Buttonwillow Race Report, April 6-7, 2002

I had a great time even though I broke my second tranny. I should name my team "broken tranny racing."

Saturday was fine. I qualified second with a 2:06xx. I was ready to race and perhaps win. But I committed another mental error. I mis-read the schedule and though our race will be at 2:30. It was at 12:20. I almost missed the entire race. One person came looking for me and it was SHANNON FITZPATRICK. That you very much Shannon. You are a great man. I owe you big time. I am very very grateful for your help.

I started from the pit, the last car on the track. I had a blast. I raced and passed more cars than any of the other SE-Rs. I was blasting my way through the field. Dicing and slicing with Miatas and RX7s, Hondas and others. It was total fun. I was gaining ground. I could see Jared's car who was in third. But, alas, the race was too short to make up the lost time. Had it been 10 minutes longer (it was 30 min), I would have caught up to Jared. Even though I was very angry, I channeled that into great racing. My fastest lap was a 2:05.xx. That was my best yet. I finished last in the SE-R class and gain 80 points. Not bad at all.

On Sunday I was determined not to miss the starting grid. But things do not always happen the way you want them. During practice around lap 5-6 I shift into third gear and it totally shatters. I lost third gear but still had 1st, 2nd, 4th, and 5th gears. There were the usual marble noises in the tranny. I was dejected. But I was determined to run the car in the race no matter what. I just wanted to gain the 80 points for 4th place and solidify my hold on second place in the series. I will get those points if the car will finish half of the race. I did not even bother to qualify and waited for the race to preserve the car.

The cars grid and all of them take off on the track. Mine was the last car to leave. I decided to keep the car in 4th gear and not shift out of 4th. I had a feeling that if I shift out of 4th I would not be able to shift back into it. And my feeling was right on, just read to the very end.

I start counting the laps on my hotlapper, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th. Damn, the car was still running. I was doing approx. 2:30 per lap taking it easy. I saw Tom and Jared, and Rob lap me. I just waived them through as I did everyone else. After lap 5 (half the race), I pick up the pace and bring the times down to around 2:20. White flag, the final lap. Damn, I am going to finish. That was my last and fastest lap at 2:16. Paule was coming to lpa me again, so I jusr floored it on the back straight to tease him, then I let him pass. Throughout the entire race my brother and a few others were waving from the balcony and I was waving back.

I take the checkered flag, do the cool down lap and enter the pits. It was too slow to keep the car in 4th at the pit wall, so I shift out of 4th and I hear loud metal noises. I could not shift into any other gear. I wave at Jude and Shannon and they run and push the car to its final stop. Jude was yelling at me "I am so proud of you, I am so proud of you." I was ecstatic. I was so happy with this finish. Jude then tells me that I finished 3rd since Rob's car DNFed due to axle problems. So I get a plaque and 85 points. I now have a total of 345 points and 2nd place in the series seems to be secure. Jared has 170 points in 3rd place.

Things that need to be done:
* We need to build a good strong tranny. There must be a good solution to stop this tranny carnage. I will order a used tranny from car-part.com, open it up, get the gears cyotreated and shot peened, install the quaife uint and put the tranny back together.
* I will be running my open differential 98 tranny in the menatime. I will remove the ACT Xtreme plate and I hope that will help ease the stress on the tranny. I will most likely use a JWT PP and 2000 Sentra SE clutch.
* I will be installing a JUN UL flywheel.
* I need to make it to the grid on time :-)

Naji...Broken Tranny Racing