Hmm, not much reportage on the Peru Pro, so I guess I'll fill the gap
somewhat:
Weather: Cold, some drizzle, but track surface dry after Friday (practice
starts in the wet) Some sunny breaks Sunday
Hoosier people seemed to be hating life a little, as cold Hoosiers don't
seem to work as well as cold Kumhos.
Course very tough, some fast sections where power helped, but lots of cones
struck, smashed, mashed, or even sliced in two.
The Chicago boxen in the front section turned out to have a freak property
where certain cars in certain circumstances could spin though the box and
cross into the other lane. We got a warning about it on Sat. after a near
miss, but then we paid full price Sunday when 2 Neons had a coming
together. Nobody hurt, but a rear suspension bent pretty badly. This
followed by 2 or 3 more near misses.
To be honest, I'm having a hard time pointing a finger of blame here. I
don't blame the course designer - the sections appeared to be well
separated, and there was nothing that (to me, at least) suggested a
problem. We had probably 50 people on site who are registered Safety
Stewards (including myself) and none of us saw fit to do anything about the
course. Neither, for that matter, did any of the other 220 drivers,
although I heard more than a few bitching.
in 20/20 hindsight, the course should have been reconfigured after the
first incident on Sat AM. It happened early enough in the day that only a
few classes would have been afftected, and it might have saved some folks
some body work. But I'm having a very hard time fingering a single
individual with the responsibility of making that decision when 220 people
were perfectly content to take their chances with the course as it stood.
And this _is_ an auto racing sport after all. While the SCCA tries very,
very hard to reduce all the risks involved, this ain't lawn bowling.
Sometimes, stuff is going to happen.
If I had the weekend to do over again, after the first incident I'd go find
a bunch of other safety steward types (ones whose certifications are more
than a month old) and taken that group to go get the course changed, now
that a problem had been unequivicably identified. I guess I'm a little
disappointed in myself and everyone else who was there that nobody tried to
get the situation rectified. But I certainly don't think there's any need
for any more rules making or hand wringing. We all got a warning, we all
failed to respond, and so we wound up with an accident that was, IMHO,
preventable. Case closed, and we'll all just have to do better next time.
SM had a good turnout, although we lost one to engine failure before the
event started. Kent stole the win from me on his last freakin' run. Phooey!
But the whole class had good, close competition. SM is a fun place to be.
We've certainly got the trash talking down pat. And we have the Kone King!
- Jamey Abersold, who was killing 'em in batches of 6 at a time.
My new turbo works nice too. :)
Tunnell laid some serious smack down on ESP, but I don't think it's
entirely representative, and some of the better ESP "big iron" cars were
struggling with tire heat issues. Had it been a few degrees warmer, or if a
certain Mustang had been on Kumhos, it'd've been a different race. Good
driving on the part of Brian Fitzpatrick though.
And speaking of Kumho, look at DS, and see and phear Steve Couture and John
Tak in a Kumho-shod Neon! Hark! Do I hear a paradigm shifting?
Overall, a good, fun event. Aside from the course issue, and the slow
posting of results (don't know what happened there) one of the better Pros
I've attended.
DG
|