8/9/02 A track event, but with a difference. This one is the Cascade Sports Car Club racing school. It involves 4 hours of classroom before the event, and the event itself is geared towards getting people ready to race at club level. Yes, I'm seriously considering it, enough to apply for a license...

I was going to bring the Westie, but the motor is not right and the rollbar is not done, so the Elise got the backup duty again. Did I mention it's good to have more than one track car? ;)

The event went well overall and I got high praise from the instructor despite my 'incident'. We even had a simulated race start, to get an idea of what it's really like and make sure that when we do it for real, it won't be the first time. Oh yeah, the incident. The car has been oversteering the whole day. Which is puzzling, because I haven't changed anything since the last time when it was just fine. In the video you can see what I mean...

I saved it a number of times throughout the day, and even in the incident itself I did save it at first - only to lift and spin instantly again after recovery. Oh well, no harm done and spectators were entertained. Later after getting the car up on the lift at home I discovered that a nut attaching one of the endlinks to the front antiroll bar was loose. A little thing, big consequences. I'm learning that this happens a lot in high-performance machinery.

Overall an interesting day and a slightly different track experience. I can now get my novice license, after which I need to do three novice races in the next 12 months to move to the next level and be able to participate in 'real' races. I'm hoping to get the westfield done by the end of September, when the next race takes place. If not it might have to wait till next year...

8/30/02 Another Lotus track day. As always, a first class event. Tons of track time. I ran 6 and a half sessions, but could have easily run more. A failing clutch made me depart early, before the 1 hour (!!!) all-lotus track session at the end. But I was getting kinda tired anyway. On the plus side the handling was great (after getting tire pressures back up to where they should be, about 24psi hot). I was pretty conservative running 1:32-1:35 laps, but it was rather enjoyable and fun just the same. And that's what matters.

Quite a few interesting cars showed up - Lotus track days attract the neatest participants that you don't see anywhere else (also see video).

A couple of M Coupe friends showed up, and did quite well against an array of assorted Loti including some turbo Esprit cars.

As for the clutch... At some point during the day I felt a subtle snap under the clutch pedal. After which I couldn't engage gears. I coasted into the pits, but upon cooling down the clutch seemed to function again. In the next session the clutch pedal took on a 'gritty' feel, and a couple of shifts resulted in very noticeable clutch stench. So I packed it in for the day and headed home. The car got home OK (every gearchange feeling some 'grit' in the clutch). But when I went to pull it onto the lift in the garage all I got was a screeching noise and failure of the clutch to engage. At all. So I had to push the car onto the lift by hand (harder than it sounds given the sloping geography of my driveway). I guess the good news is that I was going to replace the gearbox and clutch anyway (and aleady have both parts). This just forces the issue sooner. Of course it seems the throwout bearing is shot too.... One thing clear - no more track days for the Elise anytime soon. Such is life.

09/17/02 Was searching the web today and quite by accident discovered that in my one and only hillclimb outing two years ago I managed to set a class record that still stands today. Cool. To this day only a couple of formula cars have gone faster (a Formula Atlantic beat me by over 20 seconds, no surprise there). Wonder how I'd do in the Westie. Perhaps next year I'll have to find out...

Also found some low-res pictures of me in the Elise from the July event at ThunderHill.

11/17/02 While gathering courage to dig into the Elise to replace the clutch and gearbox, I took a trip down to California to check out a Honda-powered Exige conversion by Prototype Racing. The engine installation is very clean and professional looking. Not exactly cheap, at roughly $12K when all is said and done, but it's in line with what it would cost to supercharge my current VHPD engine to similar power levels. And the Honda motor is not even straining, being totally stock and pushing around only 2/3 of the weight it was designed for - so it should be totally reliable.

The motor develops about 220hp and comes with a 6-speed gearbox and torsen limited slip. I didn't get to drive it, but did get a quick ride. The power is very impressive. Definitely faster than my Elise, and approximately on par with my Westfield, and I would guess it would blow away the Westie past 80mph where aerodynamics start to matter. In fact the ride reminded me a lot of the rides I've had in Ferrari F40 and F50. If I ever blow up the Rover engine in my Elise, this is going to replace it.