I know, VV, every time I drag it up the Toe I pat the dash and implore it not to 'splode, as Ricky Ricardo might say , like the big Camaro did on Tuesday on the back straight......big fire and smoke!! Driver OK but really p.o'd. A real red flag, too--haven't had one of those that wasn't just an exercise in a long time.

Started tracking this black car at 21k and now has 82k, all to/on/from the track--runs great (knock on wood)......

 

40 days - Wow! It probably took me 5 years to get to that number...

I might hit 10 days this year, which is at the upper end of what I can do. I have 3 at NYST, 2 at WGI and 1 at LRP, so I am getting there.

I do GVC, in part, because my cousin from NJ (drives a M2) likes their events, so we get together for their events and we get to see other relatives in the Ithaca area. I also know, and like a lot of the people at those events and I have great trust in them out on the track.

Yes, your MINI is doing really well. My Gray MINI has almost 70K on it and it continues to go strong (knock on wood... ). I find it really interesting how some MINIs must have been made on a Friday or Monday (lemons), others have no problems, but that in general a lot a “track” MINIs seem to just keep going.

It is interesting about the Camaro that turned into a fireball... The Event organizer for the NYST event we just did talked about being safe, checking the car over, no leaks, fresh hoses and what not. He had a recent example of car fire that put the driver into the burn unit. In my years of doing track stuff, fire was the one thing I had not heard of happening. Now, within a week I have heard of 2 times that happening...

 

You would need added front camber for TW100 tires...

 

That's how it is with the groups I drive with now--been doing so for so long we all know and trust each other out there, which is very important with PCA's Expanded Passing where you pass anywhere on track. You have a contract with the car you're going into the corner with that each of you will stay on your side of the track until the pass is completed. If one of you crosses over that imaginary double-yellow, that trust is violated. Needless to say this is only done in the advanced and instructor groups and has worked flawlessly in my experience.

I must have had some good luck with MINIs as I've been in them since '05 and nary a major mechanical, all with that much-maligned PSA engine. Hope it continues...... I've heard so many horror stories about the electronics in the newer cars, particularly the BMWs. A favorite is starting your tire pressures on the low side for the track, which, if too low, throws the car into limp mode and you have to stop and add air. Are you kidding me?! The Ultimate Driving Machine? At this point in my life, if I had the $$$ I'd buy a new Cayman over a new BMW w/o hesitation. I've been on track with so many of them and they just go and go and go (and REALLY go if it's a GT4 ) Which ends my PSA

 

That's for sure--w/o it the LF wouldn't make it to lunchtime Talking real camber here, not the free mod or even the IE fixed plates that you have and that I should have--probably need a minimum of -2.5 front and perhaps some in the rear also to get the best out of those.

 

Back from the Glen after driving Sat and Sun w/ MetroNY PCA.....Sat was just great weather-wise and otherwise as I started the day with 2# more in the front tires (36 COLD) to try and stiffen them up a bit, the thought of which gave me pause (I didn't check the hot pressures--didn't want to know ). But.....it worked! Car felt much more "under me" and a lot less "squishy" in the turns than before; in short, like the RE71Rs felt. Best part was that I recovered the 2sec/lap I lost last time out. The ambient temp was a full 20deg cooler this time and I'm sure this contributed--the car did feel a bit quicker and my exits out of the Toe, for instance, were markedly faster. The car just STUCK going up there, at least early in the day.... But the fact remains that the car felt more planted with more air so I'll be doing this again going forward until the car tells me "no mas". Oddly enough, the increased pressures didn't affect the wear one way or the other; these tires are just really soft and sticky and will wear. Disposables......

