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Our Daytona Grand Am Adventure (w/pics)
I wanted to write up a little narrative about the adventures we're having with ROAR Racing at Daytona this weekend. I'm dead tired this evening so the info may be a little slim, but I'll try to post as many pictures as possible. I'll also try to get some video tomorrow.
I arived around 11:30 this morning and felt great going to the credentials building to get everything ready. I got a good parking spot at the infield of Daytona and waited for the Roar Boys to come in. Here they are driving into the garages: http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...8/IMG_1397.jpg We waited for everyone to park before being allowed to unload the trailer and once the cars were set, we took suspension settings, cleaned up the car, and made last minute modifications. The #63 car, Kurtbob will be crewing this one. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...8/IMG_1399.jpg My #62 car, this is the one I'll be crewing. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...8/IMG_1398.jpg I felt like a kid in a candy store the whole time we were there. I got a chance to meet Juan Pablo Montoya as well which was really cool. I realize he's even shorter than me which made me smile. He's like 5-5 or something like that. :) I guess you have to be for F1. Also, Patrick Dempsey's (Dr McDreamy) car is a couple down from ours which was much more exciting to my wife than it was for me. So, I now have to try to get his autograph for her this weekend. Once the cars were set, it left a little bit of time to explore before the garage was closed. I went over to see the three rotor cars and talk with them. The Speedsource guys were working on the #70 so I kept my distance and just looked from afar. I did get a few shots of the engine which I drooled over since they had the hood open. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...8/IMG_1403.jpg The 3-rotor: http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...8/IMG_1401.jpg Also I went by the Goldin Brothers paddock to talk to them. The red and black car is just beautiful and they were very nice and talkitive. They opened up the hood and let me take a few extra pictures. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...8/IMG_1407.jpg Goldin Bro's 3-rotor. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...8/IMG_1410.jpg The Exhaust Manifold, you can see the RB notched out. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...8/IMG_1409.jpg The interior of the 3-rotor: http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...8/IMG_1406.jpg I can't wait to see these cars on the track tomorrow. I'll take some video and post them online. I'm interested to see what they sound like. Later on, we charged the batteries, and cleaned up the cars some more. Then, they were put in the trailer for a good night of sleep. Tomorrow, we have practice and qualifying. We'll be scrubbing in tires and doing some fuel consumption studies. I didn't sleep well last night due to the anticipation of today, so thank God I'm exhausted because I need the sleep for tomorrow. I've been smiling all day and I'm sure I'll be doing that the rest of the weekend. I'll continue to write more tomorrow evening when I'm back at the hotel. Good night! |
umm...damn.... meh jealous!!!!!!!!!
awsome photo's.. can't wait till Saturday and wake up and see this race!!!! Already have a friend telling me "After Fox stops coverage I'm coming over!". He doesnt have Speed Channel haha. |
if you have time, come by the farnbacher loles pit area, ill be there saturday morning. ill be the one with the shaved head.
-Drew- |
I'm loving the turn signal and wiper controls!
Interesting lack of a front strut tower brace. |
Originally Posted by PhotoMunkey
Interesting lack of a front strut tower brace.
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legokcen,
confirmed today.. i will be there fri.. will try to chase you down before it gets do busy.. beers :beer: |
cool, thanks for sharing :)
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Awesome Lego!
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Lego,
You the man!!! Keep it up!! I'm jealous as hell!!! |
lucky lucky man. I would not mind doing this with the Roar Guys one day, it would be a blast, and well worth the experience. Keep us updated, can't wait to watch on FOX in HD for the first part of televised coverage.
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Originally Posted by L8APEX
lucky lucky man. I would not mind doing this with the Roar Guys one day, it would be a blast, and well worth the experience. Keep us updated, can't wait to watch on FOX in HD for the first part of televised coverage.
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So, tell me.......are you the jack guy????
sorry, couldn't resist..........nothin' but luv!!! :) |
Great blog Lego - keep it up. I can't wait to read your update at the end of today! Tell JPM I said hi.
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Originally Posted by L8APEX
lucky lucky man. I would not mind doing this with the Roar Guys one day, it would be a blast, and well worth the experience. Keep us updated, can't wait to watch on FOX in HD for the first part of televised coverage.
See Ya'll down there. I'll be there Friday some time. |
Thanks for the pics lego, great threat!
Any pics of the headers on the speedsource cars? |
Great pix man!! The speedsource 8's and goldin bro's cars a BAD F#CKING ASS!!!
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Nice preview of what I'm gonna see. Cheers.
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time to subscribe!
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Originally Posted by alnielsen
I checked my local listings. The FOX broadcast isn't being listed with HD. It will be on their digital channel, just not in HD.
See Ya'll down there. I'll be there Friday some time. your listing may vary, subject to change and blackout, check your local listings, not available in all locations, call your local provider...all that jive. Can't wait to watch. |
Thannks for sharing LEgo!!! was the goldin bro car running a speedsource-style airbox as well?
