What a blast Sunday running my MINI in its first autocross! The St. Louis SCCA folks put on a well-managed event, very organized and chop-chop in getting all the cars (about 80 or so) through in two heats, 5 runs per car. Even a evening-before stray car in the lot didn’t phase them: some resourceful use of a floor jack, wheel dollies, and huffing-puffing had it moved out of the way in short order.

I hadn’t run autox since my high-school days, and just after. So, yes, I was pretty rusty, and my skills suck at this point. All my prior experience was in air-cooled VWs, including one that was pretty “prepared” (gutted, rollbar, Z-bar, enhanced engine, etc. etc.) so those runs were mostly adventures in catching oversteer. With my stock, street-tired MCS, it was all about reading the course, remembering the course, and managing understeer. I’m not yet good at any of it, but I’m looking forward to a lot of improvement.

Just one other MINI, a Cooper in HS running sticky tires and he won his class. My wife brought her Z06 and had seat time with the novice instructor riding shotgun, I may try that next time.

STL runs their events once a month, it’d be great to see more MINIs there. My take on it was that it didn’t seem too hard on the equipment. Back in the day, running VWs, Fiat 850s, and others in that class, there was a lot of 1-2-3 shifting and 3-2-1 shifting that was hard on 2nd gear synchros. Most cars on Sunday, including my MCS, ran the whole course in 2nd, so other than the consumables (tires, brakes) it didn’t seem like much of a strain.

Definitely a fun way to spend a Sunday…can’t wait to try this again!

 

Welcome back to the sport!

Cheers,

Charlie

 

Hang on now... your wife drives a Z06? Why are you auto-xing your mini again?

 

Because the MINI destroys Z06's in autocross! My JCW does extremely well in the local seen placing first in PAX the last two events and 2nd in PAX the first event. There is a Z06 on race slicks that runs slower than me, heck most run slower... Generally there are only two or three cars with a faster raw time than me. I am a decent autocrosser but the car is extremely capable in its stock form.

Have fun and keep at it!

 

LOL, indeed. I did take the wheel for a couple of passes at the Texas Mile back in March, couldn't help but do that.

For autox, I'm really wanting to build my skills in my MINI, though. It should be very capable, I just need to get better...lots better!

 

Thanks! And great to hear more of what these cars are capable of in the hands of someone who knows what they're doing :-)

I'll likely move to "T"DS next time, our club here runs a street-tire 180+ PAX'd class (do they all?) as I don't have any interest (yet) in swapping wheels/tires each weekend. The class leader last weekend in TDS was a Subi WRX who ran 8th fastest (of 99) overall, and got top PAX overall. I watched his runs while I worked the fast slalom section, very impressive! So the bar is set pretty high here, that's a good thing.

Fun sport, I'm remembering again how much I loved it way back when.

 

IDK what's up with the corvette drivers around your area but they need to pick it up! I've driven a 600hp 'vette on slicks and it's way faster than our mini.

The mini is an excellent car to start auto-xing in. Very easy to learn and great to build your skills in. Enough power to get you into trouble but the FWD makes it easy to save. Corvettes are a blast to auto-x but in stock form on street tires they don't stop or turn very well. They go like hell though

 

Which is the exact reason the corvettes are not faster around an autocross course. On an open track there would be no comparison but autocross is generally less than 70mph at most. Stopping and changing directions with a 3200 lb car is different than in a 2650 lb car.

 

No way, a competently driven c5z or c6z will rape any equally rubbered (i.e. A6 v A6) Mini on any course that isn't a 25 mph slalom in a McDonalds parking lot. Minis are fantastic autocrossers, but lets be realistic here.

ljmattox, glad you had fun! Stock will be back to 200 TW tires next year so you won't be running index class for much longer.

 

Here are the top 20 raw times from the Bay State Corvette Club event
in May of this year. A long course at the Moore Airfield in Devens.

