Great race guy's! Really enjoyed watching you race and wanted to say hello but was never able to catch you guy's out of pit lane... Nite time was fun, how was it in the car and your thoughts on the 15's at VIR?

 

It's over . . . last race of the season.

11 races, 20,000 transporter miles, two trips to Canada, 50 hours+ of on-track race time, over 180+ Hoosier race tires, 1250+ gallons of race fuel, 15 different drivers. . .

It was fun, it was hard work and I can't wait until next year !

Special thanks to the Sponsors, Crew, Drivers, Grand Am, Race promoters, Fans and of course Mini owners who gave us great support all year.

---------------------------

This was our 1st trip to VIR and we really enjoyed it. VIR is a great track and facility.

We faced some new challenges this weekend as we were thrown a 'curve ball' by Grand Am. During tech inspection on Friday, Grand Am forced a change on us. At first it seemed inconsequential . . . but it proved to be a disaster.

For some inexplicable reason, they decided we needed to install the original factory grill. It's the chrome horizontal slats (x 3) that adorn the Cooper S in the upper radiator hole under the scoop. We scrambled and purchased two grills from the dealer in Winston-Salem. $300 later we had our parts. You will notice they are missing in the signature picture below. We have NEVER had them . . . nor did Tony Nuzzo when he raced the cars for the prior 3-4 years.

We got them installed on Saturday and reported back to GA that we were in compliance and ready to race.

As it turns out, it caused BOTH cars to dramatically overhead. The #197 runs a JCW, GP intercooler. The IC temps went through the roof and tripped the motor into 'limp mode'. After numerous trips to the pits we got the engine to run at about 70%. We lost at least 15 laps in the pits and more on the track as the car could only manage 2:30's+ which was about 20 seconds off the pace.

The #198 has our very successful w2a IC unit which had performed perfectly all weekend . . . up until the Saturday race. The upper radiator sits behind this newly installed grill. We monitor these IC temps on a real time basis and they were running in the 220+ range. This put the 198 in the 2:24's+ range.

We believe the design of the grill causes the air to flow over the upper opening instead of through it when the speeds exceed 80+. You could actually watch the temps spike once the the speed rose above that speed. The slats are similar to a wing in appearance. We also think the blocked air caused the scoop to lose its effectiveness because everything went to H*** once the grills were installed. Within 3 race laps both cars started losing power.

At the about the 2 hour mark, Tim went to the GA trailer and plead with the officials to get approval to remove them. After the removal, the temps dropped and the cars' performance improved. Unfortunately, the damage was done to the 197 as it never recovered to full power.

We were helped later on as the sun went down and the ambient air cooled.

Kudos and thanks to the driver's who pressed on and turned the disaster into a respectable finish.

#197 ---Jamie Slone and Caleb Kenney who drive 5 1/2 hours of the 6 hour event. Jon drove for about 20 minutes and got out. Owen chose not to drive at all. Frankly, I was disappointed in those two. Jamie and Caleb proved you CAN make lemonade from lemons.

#198 --- Peter London, Mark Congleton and Rick Johnson II. They drove a great race and pushed the car for all it could give. They were the heroes of the day as they brought the car home in 15th. I also drove a 33 lap stint in the heat of the afternoon. During my drive, I saw some straight-away temps in the IC at 250 . . . scary.

The racing 'gods' were on our side after the sun went down.

Incident 1 : Rick was driving the 198 up through the 'esses' and hooked a wheel on the inside of the curb. It bent the wheel, deflated the tire and Rick 'limped' back to pits at about 80 mph! The tire flew off the rim (without damaging the car!) and he flew into the pits in a shower of sparks.

Incident 2 : With about 10 minutes to go and Peter behind the wheel of the 198, the 00 Cobalt spun into the grass . . . he spun back onto the track and slammed the passenger door very hard. Fortunately, it struck directly between the wheels and did no mechanical damage.

Sometimes it's better to be lucky that good. At this race, we had both. Lot's of good luck . . . some bad . . . and a really good crew.

Thanks again. I will provide update over the winter with the '08 plans. We will see you in Datytona.

Randy

 

Thanks for the rundown. I new something went wrong with the 197 early and didn't think either one sounded right, but there was little information to be had out in the crowd. It was very noticable later on that the 198 picked up a lot of speed. Really great job with the problems you faced!!

