My 4th Time Trial - Laguna Seca
Gotta get rid that mzda thing..
Life had changed significantly after I joined a startup company, time that's already been scarcy had become unobtainable these days. I haven't got around to build this page for long time so I am leaving it in this unfinished state so you can read the partial story first. I will try to finish the story and get the photos in when I have time (whenever that is).
Well, I missed Nov 99 and Jan 2000 Time Trials at Willow Springs... But I am back to Laguna Seca, where I started my very first Time Trial about this time one year ago. It somewhat marks a milestone in my driving history because here I am, one year since my first drive on this very same legendary track, I am back again with more experience gathered throughout last 2 time trials at Willow Springs. It's time to see if I can apply those experience on a different track.
Weather was cool and sunny as opposed to scattered thunder as wheather forecast indicated. We arrived at Laguna Seca around 8:30 am and started the regular "arrival works" that by now I am used to, which basically unload everything from the car, have helmet and gloves within reach, and so on. This time, our "group" member is yet again somewhat different. Nizam with his 75, Larry Jr. with his home grown 3.0l 24valve GTV-6, and of course, me in my old fathful 88 grey verde.
A little background about what happend to my car prior to the time trial, and the main reason I missed the January's time trial at Willow Springs. It all started with an innocent routine 4500 miles oil change that I do before last time trial at Willow Springs. I exclusively use Castrol Syntech on my then 165000 original miles engine and it has performed flowlessly for all the track times I have attended. I picked up the last AC Delco oil filter on sale from local Wall-Mart, understanding that AC Delco makes quality products. Unfortunately, this particular filter may had dirts and particles inside, or might have been faulty. After the time trial, I noticed the engine seemed a little loose than before. Few weeks later, engine rattles a little, main bearing seemed loose, and things just got worse and worse. Upon opening up the engine for diagnosis, many new scratches were found nearly everywhere in the engine, with main crank bearing taking the biggest hit as well as nearly completely worn oil pump. A massive engine rebuilt was the result, and everything were put together 2 weeks before this time trial at Laguna Seca. I tried to drive around as much as possible including a trip down to LA on Hwy 101 and back. But 2 weeks were simply not enough. Following my mechanic's recommandation to preserve the engine, I would only be pushing 80% from the engine.
With this limitation, I knew I will not get my best possible time. However, this time I came with brand new Yokohama AVS-intermediate tires which are a step above the Falken GR-B that I ran for my previous time trials. I figured I should get slightly better time than my previous result given that I am more experienced now even though I am a little down on horses. Will I meet my goal?
It turned out to be quite a crowd, especially for group 4 which consist mostly of regular street cars, and novice drivers. Among the novice drivers there was a brand new Porsch 911 turbo, as well as Audi 1.8t quattro. For this time trial, I have added yet another valuable tool onto my car - in car video camera. I mounted a camera mount onto the rear deck on the passenger side to video tape the event and my driving for future discussion and memory. Because the position is relatively low, front passenger seat back must be lowered to clear the line of sight. I barely got the mounting installed the night before the time trial so the installation was a little crude but that was all I could manage. Lets hope it works out well.
Day One
The first day's event was devided into 3 30 min practice session. I spent first session going slowly to get myself familiar with the track and tried a few corners a little hot and see how car reacts. I was also staying behind a gtv6 which was running slowly. I figured he must had some problem. I didn't want to pass him either because I was running in engine-preserving mode and I told myself to stay under 4500 rpm in the morning, and gradually push 5000 rpm toward the end of the day.
Laguna Seca is a very demanding track, most turns require brake application or else those turns are usually too much for street tires.
Session 2, I started to push the car harder and harder, and higher speed means more braking into the turn. In the middle of the session 2 I was getting bad shakings whenever brake was applied. The situation got worse as time goes, to a point where the steering wheel also start to vibrate almost violently. I came out to the pit area to check and to make sure I didn't get the vibration from loose wheels, but that wasn't the case. So lo and behold I was back on the track, while carefully paying attention to the vibration. Because the vibration appears consistantly only when brakes were applied, I concluded that I must have had warped the disc rotors. Nonetheless I continued the rest of session that way, trying to brake light and early while learning the track.
