STS 2&3: the warm and the windy pt duex

[nostatic]

Day 2 (STS3), was a horse of a different sort. I was awoken at 2am by heavy rain in LA, and feared for the worst. The 5am alarm was nasty, as I'd had about 5 hours sleep, and was still pretty wiped out from the previous day. Depsite a lot of clouds on the drive, the sun was out in Willow:


As was the wind:


It was wicked cold, and the wind was blowing hard. But ya gotta do what ya gotta do. Dan representing clockwise:


Dan and Wayne (instructor) surrendering to the wind:


Bill, our new friend with a sweet GT3 pointed in the wrong direction coming out of 8:


Me working turn 9:


And me being too fast for the camera


When all was said and done, Carl went out for the first session with me in the morning, and said "you're ready to race...let me sign you off."


So I ran sessions 2 through 5 solo. For whatever reason, my fast time was in session 3, where I managed to break the 20 barrier again and get a 1:19. And this time my new nemesis (Matt, who beat me by 0.2 seconds saturday and is a really nice guy) could only manage a 1:20, so I *think* I won my class (there might have been another II car that wasn't there on Saturday though...didn't stick around for the final results.

So I'm licensed now...and the slope isn't getting any more shallow. Although I'm focusing on track time rather than mods at this point (mostly due to lack of budget).

OTR on May 11th

[Shuie]

nice job! congrats!

[drums]

Please excuse my 'newbie' inexperience. Was this a part of PCA 'Driver Education'?
I ask because it sounds like a hoot and a lot of learning how to REALLY drive.
Drums

[911]

Todd,

Nice to meet you today (finally). Yes, you did win your class! Congrats. I went to the awards' ceremony and they read your name for winning II.

[nostatic]

Drums, no this is POC (Porsche Owners Club: http://www.porscheownersclub.com). They are more focused on racing than PCA (at least in SoCal). The STS series is their entry into racing, and has a school day that happens twice a year. If you want to learn what your car can do, I highly recommend doing the STS school and at least one event. Very safe, good instruction, and an eye-opening experience.

Rich, good to meet you too. Good to hear I managed to hold off the other SCs. I'm sure Matt will be gunning for me in June, and if Jackie (or Diane) decides to run (she had last year's track record), I'll have to hustle to stay in the running.

One interesting thing about Saturday: evidently the track was *very* fast. My 1:19 would have beated last year's CCW POC track record for my class. In *16* classes, new track records were set on Saturday. Sunday with the wind and the rain greening the track, it wasn't as fast (plus clockwise is evidently a hair slower than CCW).

[911]

Todd,

Generally speaking, running the Streets CCW is about 1 second quicker than going in the other direction. Fyi.

[nostatic]

that doesn't surprise me. I was thinking over the course last night and that run downhill onto the main straight should be good for a few tenths. Plus the chicane seems easier to nail running CCW. the Bump in 4 comes into play a lot more running CCW though, although I was running a really tight apex to avoid it.

Damn that was fun...