I decided to try autocross. We signed up for the local SCCA branch's first event in their "slush" season. (That is a winter series of 6 events.) Both me and the wife took Tristan in HS novice. We're quite experienced at running the MINIs on tracks, I was hoping that this will give us a head start against the other novices. We were using our track setup with SSR Type-C 16x6.5" wheels and Bridgestone RE-11 tires in 205/55-16 (the region doesn't allow R comps for novices, which suits me). Everything else is stock as needed for the stock class.

My first impression is there's a lot of effort for very little reward, and the wife got a better time than me. How did that happen?

We got there extra early and chatted to several of the others who were there. Eventually registration opened and then we went for a course walk (as is recommended). After 2 corners I totally can't work out what the course is doing, the chalk line wasn't layed down yet making it a little unclear. Also making it difficult was a weird course, it had a loop in it, you ran one slalom twice and took a different exit each time. As we were puzzling a guy we'd talked to earlier came along making his notes, he could see where to go next, so we tagged along with him, he was very helpful.

Then we saw a large knot of people walking the course, it was the course designer doing the novice course walk (which we didn't realize was going to happen). So we joined in which him to get a better explanation of the course.

We were in the second run group, so we were working the first runs. The wife signed up for cones and never had any to pick up. I signed up for flagging and had a little more action with cyclists and trucks wanting to take a short cut across the course. I spent most of the time talking to the other workers and watching the line the cars took.

Then it was time to run. I was intending to take it slow on the first run, and use it as an additional "walk". After the first couple of corners I was presented with the slalom and totally didn't see where I was supposed to go. I basically missed doing the slalom, so I got a DNF, I completed the rest of the course in 67s.

For the second run I was studying the slalom cones so I'd have some idea how to do it. I was again going to take a leisurely run to learn the course. I successfully completed the course in 63.2s.

For the third run I turned of the DSC and went for it, I got 63.0s. Disappointingly not much different from the second run. I did think I lost a little time when I turned in too early at the far corner of the course. The back end also got a bit loose in the slalom.

For the last run I was going to have to really go for it to improve the time, so I spun the second time through the slalom. That messed up that run, I got 79.1s.

They were cycling the two driver cars through the line twice as fast as the others, so we had to hurry to get the car ready for my wife (sticking on new numbers). On her first run she managed 69.1s. On her second run, 61.9 so she'd already bettered my time. The third run wasn't that good (63.6). Her final run was 59.7, which elicited a big whoop. That was a big surprise, she's never been faster than me at any driving we've done so far. So next time my goal will be to be faster than the wife.

In the novice class, the wife was 4th and I was 6th out of 7. Overall she was 61st, I was 71st out of 73.

Compared to a track day, you get a lot less driving, only 4 runs, on a track day we'd do 40 or 50 laps. You also have a lot more hanging around, working your session. With a track day you work at it to get it right, with autocross you have to get it right almost immediately. I can see the skill to autocross is to appreciate the course quickly.

I had the video camera running, and the iPhone doing data acquisition, though it managed to crash before saving the data for the wife's runs. I have video:

My wife's best run: http://btwyx.com/Movies/AXOct12GGFCBest.mp4

My best run: http://btwyx.com/Movies/AXOct12GGFBest.mp4

Spining: http://btwyx.com/Movies/AXOct12GGFBSpin.mp4

I took a few pictures of the wife running: http://btwyx.com/AXOct12GGF/

The official results are here: http://www.sfr-solo.org/solo2/Result...h/round01.html

 

Autocross is crazy like that - a totally different animal compared to the track. Powerful cars don't always get the fastest times and a quick driver on the track doesn't necessarily achieve quick times in autocross. On the track, in a car or on a motorcycle, I can turn some respectable times for my experience level, but at autocross I quickly learned that I was SLOW. It was frustrating and humbling, but I accept the challenge! LOL. I want to figure out how to get faster. As you said, you only have a few runs to figure it out. And the course is different at every event. I'm still learning and, in addition to just memorizing the course, I'm figuring out how to drive aggressively while conserving the limited traction that my tires have. Just like anything else, you'll get much faster with practice.