This was an "interesting" event--lots of real New Yawk/Joisey accents heard Also quite a few really fast, well driven cars in my combined Black/Instructor run group. There was a Lambo out there from the Super Trofeo race series that I couldn't give justice to by attempting to describe how fast it was. Just watch the mirrors and flaggers.....unfortunately, there was quite a bit of "attrition" also, both mechanical and driver-induced, and many of the Porsches out there were older and, though fast, obviously weren't up to it here. One old 944 race car let loose at the top of the Esses and oiled the entire left side of the back straight, leaving a big strip of oil-dry that nobody in my group (the one immediately following, of course) wanted to drive in. I didn't, and thankfully there was still room to let cars pass on the right before the Bus Stop. I entered this from mid-track and lost 2mph on exit. But it's not a race, RIGHT??. Thankfully the oil-dry eventually dissipated.

The capper was on Sunday, which started out sunny and nice as we did our first run. Then the clouds started rolling in, as forecasted, and we figured we'd get our 2nd run in right before lunch. That was before, right at the end of the session preceding ours, a newer 911 spun in T11 and backed into the wall. HARD. Lots of rear-end damage to the car but the driver was OK. I thought they dialed the rear-weight-bias oversteer out of the later 911s with suspension tweaks and monster rear tires? Try telling that to the driver of that car.....you can only cheat physics up to a point, as they say. So they moved lunch up so they could work on the wall and moved our next session to 1230-1pm.

Never made it.

I was lined up first, ready to go out, and all hell broke loose. Torrential rain, accompanied by lightning and thunder once again....after a while the rain, while not stopping, let up to the point where I would drive if they'd let us, but the lightning persisted all the way until 3pm which was how long I waited until I bagged it and packed up. The weather gods have not been smiling on us lately

On a positive note, met a really nice guy from Indiana who made the trip in his Cayman GT4 (which he drove beautifully and FAST) and in chatting with him he simply couldn't get over how fast the Mini was in the turns and that it was only a Justa. He owned a Cooper S years ago and did track it, so he had an idea about the cars......and I was indeed putting a little bit of space between us through T1, the chicane and carousel, and T10 and T11. Otherwise, forget it. He was doing leisurely 2:10s and I was killing myself for 2:30-31s As stated, beautiful car, beautifully driven. Can't beat that......

So one more in the books--off until Aug 13-15 now. Round about this time next week I'll start getting the shakes.....

 

Almost any car can be made to spin, just easier to do in a 911 Punching holes through hedges, backwards... Even with the big front swaybar my Gray MINI has, it will bite me if I am not careful...

With something like 50 to 100 lbs less on the front wheels of a Base Cooper as compared to an S or JCW, I am not surprised by the way it corners...

is a bit of an oxymoron ya know...

Hope you don’t get the shakes too badly... Enjoy your next visit there...
I’ll be there in a couple of weeks for 3 days of fun...

 

There was a saying attributed to Michael Schumacher back in his day that when he got out of the car after he finished stomping everybody in one of the many races he won, he looked like he had just come from the library And so it was with the GT4 driver....2:10s no sweat.

Enjoy GVC and I hope you have better weather than I've experienced lately--Anthony went to Ohio to pick up his NISMO today so if all is well you'll see him and the car at your event as he's signed up.

 

...which is why I never bothered with either and always stuck with base models......

Not really, simply less stuff under the hood to break

 

The saga of my battery replacement on my Gray MINI (Link)

 

Jeez! I thought it would be plug 'n play, something I could handle. Does Terminex cover cars? I'm sure you'll engineer something to prevent the 'battery apartment' from being rented out again

 

Of all the MINIs we have (Gen I, vs Gen II, vs Gen III), I think MINI got a lot right with the R56, with the N18. The battery replacement was not one of those things. And I am scared to think what the procedure is to change the battery in the JCW (Gen III)...

Being a critter B&B is the worst. I already have some of the sonic things that are supposed to discourage them... Some say they work; others say - not so much. At least they haven’t gotten too far into the car and really mucked it up.

I did find that there is a flap that closes to the heat and AC unit when that is all turned off. I will need to do that in the future to keep the critters out of there.