Pos. Class # Driver Car Model Total
1T er 68 Troy Velazquez 1993 Mazda Miata 76.914
1T es 75 Joshua Noble 2007 Subaru WRX STI 77.316
2T er 65 Matt Robinson 2006 Mazda MX-5 Miata 77.868
2T es 96 Eric Isaacson 2005 Mitsubishi Evo 78.173
3T er 113 Charlie Thompson 2013 Mini Cooper 78.954
4T er 10 John MacDonald 2006 Mazda MX-5 79.108
3T es 39 Darius Trinka 2007 Nissan 350z 79.186
4T es 69 Victor Larin 2004 BMW 330i 80.525
5 er 11 Ian Cook 1999 Mazda Miata 80.716
5T es 101 Daniel Oberist 2007 Subaru Impreza STI 80.901
6 er 152 Sam Krauss 1995 Eagle Talon TSi AWD 81.105
6T es 92 Jay Shin 2008 BMW M3 81.416
1T cst 5 Mark Stimpson 2005 Chevrolet Corvette 81.503
7 es 41 Frank Bayliss 1988 Pontiac Fiero 81.681
7 er 52 Charles Moss 1995 Eagle Talon TSi AWD 81.875
8 es 603 Josh Reid 2012 Subaru sti 82.222
8 er 660 David Tyo 2012 Ford Boss 302 82.506
9 es 100 Jeremy Bisbo 2011 BMW M3 82.546
10 es 37 Don Kuehl 1999 Mazda Miata 82.892

Having posted this, I am not disagreeing with the previous note - just adding a little color to the phrase "competently driven"...

Cheers,

Charlie

Ps: if you suspect that it might have been wet that day - you are correct!

 

I don't think I ever said that a corvette is slower than a similarly prepped mini. It's possible that the mini could be faster but the course would have to really favor the mini. The Z06 and GrandSport are really really wide cars which can cause problems on short/small courses. Equal drivers and equal prep the corvette will be faster. They're definitely harder to drive than a mini though.

From the factory they just don't put enough tire on the front of the 'vettes. Which hurts stopping/turning.

Charlie... Shame on you for going and beating up on those corvettes in your H-Stock mini

 

It just so happens that the average Corvette owner cannot drive faster than a someone experienced Mini (or random 30+ MPG car) driver

Anyway, I wanted to clarify, MCS are eligible for RTF class right? PAX will still differ from base but it will be in the same class right?

BTW, TS your Mini looks pretty low for DS. That's just sport suspension?

 

Good eye; yes, NM sport springs. I did get tech'd, but I'm sure they'll kick my a$$ into DSP or STX if I start evidencing that I have a clue. I'm going to put my stock Sport Suspension springs back on when I change shocks before next season; I was considering in anyway since I'm scraping those underbody spoilers now going in/out of the downtown parking garage that I use.

 

From what I've found, at least in my area, they don't care that much unless you're just destroying your competition.

And in that case the competitor will call you out. Tech isn't really looking for that.

I ran 2 events with PCA in my RSX-S that had an intake in G-stock. Once I started running with ER I knew I had to switch to STF cause a guy in a Civic Si wasn't happy.

 

I do tech for SCCA, we're told that tech's job is not policing the rules, just making sure the car is safe. Its up to your competitors to police the eligibility rules, through the protest mechanism. Having said that, as I'm usually teching my competitors, if I see something that I don't think is allowed, I'll mention it to the driver. This is best done informally with a quiet word, but if you win, your competitors will look more closely.

There was the one round where one of my competitors was running illegal tires (r-comps when novices are only allowed street), I mentioned it to the guy at the time, but he thought it was legal (reading the wrong rule). It was mentioned later and he volutarily withdrew before anyone protested him. He was behind me so I didn't care that much, but he was in front of the wife, so getting rid of him out did her some good.

Running a car you know does not conform to the rules is unsporting, and opens you up to being DSQed which would probably ruin your day. I don't knowingly break any of the rules.

 

That makes sense, then, that they focus on safety items, since I also ran with my JCW strut brace, nothing's more visible than that big hunk of shiny aluminum bar. I'll just continue to improve my novice skills and work on getting my MINI back to class specs.

 

I plan on running most of next season and a few runs yet this fall. I know me and at least one other are running this Sunday.