Obviously, how many runs you get depends on the turnout. Depends on the length of the course too. In my experience, I get 5-7 runs over the course of about 4 hours (8am to about noon, for example). I've also been to events where we've gotten 9 runs in about 4 hours. At an HPDE you're there from about 7:30am until 4:30 and have people working the course for you. And in autocross you're either driving, sitting in line waiting to drive, or working the course. At $200 - $350 track days you have people working for you (i.e. corner workers, etc), but at $30-$45 autocrosses, you get volunteered.

Autocross isn't for everyone, but I've accepted that it's just totally different from track days. Unlike track days, the events are generally fairly close to me (all you need is an available parking lot) and I can be done by 12:30, so it's a good way to flog the car when I don't have time or funds for a weekend at the track.

 

Not sure if this helps as you have already been there but I thought I would share!
http://new.minimania.com/article/303...oss_Techniques

 

Btwyx, It was a pleasure meeting you, and the MRS. yesterday. She beat me too BTW I was out helping set the course when I noticed a nearly identical mini park next to mine.

This was my fist autocross. I haven't done any track days, so I have nothing to compare it too, but I had a blast. There was a lot of downtime, but the rush of the 4 minutes of race time are still with me. It was fun having some other Minis there - there was one other normally aspirated Mini there who's times were a little quicker than any of ours. I didn't speak with the owner, or see him run for that matter, but I presume he had a little more events under his belt. Hope to see you both again at another event, and congratz to your wife!

 

I enjoyed this thread; including the AX tutorial that Don posted.

AX is rarely kind to novices; especially those who have track experience, it seems. Fortunately, there's usually a steep learning curve for those who keep coming back. Cathy didn't wait for the second event though; she chipped away 9.4 seconds from her 1st run to her 4th.

I hope all of you novices return for more. My wife and I started in 1970 in a '69 Datsun 510 sedan in E Stock. The next year we ran a '64 Austin Mini Cooper 1275 S. I'm still doing it, and probably will be long after I've given up tracking.

 

You're supposed to switch drivers between runs. The first to go must get out after one run, then each driver can do two before getting out. Your wife drove on hotter tires on a course that had more rubber laid down. That might explain one of those three seconds she found over you. That, by the way, is huge. A tenth is significant in autocross.

There is ton of information and the local supplemental rules at SFRSCCA.COM and much discussion at http://www.baautox.com/forum/index.php.

That's a highly professional group but up to 1/3rd of the participants are day trippers.

Autocross can be very rewarding if you fight for a class championship over a season. And of course it is cheaper than track days, and you don't risk death or car destruction from sudden stops from high speed. As a general rule, race drivers tend not to do well at autocross while autocrossers tend to quickly pick up race driving.

 

Oh, I missed the picture. That is Golden Gates Field. To post a quick time there you must give up everything you have ever learned about the proper or quick line. You must follow the gravel free line.

 

Good to meet you as well. We turned up early (as I said), had difficulty finding the place and then when we did we saw your MINI, it seemed like a good place to park.

I have a few pictures of you in action, I can send you the full size shots if you want. Here's a sample:

 

They said we could do it either way. Given I hadn't chosen easy to swap numbers, it seemed easier to do one then the other. The course advantage isn't going to mean much to us, and the first run group had already scrubbed the course.

Yup, there was a lot of gravel.

 

Yes please. I will PM you.

 

We did our second autocross on Saturday. Round 2 of the slush season was at the Marina airport just North of Monterey, about an hour and a quarter South or here. We didn't think we could get to this round at first, we had something to get to in the evening and weren't sure we could get away in time. Then we decided to enter in the regular stock tire class, not the novice class. The novice class was going to run first in the afternoon, the stock tire class was running second. However the work assignments were the other way around, so if we ran in novice, we'd have to stay around to the end, they don't appreciate you not working (it'll get you kicked out). In stock tire we got the work over with and then drove, we could leave early if necessary, we'd just lose some driving time. Switching classes wouldn't be good for our standings in the championship, but we're not expecting to be in the running for a trophy. We're just getting experience.

