Willow Springs

The first time is always special…

June 27th & 28th, 2003

First day ever on a racetrack - 1:50 flat. Who needs turbos?

Well, well, well. Here I am, back in Santa Barbara. AccZDent, my 197,800 mile 1990 300ZX 2+2 NA sits outside. There are no new dents, no new dings, no dust (no spins). Most importantly, there was no tow truck bill. I drove the car to Willow Springs Raceway, beat on it all Saturday, beat on it all Sunday and then drove it back to Santa Barbara.

June 27th finally rolled around. My first trackday ever would be at the “Fastest Track in the West”, Willow Springs Raceway in Rosamond, California!

Willow Springs Raceway – “The Fastest Track in the West!”

Day 1:

Having signed up with NASAProRacing.com to run in Group 1 (with Instructor), I lined up in the Hot Pit and waited.

Soon I was greeted by my instructor, Tom Paule. Tom races a Sentra SE-R in NASA’s SR spec class. He definitely knew his way around a track.

I headed out on track and Tom would talk me through each lap. Simple, clear instructions like “Turn in”, “Gas, gas...” and “Brake”, given at the right times, helped me to learn where I should be and what I should do to run the best lines through each corner.

His instructions quickly had us running under 2:00 around the track. We even began to have to pass other people!

Just when I felt like I was getting the hang of it, the checkered flag was waving (DON’T MISS THE CHECKERED FLAG!). Time to come in.

The track bug in mid bite…the red mist begins to form.

We then had a “download” session, where we would learn who went dirt farming, who had close calls and who had fun without either. There was a driver in a C5 Corvette who had turned off stability control. Turn 3 spins: two. There was even a Lexus LS430 on 18s running 110mph through Turn 8. Everyone had a huge smile on their face and we were all ready for more.

After about an hour, we were up again. Tom rode with me, to evaluate me for Group 2 so I could run by myself. Being much more relaxed, I began to hit my turn in points and apexes consistently. I also began to look around. That’s when I noticed a lot of trackside landmarks. Skidmarks, divots, water towers, all kinds of things.

After the session, Tom confirmed my move up to Group 2. Time to let her rip!

Over the next two sessions, I would whittle the lap time down to 1:50.0XX. I began to get the “rolling chicane” effect and decided that I would need to be in Group 3 to end it. Unfortunately, to get into Group3, I would need to be running mid-1:40’s or less. There was much work to do.

DAY 2:

Having stayed on track without crashing, I decided to go for another day of blasting around Willow Springs.

After breakfast at the local McDonald’s (breakfast of champions), I checked the lugnuts, tire pressures and fluids and went back out on track.

There were 13 cars on track this time. Six are different from Saturday.

I managed a 1:49.6XX, but that was all I could do. The brakes on the 90’s 300ZX’s are all the same except for early 1990 NA and that’s what I had. I ran into MAJOR brake fade problems and just could not trust them. Looks like an upgrade is in order.

By mid-day the A/C read 113F ambient! Wow. It doesn’t do that in Santa Barbara. Ever.

One of the instructors took yesterday’s spin happy C5 Corvette out for a demonstration. He spins it at Turn 3 in the same spot. Hmm...

There was a Maserati Cambiocorsa with a passenger that went out 1 session and ran a 1:37.X. The thing blew my doors off in Turn 8 like I was on the brakes!

This would be the first time I would meet my friend Shannon. Running a caged 5.0L GT on 245s, he would run a 1:45 and then spin off the track. We diced it out for about six laps straight, as I was faster into Turn 2 and through the “Omega” turns of 3, 4 & 5, but he was faster everywhere else.

It was lots of fun as we would freight train through traffic like Shuey and Montoya, chasing each other while having to deal with traffic!

In the meantime, the Group 3 cars were averaging ~1:42s with one 1:37 hotshoe.

If you're wondering, no, you're not really supposed to run a transponder in HPDE 1&2. Three of us decided to find out what would happen. None of the people with transponders were spinning, so it never became an issue. Rather, they were too busy chewing out the people who did spin to worry about us.

Having “freight trained” through traffic, I figured that I should get an evaluation to move up to Group 3 just to see what I would have to work on.

My Group 3 evaluation instructor, Shane, a 12-year karting veteran, actually got on the ground in 110F heat to look under my car after hearing it was stock with Azenis & non-adjustable Tokicos. He thought we were running on R-compounds and he argued with me until I gave up and said take a look. Ring up one more Falken Azenis customer! I had guessed the correct cold tire pressures to use and cross rotated after day one. The tires looked great.

A guy in a 2003 Cobra managed to eat a brand new $800+ set of Michelin Pilot Sports in two days. The tire pressure got so high that the tread in the middle wore away to about 1/16" with about 1/4" tread at the sides. How do you do that to a steel belted tire? There must have been 65+psi in there.

Overall, it was a fun time and the no tow truck factor kicks ass. Now that I have all the gear (helmet, car with roof, tires with tread), I am considering what trackday to do next. It looks like there is an event in August. I just hope it isn’t 113F next time.