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| Race Results |
| Date: Frirday 10/14/05 Time: 7:30 pm Place: RCR Speedway Attendees: Jim, Tim, Mike, Paul, Danny, Mark, Gene What a fun start to a new season point series! Thanks everybody for a really fun race! Tim made good on his prediction to win as he swept club stock and super stock for two first place finishes. Congratulations, Tim! Mike and I joined Tim on the podium for club stock and super stock, each taking turns with a second and third place finish. The club stock race featured a really close finish where Mike, Mark and I all finished with 160 laps and finish placement was decided by fractions of a lap! Special thanks to Paul for taking over some race director duties and getting us going�we�d probably still be practicing for club stock. J Gene registered the highest reading on the excitement meter�you could have picked him off the ceiling, he was so happy with his re-introduction to HO. Gene has some prior scale auto modeling experience and it showed as he produced some very fine race bodies. Unfortunately, some tech width issues presented him from racing the new bodies. Danny showed off his new IROC cars (looked like 427 Cobra�s to me). I had to actually touch them to believe that they were made out of Lexan. Good job! Both Gene and Danny are ramping up rather quickly to club racing. They are also becoming acquainted with some obstacles such as body posts that won�t stay on, too much black max in the body posts and other short-term challenges. Lessons learned�An especially important aspect of this hobby is learning from each performance and making the necessary adjustments to improve the next performance. Here are some of my observations and suggestions: 1. Start with the winner�observe the overall totals for club stock and super stock and lap totals per lane. Look at Tim�s best times per lane. Anything special about how he drove the race? I noticed that he was really relaxed and consistent. He was not making the fastest laps but he was making very fast laps and STAYING ON! I spoke with him after the race and learned that consistency was a conscious part of his strategy. For later follow-up, you may wish to find out what configuration Tim was running. Documenting the winner�s configuration can be very instructive. 2. Keep track of yourself�what were your lap totals? What were the lap totals per lane. You will notice that the high bar is set in the low and middle 40�s per lane. The important thing is to see where your lap totals are and to plan to compete against your previous totals at the next RCR race. 3. Keep a log and document your setups and include notes on what worked and didn�t work. For example, in the tune-up race, my axle retention clip broke and I had trouble keeping my axle in place. For last night�s race, I had a new axle clip for both of the cars that I raced. 4. Look at the support aspect of your racing�were you organized and prepared? Did your race box setup work or was it hard to find what you needed? 5. Cars�what worked and what didn�t? Were your cars fast enough? How did they handle? How does your setup compare to the race winner�s? 6. Driving�were you comfortable and effective driving the car? Did the car feel planted enough? Too loose? Too bogged down? Were your controller settings effective? Did you have adequate control over your car? You get the idea�strategy is an important part of race preparation and is based at least in part on what worked and what didn�t at the last race. Now, on to the next race! Spyder Speedway poses different setup requirements than RCR and presents a different kind of challenge. You can bet that Tim is no longer basking in the glory of his double victory but has already set his sights on Spyder Speedway. - Jim |
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