I was just at LCMT with bmwcca and my spece36 car. We had about 5 cars in the no-power-no-aero speed range to race, depending on who had their wheaties that morning, so there were some good times. This video (3min, 7 sec)  has a lap of me chasing Phil, with a little thrill at the end. It got my attention anyway.

This was my first class win where there were other people in my class at the race. 8-).   At the beginning, lots of faster cars pass. As we go on I pick off many of the faster cars (finishing 3 spots up from qual). 

I edited the race down to 10min 30s.

http://www.vimeo.com/6843246

 I'm working my way through my video. It was a pretty good weekend for me. I qualified on spece36 pole, ahead of all but one of the JP cars. The feature race was dry until we got to turn 1 at which point it was raining and we were on our slicks. The traction was "OK" almost till the end when suddently it wasn't and we were brought in a couple minutes early. I was OK but not great in the rain. Later, we had some good dry races, and in the fun race in particular, we had spece36 cars racing nose to tail through the whole race.

Here is the first video. One lap of lightning with a little sightseeing trip thrown in:

Here are some fun race highlights. We had 4 spece36s in the race and 3 of us were nose to tail through much of the race, encouraged by an IP car we could not get past. I'm mostly in the middle with Jim Banks ahead and Brian Henry in my rear view mirror. I've edited this down to a little under 9 minutes.

 I'm working my way through the video looking for highlights. Here is about 5min from the unexpectedly wet practice. It's kind of fun because we are all on dry tires and it's pretty wet at times. It also seems to be very difficult to tell if the track is dry enough or not just by looking.

In the fun race, exciting excerpts below, Jack, Suzin and I are stuck behind a slower IS car with -a-lot- more power. We all pass each other, but can we pass him? Don't miss this action packed episode of --- Race Car #666.

 1500 fps, you can watch the tires flexing and bouncing, 10+ seconds over a single curb.

http://axisofoversteer.blogspot.com/2009/07/super-slo-mo-and-hamiltons-secret.html

watch both videos.

pics 

http://picasaweb.google.com/johnmdanskin/LemonsNewEngland2009?authkey=Gv1sRgCOup757hgtWM_QE#

We had the e30 with the yellow feather boas, the ducks on the roof and the mini wing.

One team changed engines 3 times. Another drove from ct to maine for an engine and was rolling when the race started the next day at noon. They had never changed anything more involved than the oil before.

Another team had a leaf-blower supercharged.

We spent about 4 hours in the pits/paddock eventually discovering that the hoses were getting cut by the alternator which was moving about 6 inches under torque because we were missing an engine mount. We replaced the engine mount with a piece of plywood and a big bolt and were ready to roll. We also spent an exciting two hours installing a new kill switch after failing tech the first time.

We drove cleanly and reasonably (not outstandingly) fast, but with 4 hours out the best we could do was 21st out of about 40 finishers (or near finishers).

The half-mile track w/infield was pretty freaking crowded with 40+ cars. There was a little miata with semi-pro kart drivers weaving through everyone, threading the needle, passing on the one-lane chicane, everything. It was amazing to watch, especially since they weren't leaving a lot of sideways cars in their wake, unlike some other fast cars I could name.

It's not supposed to be a contact sport, but our car was "touched" 4 times. Once for each driver. All the touches were drivers door or farther back, so I'll put us on the side of the angels there.

My spec e36 coming up onto two wheels. First me driving, then doug thoms driving (his very first hot lap in my car).

Aaron is a pro driver in my spec e36 #666 with a semi-broken accelerator pedal.

 Tom Tice is a fast guy in spec e36 #110.

This is in-car from Aaron's point of view.

The race is not all at the front. I don't have the resolve to pass, but I do have the resolve to harass... 

 Edited down to about 13 minutes. Skip over the dull parts where nothing is happening.

This is my best qual session (best lap all weekend in this session), but it wasn't all perfect.  At the end of this 1 lap video, I pick up a rear wheel in hogpen, which is exactly like lifting, lose the rear end -some-, and head off track. I stay too close to the track, look the wrong way (you can see in the mirror), and get back onto the track too early (it sure felt like I'd slowed down enough at the time). Nothing bad happens, I get back on my game.

Anyway, it's entertaining.

I didn't know this was possible without hitting a curb. There isn't a curb to hit.

 This won't be as funny to anyone else as it was to me, but here goes. I've been reading and rereading speed secrets for a few days, thinking, digesting, reading again. 

After all this deep thought and cogitation, I came up with this fundamental insight into my driving habits. I have a bad habit:  (drum roll)

 I am not driving fast enough.

I told you it wouldn't be funny.

I am especially not driving fast enough in the rain, but that's too much information.

This is me in the mini. I'm going as fast as I could figure out how to go. Any faster and I just understeer. I was able to do this and be moderately bored. You can't see in this video but my hands look like Peter C's. No movement other than what's needed to turn. Any steering input was via throttle, but not much except heel of the boot where I always seemed to add a little too much power too early, hiccup power and back on. I can't see it in this video though.

I can't do anything like this in my spece36 yet. Maybe this year.

 This is the first race where I felt comfortable in the car and like I was really racing. It was the only dry race that weekend. I hadn't brought rain tires because bmwcca was threatening to chnage them over the winter, so I had a hard time in the wet. I would have been better off if I'd brought wets and hadn't even bought the drys. Also, the wets DIDN'T change but the drys did. Anyway, I really enjoyed this race.  I edited it down to a couple of laps at the start, David White and then Jean Luc Bergeron passing me at a very high rate of speed, and the photo finish.