LeMons South report

Sorry you missed it. I make a mean Frogmore stew. Naw, I can't make CT, I have to stay here in the Durty South. Word is there will be 2 LeMons races at CMP in '09. I plan to make at least one and possibly both!

For those interested, here's the video of my stint where a Team Salazar driver passed me under yellow. Sorry it's so long, I still haven't been able to clip out what I want. Start from 14:58 or so, watch the worker station (it's the one at 14), watch what happens at 15:06, then at about 15:27 watch the next worker station ( I believe that was turn 10, we were running the short course) through about 15:31 and make your own determination if it was a pass under yellow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYIrZwixkFQ

Eh, E36 M3. We passed on yellow too. Not the driver's fault. Nobody was watching the course. When you're passing everyone like they're standing still, it's hard to tell when they're actually standing still. Our driver was black flagged.

Jensenman wrote: 14:58 or so, watch the worker station (it's the one at 14), watch what happens at 15:06, then at about 15:27 watch the next worker station ( I believe that was turn 10, we were running the short course) through about 15:31 and make your own determination if it was a pass under yellow. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYIrZwixkFQ

Youtube has flagged the video.

I'm sure everyone did it at least once, one of my drivers got blackflagged for it and I am about 90% sure I passed under local caution but wasn't blackflagged. Of course, by that time we were so far down the leaderboard T&S probably said 'why bother?'

Regardless: It's still cheatin' and given some of the other tactics that came up in the pit buzz I don't think I would be proud of the 'largest margin of victory' as Peoples' Curse.

EDIT: I'm not surprised it was flagged. oh, well.

Team Saab Story

Be careful accepting invitations to join "race" teams - sometimes it can be more than an idle threat. When Keith of OLOA fame asked if I would join his 24 Hours of LeMons team I assumed it would end up like most of my unfulfilled racing dreams. Boy was I mistaken.

Then Keith, Dale and Wayne bought a car. They located a running 1986 Saab 9000 Turbo for $300 and then submitted the application (including the vodka, sugar and lemon bribe). Once "Team Saab Story" was accepted I was given the opportunty to send money to the Keith supplemental 401K plan. Most of which I am sure went to Jay Lamm.

Then I would get intermittent emails about "do you have...?", "what is your waist size?", or the roll cage is going in "soon". I personally liked the email about wrecking the car in his neighborhood while towing it. In the end the Florida contingent put the car together and hauled it to CMP. My contribution was to get the trailer over to CMP with tools and provisi ons.

Little did I know Keith did not trust Jake and me to really bring the jack, tools or tires. He managed to cover almost every square inch of the floorspace in a 28 foot trailer with "stuff" loaded into a Saab and Armada. Luckily, the 220 generator is still new in its box and the MIG welder was never used. But then again neither was most of the stuff we brought. Good news was we had every tool we needed.

Going through tech was a lot of fun. We almost did not make it to tech when Keith blew 3 fuses, including one on the ignition circuit, just before we went to tech. Fuses were located and repairs made. Even though as an electrician Keith needs supervison we designated him as our spokesmodel and the rest of us shut our mouths at tech. The judging was tough but we made it without any penalty. That must have been when we were classed as NPF (No Prayer of Finishing).

I took the 4th stint in the car on Saturday. By then the 32 yea r old brake fluid had been cooked. But with vigorous pumping you could get a little brake pressure. But when I made contact with a car that turned into me (its my story and I am not going to change it) I received the only 30 minute penalty on the team (quite a shock huh?). It did help cool it down. Other then exhaust repairs we has no real serious issues though the turbo was leaking oil past the seals quite nicely and the left front tire was corded.

I was back in the car for the last hour on Saturday and by then the brakes only worked about every 8th lap. By tossing the car and using the transmission I was able to keep us at 28th on Saturday despite our (my) penalty. Rotating the tires and bleeding the brakes was all that was required to keep the Saab happy on Saturday night.

Sunday started out great with brakes, transmission and a clutch - things most people take for granted. Since I got in the car before Keith toasted the brakes I even had those for my first stint. Within a lap or two the transmission would only go into third gear. Even so I posted the fastest lap time on the team at 1:13.x. As we rotated the driver roster we kept climbing in standings to make it as high as 16th by 2:36 on Sunday. After the quiet hour the car had no clutch and was stuck in thi rd - luckily it would start in gear with a push off from the team. We were all worried we would come to stop on track and stall for the last 4 hours.

Keith had the last stint to take us to checker and was forced to pit when the brake system had massive leak down failure. When we poured fluid into the master cylinder it ran straight onto both front rotors and wheels - not a good sign - so we were forced to retire with 15 minutes left on the clock. With no brakes, no clutch and no transmission we felt it was unsafe to go around the track.

We finished 21st overall and 1st in class so we are overjoyed with the experience. As in any endeavour there are lessons learned. You can not do too much planning. upfront logistics or preventative maintenance. It would also be nice if you picked a car that had parts avialable in a southeastern junkyard or auto parts store. The team performed outstanding with 4 drivers and one crew chief. I think 2 crew chiefs would take the load off th e drivers. Keeping Keith away from the electrical system is important.