 

Sorry we missed you at the track . . . thanks for coming.

Randy

 

No sweat, maybe next year!

 

Interesting revelation about the upper stock factory grill!

Guess you couldn't have "fibbed" that the original grill was of the AERO variety?

Best of luck next season!

 

Here are some pics I took...you may have been running hot, but you LOOKED good, and that counts for something!


















--Dan
Mach V
FastMINI.net

 

Dan:

Those pictures are great. Thanks for posting them.

Randy

 

Great shots Mach V Dan! Thanks.

 

Do I see the RR tire off the tarmac? sweet!

 

Nice pics, Dan. Again, great job, Randy. Those idiotic rules interpretations just plain pi** me off! At least the R56 grill is more race friendly, I think.

 

what a blast this weekend was. As the sun went down i went to the top of roller coaster so we could see turns 14-17. More importantly was the glowing rotors on the cars coming off of the back stretch. that's physically the closest to the track a spectator can be with out getting in the hot pits.

again, great weekend let us know when you'll be back at VIR. i'm there often.

I've added a pic of the 197 car to my gallery. the later ones didn't show up to well with my camera

 

What a weekend, Randy summed it up but needless to say we had plenty of excitement. I was not happy when GA said add the grills, little did we know what the results of that move would be.

VIR is a great facility, going flat out in 5th gear up the esses was a real nail biter, it made the esses at the Glen feel like a walk in the park.

Randy thanks for a great year of racing, I can't wait for 2008!! The whole crew did a great job as evidenced by the race by race improvement of the cars. It really was great fun.

Mark

 

It was a great weekend! We had a lot of fun and got some new drivers in the CruiseAmerica/CaseTech MINIs - including some real class acts - Jaime Slone (www.sloneracing.com) and Caleb Kenney (www.calebkenneyracing.com) - both of which were fast and troopers for keeping the #197 going through the overheat for a great finish!

Randy - thanks again for letting us share in your passion - you get a lot of complements on the paddock on how professional your crew and rig perform!

I look forward to 2008 also and continuing to push the MINIs to the front!

Ricky "Flat Tire" Johnson

 

What is the brake combo on these two minis? does your rules re-strict you to 15 inch wheels?

Are these the same Minis we saw at Firebird Int Raceway in Phoenix in 05??

 

We run the JCW brake package on one car and the original factory setup on the other. We will convert both to JCW for next season. We tested the JCW setup at Salt Lake and VIR. It works and now we are working on some pad combinations.

We run the 15" wheels by choice. They are light, fit the brakes and the fender wells. We run 225/45R15 Hoosiers.

These are NOT the same cars that ran in Phoenix at PIR in '06. I'm not certain what ran at FIR in '05 but they are not those either.

Randy

 

Thanks for that, enjoy your rest

 

Good write up about you guys in this months Roundel.

 

Thanks . . . I missed it until your tip.

Randy

 

Hopefully, I get my Roundel today so I can read the writeup!

That's awesome to get the exposure you have gotten in one season - between this and the Koni advertisements!

 

RSR Motorsports #197 Mini Cooper race car will be on display at Mini of Manhattan at there Motor-Tober '07 Saturday 10/27/07 from 10:00 to 4:00 Come on down and watch our in car race video.
Crew with be on hand to anwser questions about the race car and the Koni Challenge Race Series.
Tim Marren

 

http://img503.imageshack.us/my.php?i...rposterzh9.jpg

There will be limited number of 'RSR Posters' available at this event. Please stop by and pick one up!

 

If you haven't put this post here, then you should. Closer to the NYC area.
http://nemini.org/index.php

 

Randy,

What's the word on the intercooler? I wonder if someone accidentally made a mistake in the installation, rather than a product failure. Would be useful to get George's input.

John Petrich in Seattle

 

Funny you should ask . . . I spoke with George this morning and he has shipped the unit back. Evidently, everything checked out from their end. There was no installation problem because we discussed that too. The only unknown is the pump and I'm going to check that out.

In any case I'm going to sell it. The unit we are now using works so well, here is no reason to keep experimenting.

We will see what the pump test shows . .

Randy