Survived again, but only just!

[Shane001]

Well we've had another great race weekend, this time at Eastern Creek, though it easily could have ended pretty badly;

Race 3 on Sunday afternoon, Lap 1, first corner. I've made a good start and I'm all over the couple of cars immediately in front of me on the grid, but behind me are 4 faster cars who DNF'd in the previous race who are all over me! Flat out in 4th gear into turn 1, making a passing move on the outside on young Garth in the BMW, round the bend to the horror of broken and spinning cars on the left, spinning cars on the right, and a huge wall of dust blocking out the center of the track!! What do I do? Can't go left, can't go right, can't hit the brakes as I've got cars right on my tail, all I can do is back off the accelerator and drive blind straight through the cloud of dust and hope for the best... Days of Thunder - "Go High Cole!!" flashes through my head! Luckily all the carnage was already spinning off the sides of the track :) My first Days of Thunder moment, what a rush, hehe :)

Check out the following links to in car footage of the incident! These cars are a few cars ahead of me so you can't see me in these. The 2 cars most badly damaged are the red Commodore, and an RX7 which arrived on the scene with no where to go (not the one seen being tagged and spinning, see link to pic below).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quQCltskc24
http://www.pbmotorsport.com.au/video/Round%206%20EC%202007/race%203%20round%206%20EC%202007.wmv
http://www.trentwallis.com/gallery/view_photo.php?full=1&set_albumName=IProO2L06&id=TWB_8329web
Luckily no one was seriously injured, just a few bruises and a sore neck, and very big repair bills :(

Was a great weekend for team Supra though;

Had my first oil spin thanks to one of the GTR's dropping diff oil into turn 7. Coming out of turn 5 I saw dust in the distance, so looked over to my left to the flaggies to see what was going on. Green flag, no problem, kept the boot in it, hard onto the brakes through the kink at 6 aiming for a late apex into 7, go to turn in and around she goes, suddenly I'm facing the wrong direction with the Commodore I passed on the previous lap coming through the oil sideways straight at me. Luckily he saw me spin so was able to back off before the corner and kept it together. Now what? Time to try one of those flick spins the V8 boys are always doing. Give er some revs, drop the clutch, turn the wheel and around I go! WOOHOO! Eat your heart out Skaify!! Now to catch that Commodore again, no way I'm coming last! Managed to work my way back onto his tail coming into turn 11 on the second last lap, slipstreamed him down the straight and took him easily on the inside into turn 1 :)

Had some great racing over the weekend with the Commodore, the BMW and even dicing with one of the GTR's in race 3! Admittedly he was running only 1 of 2 diffs, so only 2wd instead of 4wd, still... ;)

The Supra with the new Turbo (see link below) seemed a little under power in the upper rev range though, so my laptimes were down a little from where I expected, but it ran reliably and came home with nothing broken and no scratches or dents, so can't complain. A little more modification and a dyno tune before the next outing at Wakefield Park should solve this.
http://www.techmasters.com.au/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2513

So I had my first 'Days of Thunder' moment, my first oil spin, did my first 180 degree flick spin, did my first slip stream pass, and brought it all home without a scratch.

All in all a very successful weekend, and a hell of a lot of fun :)

Again big thanks to Dad for all his help, especially helping pull off and refitting the turbo on the Wednesday night and all day Friday. We didn't have it all back together until 7:30pm Friday night! Thanks again to Matt for helping out trackside. A big thanks to Pete down at Repco Bankstown for all his help and some great prices on all the gear I needed to re engineer the cooling system. And a very big thanks to John at Precision Turbos in Wetherill Park for rebuilding my turbo for me at no notice literally overnight. Seriously we dropped it off to him at 2:30pm on Thursday and he had it back to us fully rebuilt, brand new at 10am on Friday morning! Very impressed!

Now for Wakefield Park :)

PS: Check the following links for some new pics of the Supra in action!!
http://www.trentwallis.com/gallery/view_photo.php?full=1&set_albumName=IProO2L06&id=TWB_8307web
http://www.trentwallis.com/gallery/view_photo.php?full=1&set_albumName=IProO2L06&id=TWB_8400web
http://www.trentwallis.com/gallery/view_photo.php?full=1&set_albumName=IProO2L06&id=TWB_8403web


Cheers,

Supra Shane

[stav]

Hi Shane,

Some great footage and photos. That sure was one hairy moment on the super quick turn one. In car footage gives an awesome view point. Great driving to avoid the situation, especially when you found yourself on the green stuff.

What kind of times did you get around EC?

-- Stav.

[Shane001]

Sorry Stav, as per my post that wasn't my footage, I was several cars back.

Only got 1:52's this weekend. Car is previously good for as low as 1:49's. I was running used tyres though and she needs a good tune with the new turbo now. Confident of getting it back below 1:50 next time out :)

[Shane001]

And it was my first time at EC and only my second event in the car, so not too bad all things considered ;)

[Scotty]

Shane,

Wow... that looked pretty hairy... well doen for getting through... its a good example of how things can go wrong very quickly...

It would be good to see you at the next track day... and we need to organise some Trackchat Stickers on your beast.

Scotty

PS what are the specs of the Supra?

[MY Racing 221]

Well done Shane. EC takes a while to learn so you've done well for your first outing there. Looked like you were racing well too.

You need an in-car camera in the Supra now!

[CarlFST60L]

Buy one of these!

http://www.cameraaction.com.au/products4b.asp?sku=177995&dept=64

I have one, they are great, easy to use... (Although mine randomly turns off)
I have looked at doing a group buy, you can get them for $175ea if you buy 10, I also looked at importing, but they have an MOQ of 3000pcs.

