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For Autocross fans. Show your stuff!

The 2024 Autocross season in the PNW is well under way. I skipped the first 2 local events due to cold, rainy conditions that were forecast. The forecast was correct. I could have raced in 45 degree temperatures with rain coming down on me while doing my course work assignment. Somehow, that just didn't appeal to me, even after waiting over 4 months to get back behind the wheel.

One of the local clubs I am a member of kicked off their season with a driver's clinic Saturday and a points event on Sunday. The driver's clinic is for people new to Autocross and those that are fairly new to the sport and are looking for some seat time with an instructor to hone their skills. It was perfect weather both days. 60-70 degrees F, depending on the time of day. The clinic had much lower turn out this year. The event is capped at 40 students with 20 instructors. 2 students per instructor. There were 3 driving schools within a 100 mile radius the same weekend. We ended up with 21 students. They all got their own instructor for the entire day. One of our members here brought his 245 out to the driver's clinic. He started running with the club last season. He was driving very well Saturday during the clinic and Sunday during competition runs. Daisywagen is his user name one here.

Daisywagen, clinic and competition photos.
Saturday clinic

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Sunday competition.

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Other student's cars at the clinic.

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A couple of shots of my car a photographer took during Sunday's competition.

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A quick trip around the course during Sunday's competition. I didn't bother with the Advan A052s for the first event. I'm on Michelin PS4S street tires. They are a bit noisy when at their limit of grip.

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You workin' that stang! I love your more wide open track layout. We had to use a very tight course. Not well suited for the Volvo. Better for the Miata and Mini drivers that were digging it.
 
2manyturbos said:
It is a Factory Five replica. Still, a very cool car and built close to the specs of the original Daytona Coupes. Another one the same color runs with a different club I race with in central Oregon.
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Yeah, i know them quite well and drool allover the pictures and videos of the beauties :D
 
I just signed up for my first autocross weekend. In a few weeks I'm doing solo school on Saturday and the event on Sunday in the 945 :cool: I'm nervous but super excited!
 
threewagons said:
I just signed up for my first autocross weekend. In a few weeks I'm doing solo school on Saturday and the event on Sunday in the 945 :cool: I'm nervous but super excited!
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Cool. That's the way to do it if you have never Autocrossed before. The school ahead of the event will give you plenty of tips how to drive fast consistently. It's much better to start out developing good habits.
 
Emerald Empire Sports Car Club held their first points events of this season last weekend. One of the members here learned about the club when he stopped by for parts for his 1994 940 Turbo wagon. He expressed interest in Autocrossing so I invited him to join me Saturday and ride along to see what it is all about. Bam, hooked. He came back Sunday with his car and ran his first Autocross. Now, he is talking mods to make the car more suited to Autocross and track events. CheetoB230FT is his user name on here.

Saturday was wet, wet, wet. Steady rain all day long. The FWD cars ruled the day. It was more of a car control day than a typical let it all hang out Autocross day.

Cheeto's first ride at an Autocross. Trying to stay planted in his seat.

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Saturday's course without looking at the back of a helmet.

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Sunday's course was Saturday's course run in the opposite direction. The pavement was much drier Sunday. I could actually put some power down and drive the car like it was meant to be driven. I was in the 3rd run group that started their runs about 1:45 PM. By the time the 4th run group ran the pavement was almost completely dry. Their times were ~ 1 second quicker than the average during earlier sessions.

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CheetoB230FT, his very clean 940 Turbo and a pic of him with has lady friend that came out to the event and rode along in some intense all out race cars. She's a brave one.

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CheetoB230FT on course. He picked DDO as his class because you can do almost anything with your car. It's a class created by some members of our club that wanted the freedom to do any mods they wanted on their Daily Driver cars. Thus, DDO, Daily Driver Over. About the only requirement is that it has to be able to be street driven and has to have interior.

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I keep missing the local events for a variety of reasons.

Well, one was cancelled (they repaved the venue, actually a very good thing!).
Then busy doing other stuff the next two events.

