Stock Racing on a Saturday..
So tonight it was a pretty relaxed racing, heading down to the local (by which I mean it’s within 20mins drive!) club at Highfields.
Compared to the usual tracks I race on, the Toowoomba club is a little different. First up, it’s 17.5 Blinky only, so the mod motor had to come out. Secondly, it’s a temporary track on a some (admitadly very smooth) tennis courts, so traction is usually pretty low.
I started out with the same setup I normally run at the Logan track, with the exception of moving the rear shocks up one hole, lighter diff oil (1500wt) and softer tyres (Panaracer GX32’s). However, straight away was pretty obvious in practise that the track condition was so low that the car was just sliding around on the surface. The balance was off as well, with the car stopping in the middle of the corner, but loose on initial movement.
So first changes were to move the rear shock back down to hole 3, which gave an improvement in the balance. Next on the agenda was to try and generate more overall traction… so with the lack of time between heats, limited myself to trying different spring combinations. First off tried the Schumacher Blues, and then Ride Blues, with the overall traction improving each time. The Ride blues actually felt better in the lower traction, as they felt to have a lower level of reaction than either the Schumacher Greens and Blues, making the car overall easier to drive.
First qualifier was pretty good, although it did feel skaty. Made a few mistakes, but still ended up with a TQ run. Second qualifier, decided that the Panaracer32’s needed to be retired, so bolted on a one run old set of Ride 32 Blues, as I knew from previous experience they worked well on this surface. Deffinate improvement in pace… but clipping a corner marker half way through the run sheared a front alloy suspension screw (as they are supposed to mind), and so ended the run.
With a short break between the second and third qualifiers, made one last change, and tried out quickly the popular Yokomo Pink/Blue spring combo. The Yok springs are generally a bit softer, and have always had a nice feel too them when I’ve tried previously. Again another decent improvement, and the slightly harder front spring helped to actually lean on the front end a bit more in some of the quicker sections. However, again, a mistake on my behalf resulted in a race ending failure, clipping a sand bag supported pipe too close resulting in a broken DCJ. But again, pace had improved, and I was confident for the finals.
In the final, left the car as was, and decided to just take it a bit cautious as I had the pace to get to the front… which promptly went out the window as I managed to grab the lead by the end of the first lap, and then pull away. Kept it off the pipes, and just concentrated on getting a clean run in. Ended up taking the win by a decent margin, so pretty happy really, despite the breakages (I’ve been spoilt by driving mostly on permanent tracks). Overall car performed very well, and responded to the changes made as expected… can’t ask for much more than that 🙂
Anyway, setup below 🙂
Ed