When we got there and registered, I watched some of the runs in the second run group. Some students from San Jose SU were there with some of their machines. They were running a formula SAE car in AM, they were also offering to do your work assignment for you for a suitable donation. I happened to remember that AM is the fastest class, so it has an index of 1.00, which made it easy to work out how fast we'd need to run an equivalent run the HS index of 0.799 would mean we should run 25% longer. They ran a 39.something, so I'm thinking a time of 50-60 seconds would be a good target.

So we worked the first shift after lunch. I again signed up for flagging at station 2, and this time the wife joined me to do cones. Station 2 turned out to be an interesting station to work. The course started off and ran a slalom down one side of the course, then came back in a series of switchbacks. Station 2 was in the middle of the course, we had to look out for cars in 3 portions of the course, the first slalom and as two of the switchbacks passed by. As they were running two cars on track at once, someone had to be looking towards the start while a car is rushing up behind you at great speed. It really did not seem like a good idea to turn your back on the cars, but you have to. (In fact at least one novice handbook says to never turn you back on a car while working.)

Also working the station was Rob, who was the driver of one of the other MINIs we'd seen around. He was the only entry in HS, I'd had a look at his car earlier, he was running Dunlop Star Spec tires. He said he was coming back to autocross after a break of a number of years. He was an interesting person to talk to. HE also tried to persuade us to skip the novice class and compete with him in HS. If we carry on with this, I'm not sure what class we'll end up in, we could do novice for next season we might be able to win the class by just turning up, we could do street tire where there's more competition, or we could HS where last year you could have won just by turning up. This year, Rob would provide at least some competition.

During our work session I called in 2 DNFs, when cars missed one of the elements of the slalom. I hope I got the call right, I was sure at the time, but after I started to wonder if I'd go that right. I'd hate to spoil someone's day by calling a DNF wrongly. It seems like a lot of responsibility for someone who's only doing their second autocross. I was also trying to get a feel for the line to take, but I could only study the cars on the first half of the course. I was also amused by the other other MINI, it was a Cooper-S in STX and obviously took advantage of the allowed suspension tweeks, it was going around all the corners on 3 wheels. Its inside rear wheel was off the ground most of the time, so we called it the "3 wheeled MINI".

The it was time for our run group. I was the first car up, the two driver cars get to go first, there were only 2 of us. There was an AM Catherham 7 behind us. I took it very easy on the first run, I was just getting the lay of the course. We'd done the novice course walk (with the course designer), but it still looks a lot different from the drivers seat. I was also intending to take things easier in general, at the previous round I was thinking that making to many mid corner corrections and it was costing me time. So I was going to do this without mid corner corrections. Start slow and hope to speed up later. For the first run I timed in at 60.8, a good start at the top end of my 50-60 target. Though the official results show +1 cone, I don't remember anything about that at the time.

The wife then went out, this time we were alternating runs as we're supposed to. To make this easier, I'd got some magnetic numbers and changing was just a question of adding or taking off a 1. (I was running 94 again, the Wife 194.) She came in at 60.0, slightly faster than me, just like last time.

For my second run I got a 54.6, a good improvement, I was trying to speed up while still not making corrections. The wife came in at 58.8, but was announced as a DNF. The results also show a DNF for the first run, but we didn't hear that at the time. We did hear the DNF for the second run, and she was puzzled as to where she went wrong. An enquiry indicated that it was station 6 (the last station) which called in the DNF. looking at the video I see she missed the finish gate both times.

The finish here was a bit tricky, I wasn't sure it lived up to the rules (after reviewing them, Section 6.5). The run out area was very short, it requires some heavy braking to stop in time. Even in the Cooper I see I was hitting 1.12G to stop in time, some of the faster classes couldn't manage that, they would shoot out between 2 of the cones and then circle back the same way so as to not get a DNF. The chequered flag was also way off to the right, there was plenty of space to fit a car between the flag and the finish gate. That's in fact what the wife did for the first 2 runs. I also see on my best run that I was headed the same way, but made a hasty correction just in time to head into the finish gate, provoking another squeal from the tires.

