Sunday the 22nd at 1:00pm.

If you are in the area make sure to drop by. The Yaris will be in the Toyota tent up in the west paddock all weekend.

Event info can be found here: http://www.scca.com/events/index.cfm?eid=5680

The races will once again be streamed live: http://speedcasttv.com/scca/

https://fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-frc3/1149597_451620448284422_1604883590_o.jpg

[fnkngrv]

best of luck and wish that I could attend!

[racerb]

Good Luck Jason, like I said earlier go by and see Anna Neave at T&S, and look for her Dad Sam, he'll be with both the John Morton Datsun 240Z and the Rev Tech 240Z team. The John Morton car is a complete recreation of the BRE C-Prod Run-Offs winning car!!

http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/john-morton-datsun-z-car-project-46

racerb :biggrin:

[Jason@SportsCar]

Made it to the track and got all set up. The Tundra and trailer worker perfect. The Yaris is tucked away in the Toyota tent, and we are all set up in our trailers for the week.

https://scontent-b-atl.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/p480x480/14451_10151912600401983_1258300462_n.jpg

[racerb]

Jason, saw you were fastest in first practice, way to go man!

Here it is in black and white.....
http://scca.cdn.racersites.com/prod/assets/results/hp%20practice.pdf

racerb :thumbsup:

[Jason@SportsCar]

Jason, saw you were fastest in first practice, way to go man!

Here it is in black and white.....
http://scca.cdn.racersites.com/prod/assets/results/hp%20practice.pdf

racerb :thumbsup:

It was cool to see my name on the top of the charts, but I know a lot of the fast guys were not going 100% in practice. Should know in about three hours just how fast everyone is.

[ilikerice]

Keep it up Jason! You are my Knight in shining armor when I have doubts about the performance of my yaris.

good luck man

[racerb]

Keep up the good work, make us all proud!!

racerb :biggrin:

[Jason@SportsCar]

qual went pretty well, with f and H Prod sharing a qual session it was very busy, something like 66 cars. I never really got a clean lap, as I am sure is the case with a lot of people, but ended up 5th which is my best qual effort here to date. Now we will just have to see if the rain stays away and if we get another shot at it.

[racerb]

Nice good with that much traffic! Never much fun, been there and done that, it ain't easy.

racerb :thumbsup:

[Jason@SportsCar]

Its kind of wet here today. :laugh: Think I will stay in the trailer unless it clears up - not much point since I wont go faster in the wet, and neither should anyone else.

This event has already seen what must be a record number of cars crashed in the last two days, we don't need to up that number today.

https://scontent-b-atl.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn2/1234405_454217714691362_896183242_n.jpg

[fnkngrv]

Now that's a bummer

[Jason@SportsCar]

The rain let up around lunch, so I went out just to scrub in some new tires and make sure my data system was working. My lap timer has not been working since I installed my oil temp/psi setup, turned out I had one line of data wrong on my laptop and it was turning off my GPS timer. :laugh: Nice thing about the Runoffs is all the manufacturers have reps on hand, the guys from AiM found my error and got me working again.

With the track still damp everyone went about 2sec slower, so the order did not change at the top.

One more day of qual, then the race on Friday.

Busy night tonight, have to hit the Toyota dinner, BFGoodrich Worker of the Year awards, and the Mazda Motorsports dinner. :thumbsup:

[ilikerice]

wow.. 2 dinners... thats alot of weight to put on before a race... better do some cardio tomorrow also :tongue:

[Jason@SportsCar]

wow.. 2 dinners... thats alot of weight to put on before a race... better do some cardio tomorrow also :tongue:

You only get to the first one early enough to get food, its long gone by the time you make the last two. :laugh:

Then we capped off the night by installing a transmission in Philip's RX-7.

[ilikerice]

Then we capped off the night by installing a transmission in Philip's RX-7.

well, there is your calorie burner right there. Nice. I praise thee :bow:

[Jason@SportsCar]

Had a perfect going until the lat qual session... The curbs in Turn 14 knoced my alignment off a bit. :mad: Time to head over to tht Toyota tent and line everything back up. Its race day, 4:00pm today we are on. :burnrubber:

[ilikerice]

YEA!, good luck man.

[xnamerxx]

Found this on youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYSaZHkWXos

[Jason@SportsCar]

Is this week over yet? I am beat. The race was a rough one. On the start I got hit in the right rear corner in Turn 1, just as I catch the car I have two in front of me spinning, I found the open spot and came out in 3rd. :thumbup: But then they put out a black flag all which set the field back to the previous lap, which was the start, now I am back in 5th. :frown: The bad part was the hit to the rear seems to have bent the axle, hub, or both. The car did not want to turn left, and vibrated badly. :mad:

The rest is a blurr. The front of the car got hammered when someone in front of me checked up. This killed the aero, making me a sitting duck on the straits, and the car started to run hot, was lucky to finish, and happy to get a trophy.

Have not had a chance to see my video or the speedcasttv.com footage yet, but the one Bobby found has some great shots of the 99. :cool:

I have a feeling the B-Spec car is going to give up some parts to rebuild the 99: rear axle, core support, bumpers, lights. And I think even though they are heavy the bumper beams are going back in, having to replace all the metal up front from light bump is a pain.

https://scontent-a-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/539729_10151925971006983_99736526_n.jpg

[xnamerxx]

After watching that video, I have to question why there was so many completely avoidable incidents. Was the track oiled down or something?

