EVENT IS GO! Test&Tune - Sat April 19th - Pellissippi State

[John Brown]

Good FUN today!
Most fun car I drove today.. Curts STR MX5, Fastest car.. Marcus's STR Miata on Toyos.. Worst car of the day.. MY car on BFG's..

I cant wait to get my STR MX5 prepped for class.. that car seems very easy to drive!
BIG thanks to Harp! Course was technical enuff but had some speed sections.. good job!

[steverife]

I had a good time today. I think I gained some confidence in the car, so that is good.

[CABoegemann]

That was fun! Excellent event Chris! I needed a test and tune... At least I won't have to guess at a set up for Bristol. Can't wait!

[Scoob]

Another good course and a good test-n-tune. Exactly what I needed before the DC Pro next weekend (also on asphalt). I made it down to the 59s so I was pretty happy. And I finally got to drive the Geo, so a big thumbs up for the day. Exhausted after that and TKD demo at the mall for 2 hours right after getting home. Happy Easter.

[flier129]

Big thanks to Harp for putting this together for us. The course was great as well, a few technical spots but they weren't painful and some fast sections too. If we could do events like this twice a year that would be awesome.

I only got one run in without a passenger and I easily got into the 67s..... I even did the starting slalom backwards lol. It was really fun to help out Andrew and Jeff in their turbo miatas, driving their cars was also a plus. One car had oversteer issues on throttle.... the other wouldn't rotate on throttle anymore than my old 94' car did Always cool to see people improve.

The more I drive the toyos, the more I like them. I hope I can do a back-to-back comparison of the 195 toyos vs the 225 kooks. The kooks will win, but the extra 2 inches of wheel is a huge factor. Never the less, I'd like to know the difference.

Confirmed...... rivals do not work on JB's car. My 225 rivals on the 15x9s didn't behave half as bad as his car did the one run I got in it. I still say they favor heavier cars, anything sub 2600lbs will do better on dunlops, kooks, or toyos.....unless you're at that one lot in TX where they did all those tests with them

[jcox07]

It was a good day and I learned a few more things about what the mustang likes at pelli vs. the national courses. Putting it back to pelli specs got me down to a 64.1xx with Jed in the car, it may be that Jed has to ride with me to balance out the load...lol A fun day and glad for the good weather to help make this a success.

[steverife]

I'd definitely would like to see this once or twice a year. My only operational quip is that I'd like to see a grid worker, so you don't have to spend all day in line. Maybe do like they do at Nationals T&T and walk up an down the grid spaces and send you if you are ready.

Anyway, I had a lot of fun driving. I think I have more fun in a T&T environment just chasing times than any official event. Thanks to JB and Marcus and Curt for giving me a benchmark. I'm not super happy with the car's handling and a little confused about tires, but I got some confidence driving. I'm looking forward to Bristol and Atlanta.

Oh, and the first slalom was crazy fun.

[Jek]

I still say they favor heavier cars, anything sub 2600lbs will do better on dunlops, kooks, or toyos....

You callin' my BMW fat?!?

I had a really good time Saturday, thanks to Chris for putting it together and everyone who let me flog their cars for a run. Jim's Cobra is a blast, first car I've ever driven on purple crack, but man those manual brakes take some getting used to. I finally got to drive Steve's CRX after folding myself like an accordion, and I can totally see why people love STS prepped CRX's...so much fun to drive! Also the exhaust sound makes me into an instant ricer, I love it. Geo is way more fun with the extra tire but still tries to kill you as expected.

It was the first time I've actually gotten completely lost on course in years, but I only did one course walk so oh well. I'm like "Jed where the f*** do I go" and he's like "I have no f***ing clue dude" (he didn't walk the course or anything and it was only his 2nd ride along). I decided to say screw it and just finish the course, but then realized the previous person might still be on the top half of the course, so I just had a nice leisurely pit stop going up the hill...made for some good laughs I'm sure

[thrdeye]

I was surprised at how few runs some folks said they took. I wasn't even trying to run and I got 4.... in borrowed cars.

[jcox07]

Yeah I only took 5 but could have taken more, but I found out what I needed to know after my 4th run and 5th run just proved what I found, so no need in running the ho hos any more than that. I did see some cars that took a lot of runs and I think they liked being able to do that. So all in all it was a good day for all except JB on the bfg's, he looked scary loose all the time unless the car was going in a straight line. It was fun to watch just how each car did and know what tires they were on to see if what they were running would translate at all to my car on streets, not that I will run it on streets but my car may have some one driving it on streets in the near future.

[steverife]

The line sucked. No one did this on purpose, but as I was in line I saw people take a run, come back, park in a space closer to the trailer, get out, talk for a bit, then get back in the car and someone would let them back in line.... in front of the people still waiting.

I don't think we'd get any more runs with a grid guy, but it would be more enjoyable and people wouldn't feel like they HAD to get back in line immediately.

[thrdeye]

That's cool. I think we'd have enough workers.

[thrdeye]

Yeah I only took 5 but could have taken more, but I found out what I needed to know after my 4th run and 5th run just proved what I found, so no need in running the ho hos any more than that. I did see some cars that took a lot of runs and I think they liked being able to do that. So all in all it was a good day for all except JB on the bfg's, he looked scary loose all the time unless the car was going in a straight line. It was fun to watch just how each car did and know what tires they were on to see if what they were running would translate at all to my car on streets, not that I will run it on streets but my car may have some one driving it on streets in the near future.

A long time ago, some autocross Buddha told me that you can't just throw different tires on a car and expect them to work without some setup changes.

[steverife]

Testing is so hard.

I still can't figure out if I need to go 2 or 4 tires for my car and if really dead rear tires help me or hurt me.

[John Brown]

Yeah I only took 5 but could have taken more, but I found out what I needed to know after my 4th run and 5th run just proved what I found, so no need in running the ho hos any more than that. I did see some cars that took a lot of runs and I think they liked being able to do that. So all in all it was a good day for all except JB on the bfg's, he looked scary loose all the time unless the car was going in a straight line. It was fun to watch just how each car did and know what tires they were on to see if what they were running would translate at all to my car on streets, not that I will run it on streets but my car may have some one driving it on streets in the near future.

A long time ago, some autocross Buddha told me that you can't just throw different tires on a car and expect them to work without some setup changes.

where is that "BUDDA" today? and how much ST experience does he have. Set up from tire to tire is good for .5-.7 seconds...maybe. NOT 2.0 seconds on a 65 sec course. If that was true.. I could run these shit tires in CSP with the proper setup. There IS a reason NOBODY is winning on the NEW and IMPROVED 200 tires in light car classes. But its all good.. Ill go to STR next year where the tires don't feel so God awful.. and when you have NEVER experienced the Golden tire.. then you are not so disappointed.
On the line thing.. I did notice a few drivers doing what Steve mentioned.. I always got back in line where I came off.. but once and I swapped cars at that time.
The display was impossible to see when the line got long.