For our third runs, I got a 52.4 and the wife another 58 (58.4). I was starting to use the brakes a bit. For the first 2 runs I only hit the brakes in about 2 places for the sharpest turns in the switchbacks. For the fourth and final run I used the brakes in quite a few places, but I was being mindful not to spin again like last time. Trying not to overdo the trail braking. For the last run I got a 50.9, so I was pleased getting down to the 50 end of my 50-60 target. The wife turned in a 54.6. Rob in the other MINI came in with a best time of 48.something. I heard that as we were running.

Overall we came last in Stock Street Tire out of five entrants. If we had entered in novice, I would have come 3rd and the wife 6th out of 7. 0.65 of a second ahead of me was one of the guy's we'd chatted to on and off, he was running the car with "1337" as its number (a joke in "Leet Speak"). It seems he'd run in the tail end of the championship season, but only doing fun runs. My next target will be to beat his time.

Overall I came 54th and the wife 64th out of 67 in the indexed results. More importantly I was only 12.4 seconds "behind" the leader compared to 18.4 at the last round. ("Seconds behind" is a normalised number you can compared between different events). The wife though slipped to 17.7 seconds behind from 14.2.

The results are here: http://www.sfr-solo.org/solo2/Result...h/round02.html

I have video of my best run: http://btwyx.com/Movies/AXOct12MaB4.mov

And the wife's best run: http://btwyx.com/Movies/AXOct12MaC4.mov

And a few pictures:

Me:




The wife:




Rob:

 

Btwxy - I am glad to see you doing the AX. People who do AX do much better on the track than people who don't. It is a great way to learn the car and its handle quarks at speeds and in an environment that you can't do a lot of harm. I have been doing it and track together for about 3 years and I am still learning new things about the car and me.

I enjoy your write-ups and pictures. Keep us posted.

 

Today was the 3rd round of the slush series, again at the Marina airport. I went, but my wife couldn't make this one. I went back to novice H Stock. When I arrived I bumped into Rob again, he told me he'd run a 50.4 in his H Stock MINI, so I had something to aim for. At the last event I was 2 seconds behind Rob, so better than 52.4 would be an improvement. Rob also introduced me to the other H Stock entrant, Brian who was running a Ford Focus. He'd run a 48, I didn't think I could touch that.

Rob offered to walk the course with me, so we did and he shared his thoughts with me. This course was a lot different from the previous ones, it was a lot wider and more open. It reminded me more of a road course, more what I'm used to. There was a short slalom (only 2 gates), to start, then a couple of loops got you to the back of the course. Along the back was a "bus stop", followed by some Esses (a slalom around curved lines of cones), then another loop to the end. After that I tagged along with the novice course walk. After walking the course twice, I thought I could manage it at speed, not taking a "walking" run.

But first I had to work, I again signed up for flagging, and again it was a station (station 1), which looked after 2 portions of the course (the first slalom and the last loop). So again I had to turn my back on traffic. I called another DNF, one car was much too hot coming around the last loop, missed the cones, but also went the wrong side of the pointer cone. I wasn't expecting to see anyone do that.

By the time we got to run, I wasn't sure I could remember the course still, but I went for it, after a bit of a false start. I got the green flag and was just taking off when the announcer (and the speaker was right by the grid) asked to hold the start, so I stopped. I backed up a bit and about a minute later I took for for real. I think I did quite a good job, it was smooth and fast and 54.4, which would have been a good second run at the previous events. I think I lost a bit of time as I was too hot going into the Esses.

As there was only me in the car, things were a little slower paced than when we've been sharing. So I had some time hanging around waiting for my next run. I measured the tire temperatures. I'd been wondering how they were doing. The Bridgestone RE-11s have a good reputation as a track tire, but I wasn't sure how good they'd be at autocross. Something like a Dunlop star spec has a good reputation there, supposedly because they work from cold. I'd notice on one of my previous runs, I'd started out pulling about 0.8g in the corners but ended up pulling 0.95g, I was wondering if that was the tires heating up. After the first run, they weren't much warmer than they started (just over 100F).

