We’ve fallen a bit behind with our updates, but that doesn’t mean we’ve forgotten our responsibilities! Our next event at VIR is approaching fast so we wanted to drop in and post up a brief recap of our time at NJMP’s Lightning circuit with TrackDaze before we get even further behind 😉
It was a good event! TrackDaze again put on a quality show, keeping to their schedule and providing all drivers with four solid hours of track time over the course of two days. Needless to say, the Corrado took a beating, but came through the other side with only a few minor issues. Unlike some drivers, we really like NJMP’s Lightning circuit. It’s a very fluid track with a good balance of technical turns and straights. Our car just seems to be suited for a track of this size. It doesn’t run out of breathe on the straights and has enough torque to pull out of the slow turns and maintain momentum in the faster turns.
We went to this event with high hopes. We solved a few minor issues from our previous event, replaced our failed brake booster as well as added some new aero components. With our fingers crossed we made the trek down Friday night for a night of camping and an early start at the track Saturday morning. Having already prepped the car a few days prior, our Saturday morning was a breeze. We rolled the car out of the trailer, unpacked a few things and were ready to go. Jason was up first and admittedly a bit nervous knowing we hadn’t tested our new brake booster setup… but what better place to put it to the test then out at the track, right? Needless to say, everything went as planned. The booster did its job and so did Jason by keeping the car on the track and slowly chipped away at his lap times. The remainder of the day went off without a hitch and we were feeling pretty confident about the car and the lap times. To top it all off, we couldn’t have asked for better weather; warm with a really nice breeze to help keep things comfortable.
As it often does, as soon as everything goes as planned, something always creeps in to muck it all up. This time around we noticed the AFR’s continually increase (indicating a lean condition) as each session progressed. With each new session, after the car was able to cool down, the AFR’s would go back to normal for the first few laps, then slowly creep up by the middle of the session. We tried our best to tweak our fuel control setup to combat the problem, but in the end we simply had to change our driving style for the remainder of the day. In order to keep the AFRs in a safe region we needed to short-shift to stay out of the higher RPM’s where the AFR’s seemed to be the most aggressive. We closed out the day scratching our heads and tossing around all the possibly ideas and components that might be contributing to this problem. As always, Olaf from Atomic Motorsports was on the phone with us brainstorming to help resolve the problem before the end of the day or at least before Sunday’s sessions. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to diagnose the problem and made little to no improvements on the AFR numbers.
The next day was more of the same; beautiful weather, a solid breakfast made by yours truly , a great event by TrackDaze, but a car that was a bit off in the engine department. Like I mentioned earlier, the car was built for this track and it was in fact hooked up for the first few laps of each session, but due to the rising AFR’s, we had to stay out of the higher RPM’s which of course affected our lap times the entire day. We are, however, happy to report once again that we finished the event unscathed and although we did struggle a bit with that AFR issue, without a doubt, we did enjoy our time on track. With so much track time, how could we not have fun? How much track time you ask? We came with front tires that were one rainy event old and left with completely bald tires… that much track time 😀
We finished out the event, packed the car up and headed home feeling pretty good about our weekend overall.
As always, thanks again to our sponsors! Olaf @ Atomic Motorsports with his incredible positive support and the guys @ TyrolSport with their continued contribution – thanks again guys!
Here’s a few videos we put together from the event. Unfortunately the microphone battery was dead so we don’t have that wonderful VR6 engine note to compliment the video, but we are improving our data overlay setup so things hopefully look better and are easier to view. Feel free to give us some feedback… both on our videos and our driving 😉
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Some photos from the event as well.
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