________ Web shows |
1-25-07
10:35 pm. Wow, what a day. I can't put to words how exciting and fun today was! I had a hell of a time! I took 3 days of vacation from work to come here and I have to say that it was SO worth it and I haven't once thought of work at all. In fact, the day was so busy, I hardly had time to do much else besides the tasks at hand. When I talked to my wife this evening the first thing she asked was if I was able to get Dr. Dreamy's autograph for her and her sister. Not how was your day, are you having a good time.... :) We'll see about it tomorrow....
We had a stressful, exciting, fun day. I met some really cool people and did some great stuff to an RX-8. To my SE friends... during a tire change for the 62 car, yes, I'll be the jack man. :) Along with helping to change drivers... I've got visual controls on the jack/car position and we've pacticed how to do everything quickly. The day started out really rainy and dreary. In fact, most people didn't go out for the first practice due to the weather. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1418Small.jpg We didn't want to mess the car up before the main event. Several cars were out of action before qualifying even started. A GS Mustang went head first into the wall and crushed most of the front end. Also, a VW GTI went in sideways. The driver of the VW was airlifted to the hospital unconscious so our thoughts and prayers are with him. I hope he will be ok. There were several cars towed back into the paddock area but that's what racing is about. We spent the morning "nut and bolting" the entire chassis and getting things in order. You can see the rain coming down pretty good in this picture. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1419Small.jpg Here's a picture of the really loud Roar exhaust. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1417Small.jpg Man I loved the way it sounded. My week can now be complete since I was able to drive the race car. Granted it was only from the trailer to the paddock, but I still had a shit eating grin on my face the whole time. :) Now that was so cool! Then we had tech with the really mean guy. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1420Small.jpg I only say that because he dinged us for the same thing that the team ran with all last year. We were forced to move the battery back to the stock location. There were several teams that had the battery in the passenger location, so not very many people were happy. We had to design and put together a battery mounting system for the small dry cell in the stock location mounted to the lower brace and the front brace where the bumper hooks to. This was about a 2.5 hour ordeal since we had to go to Lowe's to get some extra metal and fasteners to put things together. We designed some stuff on paper and finally got everything set. Even if we wanted to make the first practice, the battery remounting kind of ruined that. So with the extra stress over, it was time to get down to business. Here's Kurt working with his two drivers on improving driver changes. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1423Small.jpg They got it down to a consistent 34 seconds which is really good. After everything was set and done, it was time for our session of practice. Our drivers were getting consistent laps at 2:13 - 2:14 so we feel pretty good about it. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1459Small.jpg The 63 car (Kurt's car) had Joe and Andy and the 62 car (my car) had Ray and Chip. The drivers are all top notch guys and I had a great time making new friends and meeting new people. I was kind of nervious going to the pits since I hadn't done this before, but with the cool drivers and the great team, I quickly felt at home. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1467Small.jpg http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...468Small-1.jpg We had a few issues to deal with after practice. Here we're looking for a small oil issue which we solved later that night: http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1478Small.jpg http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1455Small.jpg Also, the #62 drivers were complaining of the rear brakes locking up without the ABS kicking in. This caused the rear of the car to be really jumpy and loose. Due to this, they couldn't get on the brakes as strong as needed and couldn't go as fast and they should have been able to. In fact, one of the drivers (I won't name names) spun once. After practice, we found out that we had a loose wheel speed sensor on the passenger rear and fixed that. We'll also more than likely go to a softer pad tomorrow to see what that will do. In addition, we changed out springs to a softer spring rate to give the rear more of a bite as the drivers requested. We fixed this quickly and then corner weighed the car. Here's Chris changing the ride height to get the weights right. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1484Small.jpg I have to tell you I learned a whole lot about RX-8 suspension and setup. During a bit of a break, I took a 10 minute walk and took some pictures of the Rolex practice and some of the other teams. Our issues were miniscule compared to the teams who had accidents or had to change out motors. A BMW team was changing a motor between practice and qualifying. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1428Small.jpg A Honda team who qualified 6th had to change a motor due to an oil leak. They will have to relinquish their position and will start in the back of the pack tomorrow. It should really matter during a 3 hour race, but I'm sure it's heartbreaking to have that happen. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1481Small.jpg A Mini also changed a motor. http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1482Small.jpg If I'm rambling, I appologize on the front end as I'm exhausted and need to hit the sack. It's time to go to bed as we'll have another long, fun filled day tomorrow. I have to say this... if you ever have the option to do something like this, it'll be one of the best times of your life. I'm going to bed, I'll write more tomorrow night, hopefullly with good news from the races. |
Originally Posted by Renesis_8
Thannks for sharing LEgo!!! was the goldin bro car running a speedsource-style airbox as well?
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i'm completely jealous man, once in a lifetime experience.
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Here is a picture I'm sure you all want to see. The 3 rotors sounded so good on track. I can't wait to see the night races with the glowing brake rotors and flames out the back.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1430Small.jpg http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1429Small.jpg Some of the DP cars: http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1432Small.jpg http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t..._1436Small.jpg |
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