My first National race event was this past weekend. It was in Peru IN and was the Tire Rack SCCA Peru Tour. It was a blast.
I had planned on attending for months preceding the actual event. Approximately one week before the event myself and my green corvette were involved in a rather traumatic fender bender. Nobody was hurt, thank God, but the vette was deemed to be a total loss. [img]/images/graemlins/sad[/img] This was bad news for Matthew.
So I started to look for a new ride immediately. I searched everywhere. Auctions, traderonline, and every corvette Internet forum known to mankind. I finally found something of interest. There was a guy who had a one owner C5 corvette. He had an oil pump failure and decided to try and drive it home. Well, ( as any intelligent person knows) the car motor completely died. He was faced with a 9800.00 bill to reinstall another stock motor from the factory. But he did a little research and found a group called Cartech. These guys specialize in building corvette motors. He purchased a stage II Carteck motor for about 12,000.00 and drove the car about 700 miles before he decided it was going to get him killed and it was in everyone's interest for him to part ways with the car. I bought the car for the motor. Flew out to New York City at midnight and drove it home. Took all of my old suspension stuff and installed it on the new vette. I did all of this the day before the race.
The day before Race Day:
I pull into Grissom AFB in Peru, IN. Look around and decided that I was no longer in Kansas. I am surrounded by professional racers of all types. Everything from Hyped up go-carts to Formula One Vee to the A-Mod HUGE wing blown race cars. Tech was a little different. Usually we have someone pull on the wheels and give the car a general look over. These guys had me pull up onto four separate scales. They weighed the car with me in it and gave me a crossweight report.
Since it was my region that was hosting the event I went and helped mark the grid. And then went to try out the pavement on the little short test track. This was the first time I had run on this type of pavement. It was sticky. Very sticky. Better traction than I had ever felt before. The car gripped so well that I was immediately reminded that I hadn't installed my Harness bar and only had the regular seat belt to hold me in place instead of my usual 5 point belts. After 3 quickies around the test track I looked down and noticed that my left leg was starting to bleed. The G factors I was pulling had me rubbing my legs on the speaker grills and it had begun to take it's toll on my skin. Further more I was working my feet so fast on the pedals that I literally ripped the bottoms off of my shoes. I had to go to the nearest K-mart and buy another pair of shoes, some sunscreen and after eyeballing my competition, some much needed Pepto Bismol.
RACE DAY 1:
After sharing a room with 4 other guys from my region I wake up, wait my turn to shower, and then get on to the track. Upon pulling in I see hundreds of people walking the course. They had started walking the track at about 6 am and continuously walked it. Most of us walk the course once or twice.. Some even three or more times.. But these guys spent hours walking it.
I look at the grid sheet and about barfed. Not one, but two pro class drivers in an ATI Performance engineering ZO6 2004 Corvette were in SM-II. This race-car package is rumored to have in access of $500,000.00 in it. The thing is something else. They have a wild looking laptop system hard mounted that runs their PCM while it is racing. The car rocks.
Now that Im about to loose it on this wild car I notice that 4 time National Champion Danny Popp has decided to switch from ASP to SM-II. Wanna know why this didn't show up earlier? Because when he registers in any class, everyone else leaves that class. And you need at least 5 cars in your class to win tires. As far as I am concerned, this guy is the best driver of corvettes in the world. He proves it every single weekend of his life. He had an 8 page layout of him in last months sports car magazine.
Next up is the Knowledge Performance team. They field a new BMW Roadster with a complete body kit and more mods than you could believe. Two drivers and one fast BMW.
Last but not least is some old Porsche. Or so I thought. As soon as I saw it I realized that this is no freaking 73 Porsche. This was a 73 Porsche 911t frame. I could have protested this guy like crazy. This car didn't have carpet, missing body panels, GIANT slicks all the way around and looked to be one of those freaked out Hot Wheels Model cars you see in the hobby stores. It was, and should have been an E-Mod car.
So now we know the field. And my stomach begins to gurgle. I call Gwen on the cell and inform her that Im about to get my butt kicked. She is such a great wife. She laughed and gave me a few nice words of encouragement. I about got sick but decided to go ahead and move my car to grid.
I pull my car into grid space 33 and go over to meet the guys I would be racing against. The first thing I noticed was that they were not as friendly as the guys I am used to running with. They didn't like people looking at their cars. And they were not as chipper as I had expected. However they felt free to inspect my car. They asked me questions about why I was in SM-II, where I raced, how long I had run this car, and some others. They pretty much figured that I had only had the car for one day. I was not a National level racer. And my car was no match for any of the cars in my class, or the next two or three classes below us. Then they lost interest in me and moved on to whatever. Im now feeling like such an amateur. Felt belittled and I felt like the dogs around me were about to feast.
