![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/grunschev.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/2023-06-03-08.22.48s.jpg?resize=584%2C366\")
Still working on the car 30 minutes before the race<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li> ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/grunschev.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/2023-06-03-08.23.12s.jpg?resize=584%2C438\")
With the “parts” car<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li> ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/grunschev.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/2023-06-03-09.58.36s.jpg?resize=584%2C438\")
On the track<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li> ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/grunschev.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/2023-06-04-12.53.19s.jpg?resize=584%2C383\")
“I have another idea!”<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li> ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/grunschev.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/2023-06-04-13.17.46s.jpg?resize=584%2C438\")
Flood wreckage<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li> ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/grunschev.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/2023-06-04-13.40.11s.jpg?resize=584%2C408\")
Spot the swimmer<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li> ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/grunschev.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/2023-06-04-15.15.00s.jpg?resize=584%2C438\")
Team photo. L to R: Eric, myself, Kevin, Dan, Mike<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li><\/ul><\/a><\/a><\/a> <\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\nThe Weather<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Typical weather for this area in early June would be a high of around 80 with the sun pleasantly embracing you in its warmth. It might be the kind of day where the sun is so pleasant, warm not hot, that you might forget to apply sunscreen. Not that that would be a good thing to do. In the late afternoon, perhaps a thundershower would roll through.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A week ago, Kevin was concerned about it being hot enough to warrant wearing a cool suit. For track days, I don\u2019t wear my Nomex long johns, but I do for the races. It\u2019s a lot of clothing. I managed just fine in August when you can expect temps in the 90s. I wasn\u2019t concerned. With rain in the forecast, I wasn’t worried about overheating. Turns out, even wearing all that, even with the Nomex underwear, I was sometimes chilly enough to put my hoodie on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This was not a typical June weekend on the high plains of eastern Colorado. This weekend, as far as the weather goes, we may as well be in Seattle. We\u2019re having one of the wettest springs I can remember. In Denver, we\u2019ve already received the amount of rain it usually takes until the middle of August to get. My lawn looks as good as it\u2019s ever been.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There\u2019s a lot of standing water in the fields alongside US 36 between Byers and the track. The herd of buffalo stood ankle-deep in mud. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It didn\u2019t start raining on us right away. But it rained. Boy, did it rain. It came over the track in bands, never very heavy, but modulating between light and moderate, with occasional short stretches of no rain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We were parked just west of the fuel pumps. There\u2019s an access lane next to the wall, the access lane bordered by concrete barriers. A few feet farther there\u2019s a drain surrounded by sandbags that are there to keep sediment out of the drain. This is marked with a traffic cone. Naturally, this is the low spot in the immediate vicinity. I never bothered to pay attention to any drains in the paddock before, but off the top of my head, this is the only one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Saturday afternoon there were rivers running to the drain in this low spot. And the drain couldn\u2019t keep up. The sandbags formed a dam that guaranteed the water would get at least six inches deep. For starters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Our next-door neighbors were set up a few feet from the drain. They were campaigning a brown BMW 3-Series cut up and rebadged to look like an old Subaru Brat. Their livery was a knockoff of a UPS theme: \u201cURS. What Can Brown Do For You?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They had two canopies set up, tables and chairs huddled towards the center in an attempt to stay dry. What wasn\u2019t on the tables was in plastic tubs. Before long, there was a small stream flowing from the blacktop to the drain. It got bigger. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once the HPR River was flowing strongly, they had to move some of their stuff. It was bad, but not that bad when I left on Saturday evening. Overnight, though, the water got so deep a couple of their tubs floated off and capsized, spoiling some supplies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By Sunday morning most of the water had drained. That was temporary. It rained harder on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I arrived on Sunday at 7:30. We had three canopies deployed, plus the awning of the RV. One canopy was for the car. When I got to our camp, one of the canopies had collapsed. It was partly under the awning, and the weight of the water coming off it was too much, breaking a couple of struts. Both the others were still standing, one holding about four or five gallons of water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The rain started almost simultaneously with the start of the race. I was lucky to get some track time during one of the dry spells, but the bands of rain that blew over were a bit more intense. HPR River flowed fiercely once again. The puddle turned into a pool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This drain is quite far from any lower ground. I began to wonder if it was really a drain. It would have to run quite a distance to drain to the ravine that forms the lowest part of the track. In Gilbert, we had retention basins all over the property. The idea was that no rainwater would leave the development. All these basins, big or small, had something that looked like a drain. I forget the term, but this drain is only six or eight feet deep and filled with rock aggregate. These wells help the ground absorb the water. In a heavy rain, they\u2019re designed to back up. I think that\u2019s what this drain is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sunday afternoon, the flood forced the URS folks to flee to higher ground.