CART Track Day, Write Up,

[ldstang50]

Last Friday May 29th, CART held another track day but this time at Lightning Circuit, part of New Jersey Motorsports Park. This was CARTs first time at this brand new, beautiful venue. The course is 1.9mi long, has two elevation changes a few blind apex blind exit corners and a corner called The Lightbulb very similar to the bowl in the Nurburgring. We shared the day with the Aston Martin Owners Club. The 6 cars that showed up with their club easily out did all the cars that showed up for CART (32) in terms of total value. One being a former 2nd place finisher in the Targa Florio in 1961(driven by Phil Hill) and another being a DB9(???) race car. Of the CART cars that were there Nick in his quick SM2 Z, a 500+whp 3000lb Z06, another Nismo Z, and a slew of Evo's including a modded BSP Evo X and a 400whp underbodied BP Evo. The course itself has a half mile long front straight which ends with a blind apex, blind exit right hand corner. The apex is just over the crest of a hill. This is a very unnerving corner because of speed. Its a short straight before a series of corners comes up. If you screw up any part of these corners you just blew your lap. The first is a sweeping right hander than you can carry much more speed through than you think, you run your exit wide to late apex another right hander, just after apexing the 2nd right you turn left which leads you into a slight right hand bend. This bend is tricky as you can carry a lot of speed into and through it. It climbs up hill and apexes down the other side. Right when it starts going up hill you want to be all the way to the left, but already turning. The car will be understeering, once it hits the uphill, the car will bite and turn in, feather the gas over the uphill, then once you apex, full throttle to the 2nd longest straight, stay right as you pass under the bridge, then its hard on the binders for a left hand 90 deg corner. Apex normally, carry speed and pull to the light bulb. I entered the light bulb straigh, braked, then got the car turned in. My car doesn't like to trail brake and rotate so all braking is done in a straight line. Stay about mid track through the light bulb, then as the track starts going down hill, turn in to the apex and feed in throttle, if you're like me and have a set of balls, as you turn in, roll all the way to full throttle, the car will bite and turn in, over the inside curbing, now as the car starts tracking out, the track flattens out, making the car understeer, I grabbed fourth here, ran the car out to midtrack, up over another rise and down the front straight. I dont' know how fast I was going, but I know I hit the rev limiter in 4th gear. On my timed runs, to carry more speed I'd grab 5th here.....and I have the HR engine.I was classed in BSP, home to the uber fast Evos. I thought I was going to have 2pc rotors and braided lines for the event, but I didn't get them on. The only thing I changed since Pocono was the pads to HP+, the Ferrodo's and HTC70 just couldnt' fit into my budget right now. So I'm a stock Z, on Hoosiers, with Stillen catback, HP+ pads

So here I am, maybe 270whp, RWD, 3500+lbs including me in the car, going against 300 and even 400+ whp Evos. One Evo was actually misclassed into BSP when it was supposed to be BP. The only way I could even think about beating these guys is if they suck and I have the drive of my life. I start my first lap of my timed run and my tires aren't up to temp but I know I clicked off a decent lap. I start my 2nd trying to carry more speed through the first corner, but my testicles haven't dropped far enough to trust the car has grip on entry, I try making up for it by carrying more speed into to, I manage 2 just fine, but don't realize I'm carrying more speed now into 3. I'm behind now, I chop the wheel to the left for turn 4 and she starts rotating.....more than I want, I feed in throttle, counter steer to a half turn and keep my eyes on my target.....THE ROAD AHEAD OF ME!!! I make her stick but realize I just blew my lap, I know I have to make up for it, I'm NOT losing to the Evo's, I want to brag a bit, my ego is getting to me. Under the bridge, hard on the binders, turn in, whoa, more speed than I thought, ok, let it carry, let it carry, there's the curb don't life, there's the grass don't lift, there's the track out cone (still don't lift) THWACK, still in the grass (still don't lift), ok back on track (life is good), shoot down into the light bulb and trip the beams.....yell and curse in helmet, I just threw it away.

Results are read at the end of the day. Fast times around this track right now are under 1:20 (80seconds). FTD went to the vette with a 72.1, supposedlly he was hitting 171 on the front staight, I'm guessing more like 155. BSP (the class I'm in) 5th place, Evo, 4th place, Evo, 3rd place, Evo, 2nd place 400whp Evo, 1st place STOCK 350z. Somehow with all my screw ups I was still able to pull out the win but by the slimmest of margins. Evo's time 76.152, my time 76.092. For those not math inclined, thats .060 seconds I won by. I know for a fact I have 2-3 seconds to pick up there, easily. I was also the 2nd fastest car there, only the z06 was faster than me. I'm happy, me in my street car took down every trailered car there besides the Z06, I was even faster than the Aston Martin race car.

Pics are as follows. I as have a vid of my timed run, but there's no sound, if you guys want I can post it.

Enjoy

Resultshttp://www.cartct.com/05-29-09.shtml

Track Map, top is front straight, travel clockwise

Cars lined up

Aston Martin racecar

500+whp z06

$2mil Aston Martin

[Bubba1]

Nice writeup. Looked like a fun time. I'm looking forward to doing 3 days at Lightning this fall. Definitely post the vid.

[spitalul2bad]

Damn! You must have some game, or those Evos had awful drivers.

The DB9R is the race version of the DB9.The Aston in the 3rd picture is a V8 Vantage-based racer, called N24.

[ZedHead]

a z06 only beat you by 4 seconds? and he was using race gas!! Thats nuts

i want to ride with and learn from you cause you are da $shh!!tt

seriously thats awesome, congrats, I bet it feels good.

[ldstang50]

Tried loading the vid last night to youtube, its too long. having a friend edit it today and will try again tonight. I forgot to turn the camera off after my timed run so the camera kept running,,,,,ooops.Another z that was there was Matt Jablonski. He has a black I think 04. Built NA engine with over 300whp. Car sounds beautiful. I need to thank him for helping me bleed my brakes 3 times during the day.

[bmike818]

[ldstang50]

Video is below, only the first 5minutes are good, sorry no sound.

http://vimeo.com/5052539