The second run was also good, and faster 52.5, a good improvement. Again the entry to the Esses was a problem. The third run was faster, 51.7, but is starting to look and feel a bit ragged. I definitely got some wheel spin, this is where a newer MINI with DTC (and thus EDLC) could help. In the middle of the first loop, I found I didn't need to brake so picked up some time there. I was also finding a couple of places where Rob's suggestions on the course walk didn't work for me, maybe that's why he's faster. Again the entry to the Esses didn't work for me. I was pleased with the time, only 1.3 seconds behind Rob. I was going to have to see what I could do in my last run. I was annoyed to find I hadn't started the data logger on the iPhone for this run.

For the last run I was thinking about the entry to the Esses. I think my plan had been off, I'd been planning to take the far corner, brake and then do the Esses. The problem was by the time I was round the far corner, it was too late. So I decided to straighten out the far corner and brake further back before the Esses, so I'd be at the right speed to enter them. Unfortunately, the car broke lose in the bus stop. I caught it, but I lost time and only got a 51.9. Overall the run looks smoother, and the entry into the Esses was much more convincing. The tires still weren't hot, only about 120F, what I'd expect running on the highway. At the last track day I'd measured them at 160F, which is probably a bit too warm for them. There were quite a few people on grid spraying their tires between runs, presumably to cool them. One of them was making annoying puddles on the grid, I didn't want to start with wet tires.

So my best time was the third run's 51.7. This was good enough for 5 out of 8 in novice. I didn't catch the guy I was aiming for, I think I did better, but so did he, so I was 0.75 sec behind him at the end (where as I was 0.65 sec behind last week). Overall, I was 67th out of 75, 11.2 seconds behind the leader, an improvement over last week's 12.3.

The results are here: http://www.sfr-solo.org/solo2/Result...h/round03.html

No photos this week, video of my best run here: http://btwyx.com/Movies/AXNov12MaBest.mov

 

Hey Btwyx, thanks for the tales. A pleasure reading.

I gotta say from your accounts you sound like one of the few that stay and get a lot faster over time.

Then you chuckle at the talented drivers from other disciplines that start out 5 seconds off the pace. And help them if you can.

Its pretty cool - certainly it is damned hard.

Some folks like golf I suppose, and say the same sort of things...

But cheers to you,

Charlie

 

I'm really enjoying these as well, keep em coming.

That course was a sea of cones! Eeek. Tough to follow, and looked pretty narrow too.

I tend to tell our novices that it takes are few events to really get your brain wrapped around autocross courses. Your first couple events, you are reacting to the course, not attacking it. Until you get to a point that you can actually slow your brain down and think during a run, its tough to make leaps of improvement. This may come more quickly for you since you've got performance driving experience.

It looked like you were late on a lot of those elements. Especially in HS, gotta get the car turning before you get to the element, you can't just point and squirt out of it, you won't carry any speed. Softer arcs are key, more wheel = more speed scrubbed.

Do they allow ride alongs? Pester instructors to come with you, or go for a ride with the more experienced guys. You can learn a ton watching their lines and steering inputs.

Also, keep having fun and don't get frustrated. Speed doesn't happen overnight.

 

Sunday was the 4th and final round of the slush autocross series, it was held in the Oakland Coliseum parking lot. This was to have been the 5th round, but round 4 was cancelled due to lack of participants. That may be due to it being scheduled the same day as the US Grand Prix in Austin, we were in Austin so we were going to miss that round anyway.

We again entered in Novice H Stock which was in the second run group. So we had to get there early to walk the course and work the first run group. We arrived around 7:45 and things seemed to be running late. The driver's meeting didn't start until 9:15 (scheduled for 8:30), there was also an unusually large turnout which meant the first run group took a long time to run despite the course being a bit short. There were 165 entries, compared to 75 in the previous round. This may be because it was in Oakland, and thus a lot more convenient for a lot of people (it only took us 30 min to get there, compared to 1 hour for Golden Gate fields and 1:15 for the Marina.) There was also a large turnout of novices, which might have something to do with a special where the $15 weekend membership fee was waived if their Facebook page was liked.