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At about 1:30, some wag sauntered up to the pool in shorts and flip-flops and took a “swim”. A brave soul. As you can guess, most of the puddles upstream had the rainbow sheen of various and sundry automotive fluids. I couldn\u2019t help but think of all the horror stories about floodwaters in Louisiana with all the petroleum infrastructure there. But he had a small crowd of onlookers who laughed and joked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Racing<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
This is now the third time I\u2019ve jumped into and raced a car I\u2019ve never driven before. There are so many cars on the track in these sorts of races that you\u2019re in traffic pretty much all the time. To try to drive a car fast that you\u2019ve never driven before, wheel-to-wheel through a turn, not knowing how the car behaves is a bit intimidating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The stick shift was a bit sloppy. There\u2019s no reverse gear lockout, and second is a bit hard to find, so you have to be careful. The suspension is quite stiff; the big bumps on the highway straight are sharper shocks to my backbone than in the Elise. It understeers a fair amount. The cure for understeer is to slow down. The weight is mostly in the front, so heavy breaking makes the tail light and prone to rotation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
With no high cam, it\u2019s tough. Bouncing off the rev limiter slows you down. You have to shift as high as you can without hitting the limiter. It took me seven or eight laps to figure out which gear I needed to be in for each turn<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Entering the track for the first time, I got passed by three cars before I got to turn three. Coming out of the pits, you join the track after turn two so that’s the first turn. I managed to collect myself by the end of the lap, and within a few laps, I was getting comfortable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On Saturday, we had the Garmin running so we could see our lap times. The device supports multiple drivers, but we didn\u2019t make a profile for me. Kevin drove before me, and we just kept his session running. It rained pretty much the whole time Kevin was driving, and his best lap was a 2:53 or 2:54.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the first several laps, I\u2019d exit turn two a second or second and a half ahead of Kevin\u2019s best lap, but a third of the way through the lap I\u2019d be behind his time. I couldn\u2019t imagine I could lose that much time that quickly. He just must have been slow through the first couple of turns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I ran for a bit over an hour. The radio was working, and the guys would periodically ask how things were going. I really wanted to use Kimi Raikonnen\u2019s line, \u201cLeave me alone! I know what I\u2019m doing!\u201d but I wasn\u2019t sure they\u2019d recognize it as a joke.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Finally, they told me to do a couple more laps and come in for fuel. The track was starting to dry and I was finally putting in some good times. I was improving by two or three seconds each lap. So I stayed out longer than they wanted. I got a few stutters on the sweeping right-hand turns, so I finally pitted. Kevin said, \u201cI knew you didn\u2019t want to come in, getting faster like you were!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On Sunday, I got another hour of seat time. Again, I was lucky with the weather. Neither the Garmin nor the radio was working, so I had no idea what sorts of times I ran. Kevin told me later that I was turning in some consistent 2:28s. Eric had the team\u2019s fast lap, a 2:24.127.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Viewing the official results, I think I managed to figure out which laps were mine and which were Eric\u2019s. If I did this correctly, Eric had the 3 fastest laps. Of the ten best, 6 are mine and 4 are Eric\u2019s. Of our 50 fastest, 24 are mine, 22 are Eric\u2019s. Conditions, though, were extremely hard to compare. Eric has said he thinks he had a drier track than I did, but I\u2019m skeptical. In any event, over 50 laps it looks like we compare pretty well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We ran almost the same number of laps – I had 2 more. We ran our sessions back-to-back, me first on Saturday and he on Sunday. He ended both his sessions by causing full-course cautions with spins: one stalling the car when the starter wasn’t working and the other stuck in the mud. I had to stop my first session due to fuel but ended my second by getting a black flag (more on that later). <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Kevin is quick to remind me that fast laps don’t matter. What matters is running laps. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