 

My 2007 doesn't have the red plastic cover, just the standard rubber cover. Leave it to MINI to reinvent the wheel and overcomplicate even the simplest jobs.

 

The red plastic thermal cover wasn’t the issue. It was the black plastic cowl cover, which you do have. That is the cover with the flap that you can open to get to the battery terminals, but not for battery removal. That whole plastic cowl piece has to come off to get to the battery... and I broke mine...

 

Ahhh, got it. Yeah, I know the cowl has to come off. I changed my battery a few months ago. A total PIA.
In other news, I had my front suspension checked out by race technicians today. All good. The first thing they asked was, "What track were you at!" The tire shredding was almost certainly from going over "Wheelie Hill" which is when I heard the scraping noises (I thought I was bottoming out). For whatever reason, my suspension did not like cresting that hill. The tire was scraping the arch. I put two new Falkens on the front and I'll see how it goes at LRP in a few weeks.

 

Hope it works out well...

Other news - I got the memory card and I am working on a video for YouTube of me chasing down 2 Porsche GT3s at NYST...

 

Chasing Porsche GTS at NYST in my MINI Cooper...

 

Looks pretty twisty If I were you I'd do a Niagara PCA event just so you could tell Rich DeAsis and Mike Mammano that you were in the Mini they were holding up, if you didn't do so at that event

And no, you can't make your Mini sound like a GT3

 

gbuff - you would love this track...

Oh, they knew I was there, especially after we came in and I tried to explain the line they should be taking... Nope, that didn’t go over well...

There is something “unique” about how a GT3 in race prep sounds...

 

Those chases are always fun, no matter the reason for being able to keep up.

 

I knew what they were doing and that they would be going at a moderate pace. But the fact they didn’t pull away at all was a big surprise. Even going “slow” those cars are fast, so being able to keep up with them was a real treat.

BTW - the mostly white Porsche was a Cayman, not a 911. My mistake at not looking at it more closely. The Cayman would be a great car for that track.

 

I believe Mike club-races that Cayman; I've been on track with it at the Glen and it is really fast (compared to me, at least ). And the last time I drove with Rich, again at the Glen, in that car he was turning 2:02s so I don't know what they were doing.....but as gkp said it's still really cool to be able to stay close

If I could swing it I'd buy a Cayman tomorrow. They are so capable on the track--I've been on with hundreds of them and they just go and go (PDKs notwithstanding, but they do shift faster than any human). And fast! (unlike Mike was here ) Base Caymans are considered "underpowered" with 300hp but with 121hp presently the thing would feel like a rocketship.

Put a hitch on one, get a small tire trailer with a box on it (I've seen many of these setups) and rock

Back to watching the NASCAR guys make a mess of things at the Glen--they totally ignore the curbs coming out of the carousel, and elsewhere if need be......

 

I think Mike was not liking the track at all. He was all over the place and couldn’t find a line. They were both braking really early for T1 and I easily caught them with much later braking. The thing that really did surprise me was they didn’t dust me off going up that long straight. They should have been able to clear 140 easily there, given I was doing close to 110, which is close to what I do at LRP and 140 - 150 is what they would do at LRP (hope that comparison makes sense... ). When Rick was by himself, he did dust me in no time flat...

Still it was great no matter what the excuse...

As for NASCAR - if it doesn’t have a fence/guardrail keeping them from driving some place, they can drive there. A few years back they tried 3 or 4 wide going into T1 at the Glen and that didn’t end well. Then they had the nerve to complain that it was a “dangerous track”... They put the runout at T1 because those guys couldn’t keep it on the track. Now that it is paved, it is free game. But with 3 or 4 wide, the last person is going to have trouble getting back onto the track. That person found that the guardrail at the end of that runout is really hard and unforgiving....

 

I was just registering for a few SCDA days at LRP and noticed the price for novices is up to $599!!!

 

The prices for these things are just getting crazy--the late-October 3-day event with garage rental at WGI that I usually attend is up to $1235. I think I'm passing this year.