The course wasn't quite as planned, it seems the Coliseum had left concrete barriers across the middle of the parking lot. There was only a small break in the barrier to allow the cars from one half to the other, this constrained the course quite a lot. As the course has to be at least 25ft from any solid object, this took a 50ft strip out of the middle of the lot which could't be used. Walking the course it seems rather simple, it looked like it'd be quite a fast course, I was wondering if I'd need to get into third gear. That was a miscalculation on my part, it was in fact a slow course and I hardly needed to get into second gear. I blame the miscalculation on the cold I was suffering from which had been lingering for the past couple of weeks.

Also walking the course I could see the final slalom was going to be tricky. Starting with a sharp turn at the far end of the course, it went quite straightish for a bit, one of the parts I was wondering about needing 3rd gear. It then went into a tight slalom. It was only 2 gates, but the gates were a line of 3 cones (the commentator called it a "wallem"), and then the exit gate was offset a bit which would make it tricky to hit. At first the cones marking the exit gate looked quite widely spaced and I was wondering if it'd be a good idea to try and shoot through between the cones, so you don't need that extra jog to the left. That idea obviously occurred to someone else as by the time the first runs were made the holes had been filled in making that idea not possible.

During the first run group, the times were quick, about 30 sec was par for the course with the eventual best being about 28.5. The wallem and the exit gate caused more than its fair share of problems. The first runner got sideways trying to make the jog to the left and took out a host of cones, several of which became lodged under car and didn't want to come out. That may be the Miata which is credited with 8 cones for its first run. As usual I was flagging and Cathy (my wife) was doing cones, we were on the station which was responsible for the exit gate. So we got quite a bit of action, including one runner who took out the timer gate (and got more cones stuck under the car).

I was 11:30 by the time the first run group finished and the second run group got its chance. Things were running really late, it was probably a mistake to allow 4 runs each. For our first runs, we gave each other a lift. That was my idea. The rules specifically disallow you to walk the course on any sort of wheeled vehicle, but the rules also allow you to be a passenger. So getting a lift gives you an extra look at the course (and at speed). Given the times that had been set, I was thinking around 35 sec would be a reasonable time. But first up was another MINI Cooper which promptly ran a 31, somewhat intimidating. We'd talked to the occupants of that MINI earlier, the car had actually placed at the national championships, and the current owners had just bought it. There were 3 drivers for the car (which I thought was against the rules), two experienced guys (running in the indexed class) and the wife of one of them running in novice. She said she'd had a little experience from some years earlier.

I also had a theory I'd picked up from a post on the local autocross forum. The idea is you usually start out slow and workout where to speed up. The theory was you should start out fast, a probably get cone penalties, and then work out where you need to slow down for later runs. I thought I'd give that a try, but I found that trying to run too fast was also difficult and my first run turned out a bit sedate, 36.6 and no cones. I found the course speed to be awkward, somewhere between 1st and 2nd gear. A little fast for 1st and a little slow for 2nd. I also seemed to get bogged down at the far corner, it seemed to be way too slow for 2nd. Part of the problem maybe that I'd forgotten to turn off the stability control (and thus the traction control) and I was being traction controlled. (Like I said, I wasn't at my sharpest).

Because of the large entry, there was more time between runs that we're used to. Usually we have to hurry to get the car ready for the other driver and then don't have time to sit. This time we were just sitting for 20 mins. When Cathy's turn came I got a ride as planned. I'm not sure how much that helped me (her run was a 37.8). After the run we again had a bit of a wait, not quite so long this time, but long enough for me to worry about running out of recording space or battery for the camcorder. At our previous autocrosses I'd just started the camera at the start of our runs and it happily captured all of our runs on one card and on one battery charge, about an hour in total. Now the camera had been running for an hour and only captured the two runs. I had to swap the card and only start it when something interesting was going to happen.