My Miata is in the 'XB' class, which sounds about like DDO. Pretty wide open as long as it's still street legal (more or less). Mine has a few 'innocent' mods push it way out of all of the other classes and into the 'anything goes' XB. But I just have slightly larger brakes, an aftermarket ECU (and I'm not making 400 hp with it, although I guess I could). Ah well, it's just for fun.

I think the ECU by itself is enough to push me bast all the street classes and into XB.
 
JohnMc said:
I keep missing the local events for a variety of reasons.

Well, one was cancelled (they repaved the venue, actually a very good thing!).
Then busy doing other stuff the next two events.

My Miata is in the 'XB' class, which sounds about like DDO. Pretty wide open as long as it's still street legal (more or less). Mine has a few 'innocent' mods push it way out of all of the other classes and into the 'anything goes' XB. But I just have slightly larger brakes, an aftermarket ECU (and I'm not making 400 hp with it, although I guess I could). Ah well, it's just for fun.

I think the ECU by itself is enough to push me bast all the street classes and into XB.
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XB is the Wild, Wild West as far as classes are concerned. All CheetoB230FT has is an IPD Turbo cam. That alone puts him in a Prepared class. It's really irrelevant because there is no class a Volvo 940 Turbo is going to be competitive in. It will all be for fun. He bought Motul RBF 600 yesterday so he can avoid boiling brake fluid at an event.
 
I should bring my PV to an event. Maybe enter it in the 'FUN' class. I don't think that's an actual SCCA class, but it's just for non-competitive 'run what you brung' stuff.
 
When I gave it a few tries long ago. I told them my car has a cam. They still put me in a stock type class because they knew my Volvo wasn't going to be challenging anyone. I think they put me in D stock.
 
Had a blast at the Saturday school! We did a mini-event at the end of the day and I beat a bunch of Miatas, a BRZ and a new ZL1 Camaro on raw time :cool: Not bad for a 30 year old brick

Please critique my best run of the day!
 
The event on Sunday was huge, almost 200 entries. I was the second to last driver in the last heat, we finished up at about 4:30 🙃 Got some good runs in and improved every run!

A few thoughts:
  • I need some 200TWs. I'm running Pilot Sport All Season 4s currently. For 540tw all seasons, they did their job admirably. They give a good audible warning when losing grip, they were very predictable and never surprised me.
  • I need more power off the line. I may swap turbine wheels and/or compressor wheel to be able build some more boost when I load it up at the start.
  • You have to work the wheel SO much in this car, you have to feed it a lot in sharp corners. Perhaps 200TWs would help this a bit? I would consider QSRCs as long as it wouldn't prematurely wear the rack or pump.
  • Power steering fluid gets a little foamy by the end of a run. It's fine if it has a few minutes to cool before runs, but it gets pretty noisy if you run back to back.
  • This car would need a lot more modifications to be competitive in XA :lol:

I decided to send it hard on my last run and ended up improving by 7 tenths, despite having a sloppy slalom section. I think I could shave off another second with some more practice.

Here's the video from my best run:

And
 
Managed to get out to autox on Sunday at the evergreen aviation & space museum parking lot. I wasn’t dead last this time, ended up only a tenth behind an Audi R8 (he was probably having an off day). Anyway best run, sorry for the crappy sound, learned I need to sock the mic in the wind.


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Daisywagen said:
Managed to get out to autox on Sunday at the evergreen aviation & space museum parking lot. I wasn’t dead last this time, ended up only a tenth behind an Audi R8 (he was probably having an off day). Anyway best run, sorry for the crappy sound, learned I need to sock the mic in the wind.


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Your best run was a 38.510. That is impressive. Good job.
 
threewagons said:
The event on Sunday was huge, almost 200 entries. I was the second to last driver in the last heat, we finished up at about 4:30 🙃 Got some good runs in and improved every run!

