PedalFaster

B Stock hasn't yet been posted.

Congratulations Jason! Amazing run right out of the box today.

Edit: Jason's ULLLOSE on this forum, for anyone who hasn't been paying attention.

ChopsMcgraw

Way to go Jason!






Chops

Ike

Grats Jason!

ULLLOSE

iTrader: (1)

Wow what a week.... Only a Red Light away from a Prosolo win. However I will be more than happy to take the Natl championship over the pro any day. I am now stuck in Gallup NM, as Randy Noll and are caravaning and his truck broke down tonight. I hope we can get it fixed in the AM or I am leaving his sorry @ss behind. :p

I think we can all say that the RX8 can run with the 350z and the 968. I got very lucky to pull off that win when I did not have quickest time either day. No doubt that each course took a different car setup to be fast. Mine was sort of in between and that gave me two times quick enough to win.

Also congrats are due to PedalFaster, as he beat my wife for the first time this year. :D

I tell you what a great group of guys we had in BS this year, total blast.

Thanks again Clyde, hope I have the right screen name, for the very cool baby pants.

PedalFaster

Nitpick, but by my count we're 50/50 -- Jennifer beat me at all three Pros we ran together, and I beat her at both Tours and on the second day of Nationals (the first day not being comparable due to different conditions).

John V

iTrader: (1)

I feel bad for Carter...

Ugh, dropping down to 11th is not my idea of a good performance. I flat out got owned on Friday after only being schooled on Thursday.

Already planning for next year...!

clyde

What's that? I couldn't hear you. Let me turn up my radio!

Seriously, I feel plenty bad for him too. Carter and Jim made as much of an effort this year as anyone, and that was a really terrible way to finish the season.

I drove slow on Thursday and learned a lesson. I'd rather press as hard as I can like Andy Hohl or GH and cone all three runs than back off on a third run just to make sure that it's clean. While I picked up four spots on Friday, my driving was only marginally better. I think I found the solution to my biggest issue though. A couple days late and a bunch of dollars short, though. Oh well. What are you gonna do?

I have many, many pics of most of BS (and many other classes) that I'm trying to sort through to weed out the really lousy ones and hope to have them posted within a day or so.

It was great to finally put faces to some of the names and see some of the other faces again. Congrats to Jason on the win and my wife and I hope that you guys enjoy the pants. :D

edj

Congrats to ULLLOSE for the win this week. I'm disappointed my times
weren't better on Friday but I suspect some sort of adjustable front sway bar
will help there. Nice to meet all the B Stockers and hope to see you next year.

tomsn16

Many congrats to Jason and GH and all those between them on the trophy list.The RX8's and the 968 were just plain fast(well driven) from the get-go. Jason's first run blast on Friday was a classic.
Carter's "radio cone" on Friday was indicative of our week but the bottom line was...... RX8's ROCK.
Jim & Carter Thompson

MazdaRich

Well BS was the fastest stock class by a wide margin. Obviously rain was a pretty big factor this year. I'd like to see how the RX-8 stacks up agains the S2000 now.

PedalFaster

About the same as it always did.

AS and BS both ran in good conditions on the South Course on Sunday.

The fastest '04 S2000 time was set by Bob Klingler: 58.0.

The fastest pre-'04 S2000 time was set by Steve Wynveen: 58.4 before penalties.

The fastest RX-8 time was set by G.H. Sharp: 58.8.

The RX-8 state of the art has definitely advanced in the past year, but there's no getting around the fact that the S2000 is still lighter, lower, stiffer, and more powerful.

Steve

John V

iTrader: (1)

... not to mention four years ahead in the development curve. There were as many different RX-8 setups this year as there were RX-8s. The cars are definitely going to get faster, but I agree that they won't ever be as fast as an S2000.

FWIW, Jason was on a stock front sway bar and GH was on a somewhat-stiffer Mark Sipe front sway bar. Friday was very sweeper intensive, at least for the fast 1/3 of the course.

Imp

Nope. He wasn't. I was tho... with no modification to it like some others. I'll let Jason tell what he's running if he so wishes.

After seeing the results of this past events times, I don't believe (yes... personal opinion.. not law) this car needs anything bigger than stock to be fast since my raw on Friday was only .002 off of Jasons 1st run and .088 off of GHs... my (and many others) driving could have been better, that's for certain, but I don't think the bar is the reason that the cars were faster by the thousandths. (And a larger or smaller bar in the front won't help you miss cones either).

I had a great week. I hope everyone had fun, and can't wait until next year!

--kC
PS... Here's a direct link to BS results: http://www.scca.com/Event/Result.asp?Ref2=89

John V

iTrader: (1)

Hm. Okay. I'll let him clarify. He implied as much when we were talking on Saturday (before practice) and also on Friday before the competition. (He asked if we were going to change out our "big front bar" :D ). I don't know the specs of the Sipe bar, but it isn't much bigger than stock, and it's hollow.

I still think the car is much, much faster in slaloms with the Sipe bar and doesn't give anything up in the sweepers. I got inside my own head and drove like *** on Friday for sure but it wasn't the bar's fault. :p

John V

ULLLOSE

iTrader: (1)

We ended up using our MazdaSpeed front bar. Over the winter I think we are going to play with shock valving, we were on off the shelf Koni singles on full stiff all the way around, I want to see how that effects the bar choice. On stock shocks the car really needs a bigger bar, not so much on the Koni's. We have to do something to get away from the inside wheel spin, it was very bad on the North course. Some cars on the Racing beat bar put the smack down on the north course, so we will be testing some bars this winter also. :D

Imp

*grumble grumble* winter testing *grumble grumble* snow *grumble grumble* moving.... *grumble*

clyde

You can run all seasons or snow tires in STU, can't you?

TeamRX8

iTrader: (25)

Congrats on doing what was required to win. I've never doubted your ability as a driver.

I figured out several years ago that the Forbes Field North Course surface is always "looser" than the South Course surface. I don't mind saying so publicly now since we'll likely never run there again.

We have never experienced wheel spin on our RX-8 except when an early prototype front swaybar completely failed at the Peru Tour. The likely reason for your wheelspin is the (IMO) excessive rear camber you are running, which is most likely causing insufficient rear tire contact patch in most situations . We have never run anywhere near the number you stated to me in Topeka, nor have we ever found it necessary to do so for autox. You should seriously consider more front bar with reduced rear camber.

I just put my foot down with my swaybar supplier. I should have already received an order of 25 adjustable Solo2 front swaybars. They wanted to make a special punch to knock out all the adjustment holes in a single stroke which caused the delay, but I'm tired of waiting. I more or less told them to produce them soon or reimburse me. It fills the gap nicely between the MazdaSpeed and Racing Beat bars, plus being adjustable allows you to compensate between high grip and slippery surfaces as well as setup differences.


as clearly demonstrated by GH's time, which only rams home the "drove like ***" comment for me too


agreed to a degree, but IMO the S2K's are faster now (both setup and driver familiarity) than they were after their first year or two of development. I think the S2k will always be faster for the reasons you stated, but I do anticipate the RX-8 closing the gap some in the next year or two. The same thing happened when the RX7TT came out in 1992, it didn't really take off and show it's stuff in full until 1994-95