[Fot] COTA- Race Report

[Bob Kramer]

Walt

The attendees really appreciated your rendition of the National Anthem. I
could hear the hand clapping up and down the garages. Great job!

Bob Kramer


On Tue, Nov 10, 2020 at 2:37 PM Walt Hollowell via Fot <fot at autox.team.net>
wrote:

> Just got back from a successful race weekend at Circuit of the Americas. I
> raced my 1970 TR6 with no mechanical issues whatsoever. The weather was a
> perfect upper 70s to mid 80s all weekend. SVRA placed me in Group 8 GT
> while I would have preferred to be in Group 3 where other British car
> racers I have competed with were. My wife was with me as my umbrella girl
> and two of my grown children were there to pit crew for me. I found that
> the best starting tire pressures on my Hoosier TDs were 26 front and 24
> rear. I set my 123 ignition at 32 degrees maximum advance while I normally
> set it at 36 where I live at 5,000 above sea level. I ran all three
> practice sessions on Thursday the 6th to learn the track. Friday I ran
> with 41 cars in my group for the two practice races. Within my Group 8 GT
> class there were only a few cars which some broke and one crashed out so by
> the Saturday feature race it was just me so I won my class by default. Same
> thing on Sunday. I kept my revs down to 6K so I would survive the weekend.
> My best lap time was 2.527 which is respectable for me. The long straight
> is impressive and you really get going a fast top speed. I kept driving
> deeper into the braking zone but I was probably on the conservative side.
> On Sunday I performed a rendition the National Anthem on my trumpet that
> Chris Botti gave me over the public address system for the crowd and it was
> a big hit. Sunday afternoon I ran the one hour long Endurance race solo
> with one pit stop to check tires, fluids and add fuel. My two children did
> a great job of the pit stop. 36 cars of all Groups and classes ran the
> Endurance race which made things interesting while I was watching my
> mirrors for superfast cars to blast past me such as me such as a Ford GT,
> Lolas, Vipers and Cobras. I had planned on running modest lap times during
> the Enduro but the red mist hit me and I had an awesome dice the last four
> laps with a very fast Porsche 356 driven by a father/daughter team. We were
> side by side through the esses and I could pull a little ahead on the main
> straight away but on the sweepers we were side by side waiting for the
> other driver to miss a shift or get a little bit loose but neither one of
> us slipped up. Going into the last corner (#20) of the last lap we were
> still side by side with me on the inside. We both drifted through the 90
> degree left hander with less then 4 inches between our cars and the Porsche
> went pretty wide over the second white line. We crossed the finish so dead
> even I honestly don’t know which of us broke the electronic beam first but
> neither one of us cared. I have mixed feelings about SVRA. During the
> feature race on Saturday a BMW 2002 passed me dragging it’s entire exhaust
> system which was kicking up sparks and debris. I kept pointing it out to
> the corner marshals for the last two laps but he was never flagged. Also,
> $550 for the practice day and another $550 for the Endurance seem expensive
> but I guess that’s the price in the big leagues. The COTA track is awesome
> and I’m I  can say I have raced there. Overall I had a great weekend.
>
> I have lots of pictures and GoPro videos to download and edit over the
> next few days. That will be fun.
>
> Walter Hollowell
>
> Albuquerque, New Mexico
>
>
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