Everything was coming together to make Road Atlanta great! Tires were mounted, tow hooks installed, battery shutoff working right, new steering rack, brand new Sparco seat/harness, a healthy motor, and a real alignment! To add to the fun, at the start of the week, I had to get a tetanus shot. My shoulder was super sore, and then the night before we leave, I get a fever of 100.4! Yay side-effects! Sleeping was really challenging... Luckily, I woke up 3 hours later at 3:30AM and left for Atlanta, remarkably feeling no ill effects!
After arriving and unloading the car, we had a few things to just clean up, then it was off to tech. StreetWise was stepping up their game in tech and each car was put through the most extensive inspection I've ever seen. We came up short, having no working wipers (always used RainX), my wiring they wanted some adjustment to, and the rear cage design modified. They said I could compete this round, but by Palm Beach, we had to be 100% legit.
The next morning we head out for practice and first run I throw her in hard!!!! Ooops.... I guess we are faster now with this new power, and we ended up in the clay, but no harm done, just a little dirt. Second run was amazing! The car felt right at home and I still am being amazed at how awesome this motor is. The course went from challenging to just pure fun since the last time I was here! I felt I could put the car anywhere I wanted and it showed. ASD owners Ian and Dave, ForumlaD's Andy Luk, and Mike from Nexen were all happy with my drifting! I was constantly getting props on most every aspect of the runs, from smoke, line, angle, and speed. The only place I was suffering was the entries. I still cannot get a good feel with the handbrake setup I have. Its really starting to show when everything else is spot on, and the entries are not always where they could be. We will work on this as budget permits; it basically needs replaced and right now, I have to focus on getting to events and just working around the issue best I can.
Qualifying went pretty well. My first run we had a great entry, the steering bound up and I had to wait for it, causing me to straighen a second. I still had a score, but I knew I could do better. To avoid having another bind up, I entered a little slower and a little less aggressive. I had a really clean run, but again, not the entry I want. We ended up 8th qualifier and I know it had a lot to do with the entry being slower and less dramatic, but I am satisfied enough, I will battle my way up! Here is the qualifying run, you can see the more 'careful' entry I used due to the binding the previous run.
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| Top16 - Florida had 9 spots! |
Top16 I am against Fello Ambivero, a BMW driver and friend from Floirda. We drove the Stunt Wars demo together last month even. I lead first and am hitting all my marks. In the horseshoe he cuts inside (offline) and is nearly passing me. I know I'm going to shut him down at the clipping point, and yet I STILL managed to worry about it, and I turned my head to see where he was- looked back up and was about to hit the clipping point, which sent me offline and in a struggle to keep drift we bobbled and spun....
Only my 2nd spin of the day, and the other was the first run of the weekend. I couldn't believe my BEST section, the downhill, was where I messed up. I drove my follow run and there was something wrong with his car, slowing on the straight- I remember lifting and coasting behind him. He got it in gear and jumped a car length away and I never got it back. Horseshoe again he was inside and I was on the correct line, which made me lose more distance. He didn't make any major errors to counter my spin and I was out of the competition.
I took this loss really hard because not only was I feeling great about the car and the track, but because I broke a simple principle of tandem drifting- NEVER LOOK BACK. I knew better, and I still did it. I felt I could have won here.
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| Practice Snapshot! |
The next day was FormulaD Pro competition and in the morning, my car was moved to the front of the Pro paddock with the NOS Energy display. This location probably gave us more exposure than the whole day of competition! It was great to be up in the mix and part of the event still. We left the car there all day until after the Finals were done.
Next round for SWD is at Palm Beach on June 3/4. Before that, we are hitting up XDC Round 3 here in Orlando, FL- going up against some of the stiffest competition I have ever faced...
There are more bonus pictures below for you to enjoy!
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