A few thoughts:
  • I need some 200TWs. I'm running Pilot Sport All Season 4s currently. For 540tw all seasons, they did their job admirably. They give a good audible warning when losing grip, they were very predictable and never surprised me.
  • I need more power off the line. I may swap turbine wheels and/or compressor wheel to be able build some more boost when I load it up at the start.
  • You have to work the wheel SO much in this car, you have to feed it a lot in sharp corners. Perhaps 200TWs would help this a bit? I would consider QSRCs as long as it wouldn't prematurely wear the rack or pump.
  • Power steering fluid gets a little foamy by the end of a run. It's fine if it has a few minutes to cool before runs, but it gets pretty noisy if you run back to back.
  • This car would need a lot more modifications to be competitive in XA :lol:

I decided to send it hard on my last run and ended up improving by 7 tenths, despite having a sloppy slalom section. I think I could shave off another second with some more practice.

Here's the video from my best run:

And
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For your first time Autocrossing you did very well. You're not afraid of the right pedal. 200TW tires would help with the run times. I have run on Pilot Sport AS 4S tires in my BMW 335I and as you said, they are very predictable and precise for a street tire. Your seating position is good as is your hand position. You don't let the wheel spin through your hands to catch up which is a very good driving habit to maintain. You always had a grip on the wheel. I'm not sure what you were told during the school session, however, what we tell new drivers is turn early, then adjust. You are a bit late everywhere. It snowballs when you get into the slalom where you are barely making it around the cone by the 3rd/4th cone. As you get more comfortable and build up speed on course it will get really difficult to keep from knocking down cones in the slalom. Especially, if the course designer offsets a cone or changes the spacing. At the schools they will teach you to keep it tight. What you have to realize is that is a generalization. It works great for low polar moment, short wheel base cars like a Miata, Porsche Cayman, Mini Cooper etc. For your high polar moment, long wheel base Volvo planning on at least 2 elements at a time is essential. Sometimes, a little wide coming into a corner will allow you to cut back in quicker to get in position for the next element. IOW, 3 moves ahead is the key so you aren't having to use so much steering angle. It will slow down the steering inputs required and quicken your run times. It takes a lot of practice and experimentation. Watch the fastest drivers at each event and pay attention to their approach to each section. It your case, pick RWD cars to watch because the initial set up to each element changes depending on the car and driver. Experiment. Don't worry too much about the time you are running. For most people that makes them overdrive the car. Concern yourself with learning what keeps the car most composed while pushing it hard. I learned a lot over the years by just watching a few National champions that ran with the same clubs I ran with. They always looked like they were out for a Sunday drive. Super smooth, almost no tire squeal. They actually seemed like they were driving slow until you heard the announce say their time.
 
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This weekend there were 2 different clubs running their events at Evergreen Aviation in McMinnvile, OR. BCA hosted the event Saturday and WMC hosted the event on Sunday. Great courses that were quite different both days. Saturday's course was a bit more technical. That's where my Mustang and I do best against the competition. Sunday was more of a wide open course, which is a real departure for WMC. They are known for really tight, technical courses. My data logging equipment was not connecting to the GPS Sunday so I was only able to get one video. I flipped the tires front to back 2 events ago to get the last bit of life out of them. That is what concerned me about Sunday's course. It was a power course. The grip in the rear is nowhere near as good as the fronts at this point. I found their limit at he corner the high horsepower cars were spinning on during the morning session. It is off camber right where you have to tighten up the sweeper before heading across the lot. I went in a bit faster than the previous run and the GT started to go around backwards. You can see the corner worker start to run. That's never a welcome sight when you are the car causing them to run. Anyway, I got it straighted back up immediately and only missed a gate. I did take it a bit easier after that run. I had just been working a deal on a new set of tires with America's Tire on Friday. I'll probably pull the trigger today and get them on their way here.

Saturday's course with BCA. I PAXed 11th at this event running with a tough crowd.

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Sunday's course with WMC. This is the same event Daisywagen run. He ran the morning session. I ran in the afternoon session. My best time was a 34.300 second run. I placed 7th in PAX at this event.


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