In the time between runs I looked over the data recorded and compared our runs. I was using Harry'd lap timer this time, I hadn't bothered using Harry's for autocross previously as I didn't think it was accurate enough and its crippled in that it only records data at the speed of the GPS (about 1Hz). The OBD reader we have is capable of reading at about 3Hz, so Harry's would be throwing away a lot of resolution. However for this time I'd got a new toy, a bluetooth GPS receiver. If you reprogrammed it with special firmware it was capable of supplying fixes at 5Hz. The GPS data is also a lot more accurate than from the iPhone's built in GPS, so I thought it was reasonable to use Harry's to time the runs. I'd taken the GPS and the iPhone on the course walk and marked the start and finish lines for the lap timer to do its thing. For my first run it actually did a good job of timing the run, (it reckoned I'd done 36.48 vs the official 36.63). However for Cathy's first run, it didn't see the start, so recorded no lap time, and no data. After that I made a point to push the manual start button, so if it didn't see the start, it would at least record data. That's one of the know problems with Harry's lap timer, it has difficulty with triggers after a standing start. There's a standing start mode, but that requires some extra interaction I didn't want to bother with.

For both of us, our 2nd and 3rd runs got quicker, all in the 35 sec range, I ended up with a 35.1 and Cathy with a 35.2. My second run was quicker despite me way overcooking the entry into the wallem, I had to brake hard to avoid the cones, and lost a lot of time, the commentator thought I was going to DNF, but I managed to go the right way around. The entry into the wallem continued to be a problem throughout the runs.

The gears continued to be awkward, and by the end of the third run I wondered if I'd be better off not shifting to second until I was past the far corner. That'd give me a much better launch out of the corner, but I'd be in danger of hitting the limiter on the first half of the course. I also worked out I'd left the traction control on, so for the final run I decided to not change up on the first half of the course and to make sure the traction control was off. I hit the limiter several times during the run and I'm not convinced that was the right thing to do, and that run was slower a 35.2.

We came 14th and 16th out of 29 in the novice class, and 141st and 144th overall out of 165.

The results are here: http://www.sfr-solo.org/solo2/Result...h/round04.html

Video of my best run: http://btwyx.com/Movies/AXDec12OakBBest.mov

and Cathy's best run: http://btwyx.com/Movies/AXDec12OakCBest.mov

This is Cathy mid course:




and me crossing the finish line on my fourth run, you can read my time of 35.210 if you squint.

 

Thanks for sharing - I enjoy your accounts, and the video also.

I'm also bloody jealous since I'm in the "half time" period that we call winter around here...

Cheers,

Charlie

 

California doesn't really do Winter, at least not like most people would recognise. The worst it does around here is have a rainy season which makes the "winter" months a little tricky. It does get dark a bit early, so the afternoon sessions seemed to have only 3 runs. We didn't get away until 2:30, and sunset's around 5. Temperatures in the low 60s and sunny (as you can see on the video).

 

Sounds fun. Thanks for the writeup.

As for Harry's, I have found the same problem with the setup. You have to "dig" a bit to find how to set it for a rolling start. It would be nice if he would add a button/choice for a rolling start. I think others have asked but it is not there yet. I also had problems with the accuaracy of the phone GPS not putting the start in the right spot on the track so it doesn't always trigger. I think the Dual antenna will help with that. Also the 5 Hz upgrade is really worth it and is a big plus on the track too.

 

I found an old forum post of Harry's about "How to set up a Autocross" (sic). Its basically there's a button on the top corner of the GPS screen (+ chequered flag) to add a trigger at the current location. You walk to the start (as part of normal course walking), hit the button and add the trigger. Walk to the end and do the same to add the trigger.

The question is which sort of trigger to add. The end is easy you need a "Stop" trigger and its pretty reliable as you're traveling fast to get to the finish. The start trigger is the difficult one, I put in a "Go" trigger which starts a lap when its crossed, but as you're not traveling very fast when you cross the start line it didn't always trigger. Harry's answer to that was the "Standing Go" trigger, that assumes you're being staged when you approach the trigger. When you get close enough it pops up a big orange button to push when you're staged. Once you hit that its armed and starts timing once it feels acceleration. The problem with that is the timing doesn't start until you cross the start line, not when you start to accelerate. I don't know if he's got some other solution to this in the works.

There's also the autocross assistant which prompts you when to insert trigger and inserts standing go and a stop.