Mt Wash. A drivers view (kinda long)

[Bob]

Hey all! I thought Id give my 2 cents on how the weekend went from a
drivers view... (in case anyone cares) ;-)

Got there thursday, weather was pretty nice, I settled into the hotel
and found a place in the pits.  Was sharing a spot with my two good
friends Mark besso and Matt Baldoni, both driving scirocco's... we
always have this friendly wager going as to which of the 3 of us will
win ;-)  On thursday we made a few recon runs to see how the mountain
changed over the last 2 years (Mark and I didnt make it last year). I
noticed it was a lot rougher than I remember, so my new struts may give
me problems!! They dont like washboard, especially around corners.  We
made about 3 runs total that day.

Friday: Drivers meeting at stupid o'clock in the morning. Im still on
pacific time, ugh.  We got in two half mountain runs... I got to see how
the new tires (RE 910's) will hold out in the corners. Not too bad, but
I over cooked a few corners and found its oversteering under hard
braking.  I played with tire pressures for the second run and it was a
ton better.

Saturday: Another damn drivers meeting. Im certain it was still dark
out.  Today we do two full mountain runs. However the weather was so bad
we only really did half mountain runs. They said they'd be only timing
to the halfway point, so at 4 mile I backed down a lot, I couldnt see.
Come to find out, they timed the whole thing, so my numbers were crap...
The wet road made it REAL entertaining, let me tell you!

One of the legend drivers (Ed) had a pretty bad crash. He went off the
course and went sideways into a tree bursting into flames. The cages on
those arent made for this, and the car completely collapsed, shearing
every piece of cage it had!  He broke some ribs and his wrist and got
1st and second degree burns. Thanks to one of the corner workers he was
extracted from his car. Thank god for the volunteers! When they took off
his gloves, his skin came with it, boy that must have hurt.  The final
outcome was that he will be fine though, just a bit of recovery time. I
hope hes back next year. I have pictures of the car and corner Ill be
posting later). I inspected the car with the safety steward to see if we
could figure out why it burst into flames.  The fuel line was rubber
from front to rear and sheard on impact pumping fuel onto the hot motor.
Expect to see changes to legend cars in the future...  The only
surviving piece of the car was the windshield, and all the drivers
signed it like a get well card and sent it to him.

Anyways...
Sunday: Got to sleep late this morning..Buffum gives us our pep talk at
8:30, first car off at 10am.  Weather was crap again, but showed signs
of clearing. We were advised that we will be doing 2/3rd runs (I think
5.7 miles)... Road was wet, and spots of really dense fog, but it wasnt
awful. We were right at the line though at the top, a few more corners
would have been bad!  I think I got a 6:53... Not bad, but not great.
Second run of the day, the weather was perfect, dry road, good
visibility etc... I knocked 20 something seconds off my previous time
and pulled off a 6:30. Good enough for a second in class! Second only to
our buddy Ivor, but I didnt feel too bad, I had a bone stock 4000Q and
he had a specially prepared Integra type R with twice the power of my
poor Q. I royally messed up turn 13 though and it cost me time though.
To top it all off, on that 'oops' I sheared a brake line, and of course
didnt figure that out until the next turn! It made the rest of the run
interesting and it definately cost me time. Im sure I would have had
Ivor it it werent for that. Im still kicking myself. (oh yes, the ride
down was fun too!). I would have loved to see the look on his face of
beating him with a stock 4000Q with 350K miles on it :)  Admittedly he
was nice at the mountain and we had a few good conversations... Next
year!!! :)

I think I was 8 or 9 seconds behind him, not terrible I guess. Next
behind me was 25 seconds... and I think I was a full 30 seconds faster
than any other 4000 on the mountain, including the turbo 4kq, besides
john kemps that is.. :)

Awards ceremony was Ok. I wound up with a cool glass dish for 2nd in
class, and a nice check from AoA :)  Hey, its about time, Ive been
writing them checks for years!!

Ill be posting the in-car footage in the next couple of days...

Special thanks to Mr Royal... He graciously opened up his home to us the
night before so we could get a head start to the mountain.

Bob