If you have followed my previous Time Trial stories, you would have becoming familiar with the name Terry Manchester. Terry has been a tremendous resource for me in my driving history. I have always been learning alot by watching him driving or by being passenger in his car. Although I thought I was doing okey, I wanted to pickup a few hints from the great driver, so I asked Terry for a ride. He accepted without hesitation.
I don't know if it was because it's a new track or was it because Terry's driving extremely fast, but it almost reminded me my first ride from Terry at Willow Springs. I was scared at many points on the track because I felt we were simply going WAY too fast. After the first warm up lap, Terry came out turn 11, full throattle, up shifting gear after gear, 5th, speed still climbing as we arrived at top of the hill into a blind downhill corner and approaching turn 2. Terry! Brake! Brake! Brake! - I was screaming in my mind, but Terry had his right foot firm on the gas still. Suddenly as if Terry just woke up, took a stab on the brake, enough I thought I was gonna fly off the seat. As we continue to slow down Terry took the car virtually to the last inch of the track befor start turning the car, late apex, but probably a little too hot as we drifting toward outside of the track, way over, and wheels on to gravel, though recovered without any halm. As we continued marching to turn 3, Terry waved his right hand with a gesture telling me don't do that, that was a bad example. A tap on brake and another right hand drift we were onto turn 4, 5, 6, 7, entering turn 8 the famous corkscrew where you have a really slow 90 degree left hander, followed by sudden drop of elevation while turning to right on to a long bank-changing left turn carousel. Here is the biggest difference from what I have been doing. Instead of finding easy way thru, Terry took a very different line here, it seemed too agressive to me but Terry went thru that corner just perfectly fine exiting turn 9 drifting all the way to the side of track and getting ready for turn 10, straight onto the last turn of the track, and onto the front straight.
For some unknown reason, I never get to meet Nizam and Larry on the track, so I was not able to see their driving or try to follow. But from what I hear, both were also discovering new ways of taking each corners.
Last session of the day, I was mainly trying to exit turn 8 properly to setup for turn 9 so that I can try Terry's line. It was really uneasy as the camber changes many times from exit of turn 8 to apexing turn 9, lifting gas in the middle of all that change is gonna send you in trouble, yet it's not for the fainted heart to keep the foot firm on gas pedal either. I kept trying to recap the memory wondering how did Terry take such a corner at ease. By the end of last session, I've also picked up a few discoveries on a few corners, and will try to push further to see how much I can push using those newly discovered techniques.
(3/19/2002) It's been a while since I started writing this page back in late 2000. Things changed quite a bit, I've moved on to yet another job, bought a small townhouse, got married, build up my home sweet home etc etc etc, hope I still remember something from the event
The brake was certainly warped so it would be tough to go thru the day with vibrations under braking as well as shaking steering wheel.
My car also started to run very rich since the day before, but since this morning, it was so rich to a point that the engine refused to idle. I had to keep my foot on gas pedal while car is idling to keep engine from stalling. Checked cold temp fuel injector for leaking, checked all the related sensors and they all appered to be in proper condition. I had no choice to continue to the track while keeping eyes on the engine oil condition.. if it gets too thin, I will have pull off the track to change the oil...
(it turned out, that the fuel pressure regulator was faulty and stuck closed, so the injectors got all the pressure from the bosch fuel pump.)
Great, I thought... I had warped front brakes, loss of engine power, possible engine damage from thining oil, 80% engine push during the engine break in period.. this was just great... The morning practice session went pretty much unoticed..
Because my previous lap time was 2:10, and that I did not have chance to time myself before the time trial session starts, I was given a position based on my 2:10 record. I figured, that with all the problems I was experiencing, my lap time was probably not gonna get much better so perhaps 2:10 was still reasonable. I could be so wrong...
I get very uncomfortable when there are other vehicles nearby me while I am on the track. So when I caught up with the car in the front after 3 laps, I gave it up on the last lap, yilding best lap time of 2:05, or a full 5 seconds improvement over my first time trial! This is definitely an improvment yet i know well i could do better if car's condition allows! We'll see, when we get back to Laguna Seca next time for Time Trial!
Jess Liao
Jess Liao - Aug 22, 2000
Last touch up: Mar 18, 2002