Autobahn Country Club - Joliet, IL
Saturday, April 16th was the opening weekend for the NASA Midwest Region. First up on the schedule was Autobahn Country Club, a favorite track of many of the participants. NASA will be making three visits there this season.
This was the first time that the 145 Evo had been on track since the season finale last October. In the off season a few new upgrades were made and some routine maintenance performed.
First on the list was a transmission rebuild by Shep Racing. They installed an Evo IX 5th gear to help give more kick in that gear and avoid the RPM loss between shifts that was hurting straightaway speeds at several tracks last season. A rebuild was necessary since the stock tranny had taken quite a bit of abuse and there was grinding in a couple of the gears.
While installing the rebuilt transmission we put in an Exedy twin disk HD clutch.
Both of these upgrades felt great this past weekend and were well worth the money. Great work performed by Shep Racing on the rebuild....highly recommended to anyone looking to do this. Customer service was great and turnaround time was good.
Second upgrade in the off season was some new aerodynamic pieces. The APR-GTC 200 wing was taken off and replaced with a GTC-300. The 300 is a much larger wing that should generate quite a bit more downforce. This wing will be used with a Gurnee Flap as well as some extensions to get it up near the height of the roofline. Since the trunk lid on the car was carbon fiber, a stronger mounting solution needed to be used to first of all transfer all of the weight to the chasis where it is needed and also to keep the wing from tearing off of the trunk lid. My sponsor over at VS Motorsports came up with a great solution for fabricating a setup that would meet all of the goals needed and yet still allow the trunk lid to be opened. More info on this to come soon.....good stuff!!!!
To balance out the much larger new wing we built a custom splitter for the front end of the car out of 10mm thick alumalite composite material. Unfortunately due to time constraints and not getting a chance to test the balance of the car out with the new splitter and wing we opted to leave the splitter off for the first event and set the wing at it's lowest possible position.
Now on to the race recap...
Saturday
The first session of the morning was a wet track. The Hoosier R compounds were removed in favor of something a bit more suitable for damp track conditions. A set of Nitto NT01 were put on the car to go out for the first session to feel the car out and take it easy to give the new transmission a chance to bed in a bit.
The first session was slick and I ran a 2:20 which was good enough to secure a 5th place position on grid for the second session of the day. Everything felt good on the car and seemed to working properly...what a relief!!
Second session of the day the track was damp once again from light rain that continued to fall intermittently throughout the morning. In this session I ran a 2:12 which moved me up to 3rd on grid. This was the last session of the morning and it was soon time for lunch.
After lunch we were the first session out on track. The track conditions were just a bit better than the two previous ones, but there were still a lot of damp areas on the track. I once again ran a 2:12 in the third session.
Before we could get to run the fourth session some heavy rain moved into the area. This rain was mixed with sleet and a few snow flakes. BRRR! It was cold!
The remainder of the day stayed quite wet and we decided to sit out the remainder of the session for the day. In the last sessions of the day my first place status in the class was taken from me by a couple of the ST2 drivers who ran TT as well. Both of them were on Hoosier Rain Tires and ran significantly faster laps than what I could run with the NT01. It ended up being a third place class finish for the day.
Sunday
Everyone arrived to the track Sunday morning to a very cold and windy track. Lows had reached the freezing mark overnight but at least the rain had come to an end!!
First session since it was so cold out we left the Nitto tires on. The track was very slick and provided little grip at 8:30 in the morning. I ran a 1:41 in the first session, which put me first in class and 5th overall.
Second session we decided to mount the Hoosier tires and get them scrubbed in. A set of left over tires from last season was used. The track was still very cold and the Hoosiers didn't want to offer much grip, especially in the braking zones. Hopefully after getting them slightly warmed up and scrubbed up a bit they would get better as the day progressed.
Third Session was immediately after lunch once again. This time the track was starting to warm up and available grip was considerably better. I was able to run a 1:36.2 to take first place in the class and third position overall. Some tire pressure adjustments were made after the session to help try and take some push out the car. Without the splittter on the front and it being completely open underneath I was starting to feel the effects of it. Front end of the car was lifting and causing car to push in the higher speed corners.
Fourth session I was able to improve slightly and ran a 1:35.3. Not a great time, but getting farily close to times that I ran last season. My goal for the weekend was to try and match the times ran last year since there were several factors against us this first race event (unbalanced aero, old tires, first time on track).
During this 4th session one of the ST2 drivers ran a 1:33.5 which bumped me to second in class.
Fifth and last session of the day the track was in good condition and the air temps had moved up to the low 50's. This was the last chance to make something happen. I was the second car out on grid behing a Z06.
In the first hot lap I got around the Corvette and had open track to push the car. I was able to know off a bit more time and ended up with a 1:34.7. This nearly matched what I had ran last year at this track. The ST2 Mustang of Ryan Winchester ran a 1:33.3 in this same session. Second place was the final standing of the day out of four cars in the class which included 2 Corvettes, 1 Lotus and a Mustang.
Final Thoughts:
All in all it was a decent start to the season and it felt great to get the car back on track after a long winter. A few new suspension ideas were discussed with my sponsor to help improve future events at this track.
In several of the high speed corners the rear inside tire has a tendancy to get airborne and limit the amount of power I can put down when first getting back into the throttle. Some suspension balance needs to be worked on to remedy this. The TRE rear differential does a great job back there, but it would perform even better if I gave it some help by keeping the rear tires planted on the ground.
Many thanks to my sponsors VS Motorsports who were in attendance at this event. Thanks to my family who came out and supported me like you always do! I really enjoy having all of you there and appreciate the help you each offer.
Next event on the NASA schedule is Putnam Park May 13-15. It is a crossover event with the Great Lakes Region. There will surely be lots of tough competition in TTS at that event. Looking forward to it!!
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