[Jason@SportsCar]

After watching that video, I have to question why there was so many completely avoidable incidents. Was the track oiled down or something?

This is the Runoffs, its not like a local race, cars get bent. On top of that this is the 50th Runoffs, the last at Road America, has a record entry - which means more traffic than usual - so people are not going to give an inch.

This year has been worse than most, I think 10-12 cars were killed on the pracitce day. I don't think a single qual session went green the entire way, people are pushing hard and the cars are paying the price.

I know once I got hit in turn 1 on the start I was a little less worried about keeping the car clean.

[racerb]

Great job Jason, despite all the usual Run Offs craziness, you managed a really good finish. My buddy Greg Ira got punted on the last lap leading EP, but after the Stewards reviewed all the evidence, he was awarded the National Championship. Also saw there were 2 more of my friends running in HP with you, Tony (A.L.) Drum from Mount Holly NC and Sam Moore from Kannapolis NC, this was Sam's first year in HP!

Was that Chris Albin in the yellow Golf? If so, I see he is still a demon under braking, raced with him in my ITC days, He ran ITB in I believe that very same car.

Next year should be interesting, aren't the Run Offs moving to your corner of the racing world?

racerb :w00t:

[Jason@SportsCar]

I still have not had a chance to watch it, but here is a copy of the live feed, the H Prod race starts around the 3:00:00 mark: http://speedcasttv.com/#/races/362

[racerb]

I still have not had a chance to watch it, but here is a copy of the live feed, the H Prod race starts around the 3:00:00 mark: http://speedcasttv.com/#/races/362

Watched some of this race, you'll have to excuse me for referring to them as the Run Offs! All those years that they were held at Road Atlanta, that's what they came to be known as, because somebody always would Run Off from the rest of the field. Most of those guys finally turned Pro and left it to the true amateur road racers to compete on a relatively level playing field!

racerb

[Jason@SportsCar]

Finally got my video from the Runoffs uploaded. The start offers a good bit of carnage, and around the 8:45 mark I am playing bumper cars just shy of 120mph. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwoM8JjUgo4

[xnamerxx]

Its weird to think that the CRX's muscle you on the straights. Your car could definitely use some more power to keep up.

[Jason@SportsCar]

Its weird to think that the CRX's muscle you on the straights. Your car could definitely use some more power to keep up.

And they are doing that while running at a higher weight. :mad: I have never seen the numbers for those cars, but I would guess they are 150-160hp.

But it was certainly less of a beat down this year, the Bestwick motor was the right choice, I went 1sec fast in qual with no other changes.

[xnamerxx]

If you could find another 20hp I think you'd have a much easier time getting podium, you certainly don't have a problem keeping up in the corners or under braking.

[Jason@SportsCar]

If you could find another 20hp I think you'd have a much easier time getting podium, you certainly don't have a problem keeping up in the corners or under braking.

I would be happy with 10hp, but would settle for 5hp. Its pretty close now, and long tracks like that are not where it is strong.

[xnamerxx]

I think there's a few more on the table if you really pushed the limit of the rules.

Does HP allow replacement injectors? I have to imaging another 20 or so hp would be close to the injector limit in the upper RPM range.

[Jason@SportsCar]

Speedcasttv.com edited version of the HP race: http://speedcasttv.com/#/races/367

The commentary from Randy Pobst around the 26min mark makes the grin on my face (and my head) grow. :laugh:

[Jason@SportsCar]

Got a few Runoffs action shots from the Toyota Motorsports photographer.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-c-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/1265318_461332773979856_1403748027_o.jpg

https://fbcdn-sphotos-b-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-prn2/1275447_461332843979849_1787852167_o.jpg

[Jason@SportsCar]

Great Runoffs video put together by the team at AiM Sports - some of which was filmed on the new HD SmartyCam. Spotted a slightly abused Yaris at 1:58sec. http://vimeo.com/77072338

[ilikerice]

Wow.. great video..

[yariscupcar]

I was so excited when I watched this a few months ago. All my racing friends were saying things like: "Did you see that Yaris that came out?? He's actually doing good too!" Good job, even with all the traffic! Gives me hope for my Yaris' future track days!

Also, I would LOVE to talk suspension set-ups and alignments with you sometime!

[RJay]

Very nice view. Cool video! Looks a lot like what I race in here in Holland :) Just a bunch of people bringing the cars they know and love to compete against each other.
I know it's not featuring a yaris (the yaris cupcars are one class lower than this one, because of the potential laptime), but this is what I do (when the green paper allows it)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFyozbf1ARs

[Jason@SportsCar]

Very nice view. Cool video! Looks a lot like what I race in here in Holland :) Just a bunch of people bringing the cars they know and love to compete against each other.
I know it's not featuring a yaris (the yaris cupcars are one class lower than this one, because of the potential laptime), but this is what I do (when the green paper allows it)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFyozbf1ARs

Love the standing start. :w00t:

[RJay]

YEah, standing starts are the way to fly :) i got pretty good response time so i feel like i have a bad start, but i make up a few spots every time. Most extreme starts were p8 to 3 and p5 to 2, lol. It's fun riding top 5 when all the cars around you have way more hp or are factory built cupracers. :)