Things are starting to take shape as competitors gather at the Holiday Inn in South Bend, Indiana.

Uh oh. They have four jackstands. We only have two.

If spoiler size is directly proportional to speed, we’re in trouble.

Just another 911 Turbo. Where are the slow cars??

Not exactly a slow car but Andrew Firestone from “The Bachelor” fame is driving it. Hopefully, he isn’t much more than a pretty face.

Hey, at least we’re good at putting on stickers.  The other side is a bit more crooked unfortunately.  Let’s ignore that side of the car for now.

A racing accident on the first day?  Nah, I just backed into a well camouflaged fire hydrant.  Dammit.

“Are you saying that the wet skidpad test is worth the same number of points as a race day at a road course?  But it’s just a silly circle?”



This might be a still photo, but the car wasn’t much faster in real life.  According to the stopwatch, it only pulled a 0.65G, placing it just behind a Pontiac Sunfire rental car.  Why so slow?  Because the super-tight aftermarket front and rear differentials that work like magic at high speeds on dry surfaces work terribly in the wet when circling a 200 foot skidpad at 35mph.  Placing a miserable 71 out of 79 and taking a huge point deficit, it would appear that we have some serious catching up to do during the week.  Needless to say, we’re not off to a good start.  Boo hoo.

Still feeling dejected from our freshmen event at the Tire Rack, we pack up our trailor and hit the road.  Only 600 miles to go to Heartland Park.  Our spirits were low.  The only thing worse than could happen to us at this point was for those 30 gallons of race fuel to spontaneously ignite.

The typical state of our cockpit.  Mountain Dew and Slim Jims abound!

Offering just 15mpg while towing the trailer, our little red rolling fire hazard needs to make plenty of fuel stops along the way.

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