"Autocross" on a racetrack

CART did an autocross at Stafford Speedway as part of a demo in 2005.  CART also did a quickie autocross at a couple of Pocono track days during fog outs.  It was too dangerous to go at track speed, but a tight little course on the straight was ok.    AME did a few on an oval course that had just changed over from dirt to pavement.  

Tom_Spangler (Forum Supporter) said:

Isn't this sort of what Solo 1 is/used to be? 

I came through the Solo 1 program in Southern California in the early 80s. That was run on permanent road courses (Willow and Riverside mostly) with SCCA (Cal Club) sanction. It was basically a time trial with passing restricted to certain parts of the track. No pylons to negotiate like in autoX.

There were “high speed” autoX events (with pylons) in SoCal then too. I ran San Diego at Jack Murphy Stadium which had a huge parking lot and some pretty wide open curves and elevation changes.

There is also the annual Lone Pine Time Trials which is on an abandoned airfield with intersecting and interconnected runways. Speeds did tend to be higher than the usual autoX events.

Also, similar to Lone Pine, were the events put on by a group out of Bakersfield. Those were run at the Shafter airfield.

car39 said:

CART did an autocross at Stafford Speedway as part of a demo in 2005.  CART also did a quickie autocross at a couple of Pocono track days during fog outs.  It was too dangerous to go at track speed, but a tight little course on the straight was ok.    AME did a few on an oval course that had just changed over from dirt to pavement.  

CART (assuming you mean CT autocross & rally team?) has done several trackcrosses in recent years at thompson speedway road course as well.  Generally it was laid out to start on the skid pad/parking lot area, exit onto the track in the vicinity of turn 8, and then follow the road course through turn 9, 10, 11, onto the straight. Rolling finish near the beginning of the straight, slow down gradually and return via the "pit out" access road further down the straight.

The first few times i went, they had put a bunch of autocross features out on the track to try and slow people down, but as someone else mentioned above, despite lowering the top speeds this put you in precarious situations at times, with limited runoff.  After having problems with too many cars in the grass, they eventually drastically limited the number of cones on the track, essentially using them to force you onto the proper road course racing line and nothing more.  Higher top speeds, but no offs after that...

Unfortunately they stopped doing these events.  My understanding is that the track wanted to start charging the same for a trackcross day as they did for a full course track day event.  The thing is trackcross utilized not even half of the track and hardly any track resources (we often shared the venue with a drift event on the same day, those guys used the other half of the road course and/or the oval) so the change seemed like a bit of a money grab to me

L5wolvesf said:

There is also the annual Lone Pine Time Trials which is on an abandoned airfield with intersecting and interconnected runways. Speeds did tend to be higher than the usual autoX events.

Also, similar to Lone Pine, were the events put on by a group out of Bakersfield. Those were run at the Shafter airfield.

I forgot about Lone Pine; we did  couple fo challenge events between Vegas and Reno regions there. I actually drove the Datsun to the event and camped there.

GameboyRMH said:

NickD said:

Then the track booted us because we were "devaluing the track" by "giving people the impression they could get out on the track for under $100".

I want to trap this elitism inside a dome before it can spread.

Yeah. I used to run their under their time attack series as well, and they always charged me a higher entry because I was not a member of the track. I was okay with that because I did the math and paying the monthly membership fee and just running there for the time attack series was still more expensive. Then they started shuffling the rules around to make my car increasingly uncompetitive, eventually putting my 250hp Miata on 200tw tires in the same class as a genuine Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car on slicks. Then I got told that I couldn't enter more than three events a year as a non-member unless a member sponsored me, at which point I told them "My money spends just as well as Mr. Heart Doctor and Mr. Lawyer's over there. You don't want it, fine" and I haven't been back since. Recently was talking to someone who had been running motorcycles there and got the same treatment and he was looking into a membership only to be told that now, even if you have the cash for a membership, all the existing members have to vote to whether to allow you membership or not. Real charming place these days. 

L5wolvesf said:

I ran San Diego at Jack Murphy Stadium

How I can tell you're an old San Diego native ;) 

Lone Pine is nice but I wish I got more runs. 3 a day just isn't enough for me and is how I feel about autox in general. DEs are better seat time/dollar but is also way more taxing on the system which is why I really like the idea of trackcross. 

Your post reminded me that VARA Racing also hosts "hill climb" events at Horse Thief Mile. https://www.vararacing.com/varahillclimbseries

hunter47 said:

L5wolvesf said:

I ran San Diego at Jack Murphy Stadium

How I can tell you're an old San Diego native ;) 

Lone Pine is nice but I wish I got more runs. 3 a day just isn't enough for me and is how I feel about autox in general. DEs are better seat time/dollar but is also way more taxing on the system which is why I really like the idea of trackcross. 

Your post reminded me that VARA Racing also hosts "hill climb" events at Horse Thief Mile. https://www.vararacing.com/varahillclimbseries

I did spend a lot of time in SD when I was younger. Then the autoX club I was a member of, Guldstrand Racing, wanted to reign over all of Southern California so we travelled all over.

Eventually I did some racing there (Carlsbad & Holtville) too. But I can’t claim to be a native. I was mostly based out of Los Angeles.

Lone Pine was great fun but yeah, only 3 runs on a big course was not really enough. And I hear the entry fee now is crazy.

Tom1200 said:

L5wolvesf said:

There is also the annual Lone Pine Time Trials which is on an abandoned airfield with intersecting and interconnected runways. Speeds did tend to be higher than the usual autoX events.

Also, similar to Lone Pine, were the events put on by a group out of Bakersfield. Those were run at the Shafter airfield.

I forgot about Lone Pine; we did  couple fo challenge events between Vegas and Reno regions there. I actually drove the Datsun to the event and camped there.

I didn't realize other events happened at LP.

Back in my autoX days we tried to set up a SoCal Vegas challenge. We checked out the Barstow "airport". Not sure what stopped it from happening.

I got into autocross in San Diego in the early 1980s, remember "Performance World?" I only got to experience a few events back when they ran chalk lines around the entire course, and it was awesome, never any question of where the track went. Then the stadium said that the lime was damaging the asphalt, so they had to switch to only cones, and boy did that change things. Depending how low your car was, it made navigating the course much more challenging, at least for me it did. I ran a Datsun 1200 there for maybe five years. Back then, they'd sometimes run the entire western half of the lot, some were getting up to impressive speeds, well over 100mph in spots. As the lot developed though (train, mostly), the usable size kept getting smaller, as did my interest, especially after discovering HPDEs.