Pics and reviews are starting to roll in from the CMP race .

Channel 10 News Feature (click the video link, page right, for the TV footage) http://www.wistv.com/Global/story.asp?S=8738925

Overall Jalopnik Coverage (the Pork Brains installment is frickin' genius) http://jalopnik.com/search/lemons/bydate/?timerange=all

Judge Phil's Jalopnik Top 66 Guide http://jalopnik.com/399480/the-top-66-lemons-of-the-24-hours-of-lemons-south

Raleigh News-Observer (front-page story) http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/1154759.html

S ome of the participant pix tricking in: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dieseladdict/sets/72157606392762663/detail/ http://picasaweb.google.com/r15chp/24HoursOfLemonsLemonsSouth2008 http://www.flickr.com/photos/29071791@N02/

links to photos, etc - nice one of us in a turn...

clownkiller wrote:

Jensenman wrote: 14:58 or so, watch the worker station (it's the one at 14), watch what happens at 15:06, then at about 15:27 watch the next worker station ( I believe that was turn 10, we were running the short course) through about 15:31 and make your own determination if it was a pass under yellow. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYIrZwixkFQ

Youtube has flagged the video.

??? What terms of use were violated?

I can host it if you want.

Oh dear god.... i had forgotten about the Pork Brains punishment....

RobL wrote:

clownkiller wrote:

Jensenman wrote: 14:58 or so, watch the worker station (it's the one at 14), watch what happens at 15:06, then at about 15:27 watch the next worker station ( I believe that was turn 10, we were running the short course) through about 15:31 and make your own determination if it was a pass under yellow. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYIrZwixkFQ

Youtube has flagged the video.

??? What terms of use were violated? I can host it if you want.

I'm guessing it offended team dirty sanchez or whatever the berkeley they call themselves.

I can't check YouTube at work so I checked it when I went home for lunch. Reason for flagging: excessive file size. Yeah, I gots huge files. It's 340MB so I guess they had a good reason.

I need to find a video editing program that will let me snip out what I want but not change the file format. Nero, Roxio and WinDVD were all pretty well useless. I got a program with my MotoCam 360 that might work, although when I load it Bill Gates' minions begin screaming in pain (it's not a Windows recognized program).

I use windows movie maker... simple and effective.

Hey, I forgot I had MovieMaker! Here's the clip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WZh6GxDe9Y

That was a full track yellow, and he passed. You can see the yellow flag at 1:05 and at the next corner at 1:30.

Didn't some of the GRM crew head to the race? We never heard from them, were they in it or just attending?

Bryce

They were there with the Z28. We ran into Tim, his son, and Rene at the garage area.

Yeah, I saw the yellow come out at 14 and got ready to maintain my position, then the Salazar car came zipping by and I said out loud 'He just passed under yellow!' I'm surprised it didn't get recorded.

I bumped into members of the GRM crew more than once. I saw Tim and Rennie at judging. On Saturday, that scabby looking Camaro spent more time being probed than a whole week's worth of gynecology patients. When it ran it sure sounded good, though. It was on th trailer Sunday morning, hated to see that.

Looks like John Finger was busy, the weekend after LeMons he was at the Eagles' Nest hillclimb. Man, I wanted to do Eagles' Nest but there was just no way for me to do both.

clownkiller wrote: They were there with the really, really, really slow Z28. We ran into Tim and his son at midnight, while we were swapping the water pump on our car, at which point they joked about what slow pieces of E36 M3 Hondas are...you know, the ones that were lapping them all day.

Fixed that fer ya'.

I'm entered in the Lemons Houston and I have a quick question. How do they determine the starting order?

Thanks

I'll be at Houston too. They draw a number out of a hat.

A designated starting order? Hah. No such thing.

For us, all the cars circled the track behind the pace car for about 10 minutes, while they were doing transponder checks. Then the starter picked one car at random while everyone was still circling and gave them the green flag.

Ok then, thanks. I guess I'll see how they do it in Houston.

That's how they normally do it. With that many people, it's impossible to do qualifying.

How the hell would you classify the cars for qualifying? That would be a nightmare.

Not to mention their way is a lot more fun.

http://jalopnik.com/assets/resources/2008/07/62-75.jpg

This thing was awesome.

93celicaGT2 wrote: http://jalopnik.com/assets/resources/2008/07/62-75.jpg This thing was awesome.

Moments after that picture was taken: http://jalopnik.com/assets/images/gallery/12/2008/08/medium_2728969661_a4151199bd_o.jpg

;)

RobL wrote:

93celicaGT2 wrote: http://jalopnik.com/assets/resources/2008/07/62-75.jpg This thing was awesome.

Moments after that picture was taken: http://jalopnik.com/assets/images/gallery/12/2008/08/medium_2728969661_a4151199bd_o.jpg ;)

Oooh... smackdown.