Run 1:
I'm not feeling as confident as I always am. Feeling like aI have a very sharp knife in a room full of men with automatic weapons. Nervous as hell. But I pull my act together and get ready to go out there and do my thing. The mod cars had run before my class and I had watched as they had all burned their tires a little before staging. This is a drag race thing and not usually allowed in autocrossing. But I figured that nobody is stopping them so it must be allowed at national events. I pull up and do a light burn to clean my rear tires. The starter says GO and I am gone. Flying through turns one and two and about to dive into the 270 degree turn when I see this old guy running right across where I am about to be. Im thinking Holly COW! And hit the brakes. I come to a complete stop. Point at the corner worker. He smiles, says, "Sorry Man" and I complete the run at non competition speed. This is what you are supposed to do. But the announcer didn't see the guy. He gets on the radio and the big speakers and announces that it appears that Matt Coleman has gotten lost on course. Says to hold start while he tries to finish his run. Then proceeds to announce that it is my first National event and blah blah blah. Im pissed. I finish the run and pull into grid. One of my buddies from our region says Matt they must not have scene that goofball running in your way. Then he says there are three guys coming toward me and they looked mad.
The three arrived to me at about the same time. The first one grabs my shoulder and says what the F do you think your doing at the start! Then I hear the two other guys arguing with each other as to who gets to chew on my rear first. The first guy was very rude and unprofessional. I would have handled things differently but this guy was clearly crossing the line with me and I had just about had enough. We exchanged a few words and he learned what a delightful vocabulary one can learn while on active duty in the Navy. The other two guys changed their stance and we discussed the problems and they gave me another run.
The first days runs were plagued with problems. The gearing on the new car was completely different from what I was used to. And I had forgotten to set the rear spring rate. The end result was that every time I accelerated through a sweeper that the rear end of the car would hop in the air. This cost me valuable time.
After the first day Danny was kind enough to let me borrow some tools and he showed me how I could lower the rear spring rate and the car. I did this and it made a difference.
RACE DAY 2:
Im over being concerned about my competition. Matter of fact, I was starting to be my arrogant self once again. Prodding with the guys a little here and there. Laughing about how little money I spent on my car just to whip their buts and generally playing the mental warfare game that comes hand in hand with racing. Every race I had ever run had at least five runs. At national events you only get three runs. This means that I had to change my philosophy about how aggressive I could be. My first run I ran a clean conservative run. Just enough to keep me from the bottom. My second run I started to stretch out a little and get somewhat aggressive. This was when I officially made eveyones radar.
My third run was gonna have to be the one. I sat there in my car going over the track. Thinking of every possible gear selection, entry and exit gates and how I was going to carry speed. I got myself psyched up. So psyched that I actually had to take off my helmet, get out of the car and pace around grid before my run. With this much energy I could just about levitate. I think that three of the guys saw that behavior for what it was. And I could feel their concern. A person may have thought me crazy the way I was walking around talking to myself and such, and I don't think they would have been entirely wrong. This run was going to be mine and it was going to be enough to beat everyone. It ruled my mind.
As I pulled to the start line I thought of nothing but racing. I had achieved mental clarity and was going to now prove myself to the rest of these so-called professional types.
The starter motioned for me to stage. I pulled to the line. Somewhere in the background I heard him yell GO! My corvette was at red line. (Actually about 600 RPM above redline) I was bouncing the limiter and slipping the clutch for the ultimate launch. Suddenly the engine completely stops and I fly forward and slam my helmet on the steering wheel! I look down to a horrifying sight on the DIC. "TRACTION CONTROL ENABLED".........
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, how could I? I forgot to turn the traction control system off. I hit the disable button and two vital seconds later I was off. I was way behind and ran so fast that I almost took out the timing lights. This screw up cost me my best time and even worse, it gave all my competitors another run.
The day of racing was over and I was completely surprised to find out that by the pure grace of God I somehow had managed to get a third place trophy. Very very close to second. I congratulated everyone and went to the trophy ceremony. Then helped pack up our regions truck with all the tents and gear and headed back to my wonderful wife and our two furry girls.
Wow, what an experience. Can't wait to compete in the National Finals in Topeka, KS this fall.
Matt Coleman
#5 SM-II
http://www.scca.org/_Filelibrary/Fil...pitour-sun.pdf
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[img]/images/graemlins/smoker[/img]
with the mostes.