There were 73 cars entered. We managed to come in 50th<\/sup>. Being an endurance race, the idea is to run the car as long as possible. The event is 8\u00bd hours on Saturday and 6 on Sunday. We completed 201 laps. Given our lap times, accounting for yellow flags and red flags, that would be about 10 hours of driving. The winner completed 297 laps. If we\u2019d have been able to run the whole race, we\u2019d have done nearly that many. If we can get the high cam to work, we could be a contender.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Seventy-three cars on the track is quite a lot. Almost certainly, all 73 were not all out at the same time. Even so, there are more cars on the track than at my most crowded track day. And the difference in driver skill is pretty great. About 40% of the folks at the drivers’ meeting raised their hands to the question, \u201cWho has never raced at HPR before?\u201d That would include first-time racers and experienced racers from out of the area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I saw license plates from quite a few states. Because my car always attracts attention, I talk to quite a few people. One fellow told me he has an \u201805 Elise. Not thinking, I said, \u201cYou\u2019re not in the club.\u201d Of course he\u2019s not in the club: Jaap lives in Boston but is originally from the Netherlands. Another guy I chatted with was from Oregon and suggested he might have seen me on my Pacific Northwest trip. That would be a long shot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Anyway, that 40% of drivers who have never raced at HPR before include some guys (and almost all the drivers were guys) who may be quite experienced at other tracks. But there will certainly be some drivers who have never raced anywhere before, like my teammates from my earlier Lemons race.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Given that there is a wide range in the speeds of the cars and the wide range of driver skills, it\u2019s almost guaranteed that you\u2019ll eventually come across a car that you\u2019re evenly matched with. It\u2019s more fun to pass than to be passed, and it\u2019s much more fun to race somebody that\u2019s evenly matched with you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was able to pass in nearly every turn on the track and in a few braking zones. I also got passed in all those areas, plus a few. On the uphill sweepers, I could pass on either the inside or outside, depending on where the slower car wanted to go. Once I was passing on somebody\u2019s inside and was a bit hard on the brakes. The rear of the car started to swing out; I was afraid I was going to hit the guy. He was on my right, and with no mirror on that side, I don\u2019t know if it was a close call or if he had to take evasive action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My only driving error cost me a black flag. There was a local yellow flag. No passing is allowed under the yellow. I was behind a Datsun 260. He really slowed down and moved way over to the outside and pointed me by. I knew I couldn\u2019t pass under yellow, point-by or no. I looked at the next bunker and didn\u2019t see any yellow, so I passed him. The next time around I was shown the black flag. When I explained it to my teammates, they joked that it might be a good strategy: point somebody by under yellow to try to get them off the track for a couple of laps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My penalty was to be held at the penalty box until I won a game of rock-paper-scissors. I told him I\u2019d serve a longer penalty than that, as our starter had failed and I needed my team to push me. They weren\u2019t there (they thought I came in for fuel and were heading to the hot pit). I won the game on the second play, and the officials kindly push started me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Debrief<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
I leave the event with my giant ego intact. Eric blistered my best lap by 4 seconds, but he spun twice, once getting stuck in the mud. He thinks he may have been pushing too hard. I’m guessing had more \u201cdry\u201d laps than he did, giving me an advantage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I enjoyed the challenge of jumping headfirst into driving an unfamiliar car in a race. Although this is the third time I\u2019ve done it, I\u2019m thinking it\u2019s unlikely I\u2019ll get another chance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When Eric said he\u2019d have a motor home there, I thought it\u2019d be nice. Given the weather, it wasn’t nice: it was indispensable. I didn\u2019t spend all that much time inside this time, but it gave us quite a bit more room out of the rain. Thinking about the next race, a true 24-hour race, where we\u2019ll have to nap between stints, it will be a big advantage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Because of the weather, tire wear was minimal and we never use the tires Don
and I<\/s> mounted on my wheels. I guess I won\u2019t be buying any tires for those wheels until after our September race. Not a big constraint. <\/p>\n\n\n\nRyan raced in this event as well. He was driving a Dodge Caravan minivan. At least when they had brakes. He spent at least one night at the track camping in a tent. Not ideal. John, another LOCO, often drives one of the BMWs that’s always there. His teammates tell me he was on a trip to Watkins Glen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I would have liked to have driven more laps. It’s my own fault. I’d have had maybe another half an hour if I didn’t get my black flag. Given the number of hours we were working on the car, though, I got my fair share.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I had a great time in spite of the weather. I’m already looking forward to the next race. If our engineers get the high cam sorted and we keep the car on the track, we could fight for the podium. The new challenge will be driving in the dark. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I only had the camera in the car on Saturday. All my best laps and best passes were Sunday. So it goes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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