Sample footage

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKMLinb17Fc

The quality is about double the quality of that Youtube video, for $199, I wouldn't expect any more.

[NickS]

Sample footage

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKMLinb17Fc

The quality is about double the quality of that Youtube video, for $199, I wouldn't expect any more.

Nothing wrong with your oil pressure ....

I see your oil temp is sitting on around 105, mine hit 150 at Wakefield in the GTS ... :shock:

[CarlFST60L]

Nothing wrong with your oil pressure ....

I see your oil temp is sitting on around 105, mine hit 150 at Wakefield in the GTS ... :shock:

Yeah, my temp went off the clock a couple of times at wakefield after only 4/5 laps... Poor thing only had 1000km on the clock :whip:

[Aeron]

Shane, here are a few pics I took at the track after the crash...

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i276/photosbyaeron/NSW%20Race%20Champ%20Eastern%20Creek%202007/DSC_6136.jpg

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i276/photosbyaeron/NSW%20Race%20Champ%20Eastern%20Creek%202007/DSC_6139.jpg

There are more here... http://www.trackchat.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=1546

This is the only pic I have of the Supra...

http://i74.photobucket.com/albums/i276/photosbyaeron/NSW%20Race%20Champ%20Eastern%20Creek%202007/ZDSC_5958.jpg

[MY Racing 221]

Buy one of these!

http://www.cameraaction.com.au/products4b.asp?sku=177995&dept=64

I have one, they are great, easy to use... (Although mine randomly turns off)
I have looked at doing a group buy, you can get them for $175ea if you buy 10, I also looked at importing, but they have an MOQ of 3000pcs.

Sample footage

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKMLinb17Fc

The quality is about double the quality of that Youtube video, for $199, I wouldn't expect any more.

Looks good... could be an option for a rearward facing camera, or maybe even a bumper cam... or a foot cam!:bravo:

[Shane001]

Well done Shane. EC takes a while to learn so you've done well for your first outing there. Looked like you were racing well too.

You need an in-car camera in the Supra now!

Thanks mate, learning so much so quick, helps to keep getting thrown in the deep end :)

Camera is on my list, but got a lot more items on that same list ahead of it, so probably won't be till next year for that. Gotta do some more work on the turbo setup and get er dyno'd for Wakefield, then I might have a look at the brake setup. Also need to get a higher diff ratio for Bathurst next year, otherwise I'll be screaming on the red line half way down Conrod!

Aeron, nice pic (of the Supra that is, heart sinks looking at the other 2), got quite a few good pics out of EC, pity I didn't have time to give er a wash before hand though :headbang:

[Hazza]

Good evasive driving. Alot of damage to that RX7, yikes.

This has to be the most fun with your pants on. Can't wait to get into it.

Regarding Bathurst, I assume you will be off your Provisional's by then Shane?

[Shane001]

Hopefully, got 2 out of 5 signatures down, 2 more events this year then hopefully one before Bathurst next year and I'm right to go. Gonna be a big effort to make it to Bathurst at Easter though, but that's what I'm aiming for. Also no guarantee even with an NC that I'll get a run, there's already 80+ EOI's for currently only 1x 51 car grid, and there's a lot of guys been around a lot longer than me that deserve a shot at it first, so have to keep the fingers crossed :yep:

[seldo]

..........broken and spinning cars on the left, spinning cars on the right, and a huge wall of dust blocking out the center of the track!! What do I do? Can't go left, can't go right, can't hit the brakes as I've got cars right on my tail, all I can do is back off the accelerator and drive blind straight through the cloud of dust and hope for the best... Supra Shane
For what it's worth - you'll find that generally a car will tend to spin towards the inside of the corner, so if you have to toss the coin in a nanosecond, choose the outside...

[Shane001]

mmm, don't know, I think it would depend on where in the corner the spin starts and also what caused the spin in the first place.

In this instance, the RX7 seen being tagged spun off to the outside of turn one. Also if you have a close look at the first video, the only reason the Commodore spun back onto and across the track was because as it was flat spinning to the outside of the track, the rear wheels ended in the dirt while the front wheels were still on tarmac, less friction on the rears, the flat spin became a pivot spin around the axis created by the front wheels still on tarmac and the whole rear of the car basically did a 180 around the front wheels bringing the whole car back into the racing line, that's when all the carnage began :(

I think in most level circuit corner spins, I'd be more inclined to head to the inside. In NASCAR types events gravity plays a big role and so the cars do tend to spin down the track, aka "Stay High COLE!!", but in flat circuit racing, the 'impulse'(?) of the car through a corner is to the outside, not the inside...

But I could be wrong ;)

[seldo]

mmm, don't know, I think it would depend on where in the corner the spin starts and also what caused the spin in the first place.

In this instance, the RX7 seen being tagged spun off to the outside of turn one. Also if you have a close look at the first video, the only reason the Commodore spun back onto and across the track was because as it was flat spinning to the outside of the track, the rear wheels ended in the dirt while the front wheels were still on tarmac, less friction on the rears, the flat spin became a pivot spin around the axis created by the front wheels still on tarmac and the whole rear of the car basically did a 180 around the front wheels bringing the whole car back into the racing line, that's when all the carnage began :(

I think in most level circuit corner spins, I'd be more inclined to head to the inside. In NASCAR types events gravity plays a big role and so the cars do tend to spin down the track, aka "Stay High COLE!!", but in flat circuit racing, the 'impulse'(?) of the car through a corner is to the outside, not the inside...

But I could be wrong ;)
I didn't watch the vid, so wasn't referring to this particular incident. But 20 years' of a little bit of hands-on experience tells me that generally, in a single-car "over-cooking-it" spin, the car will tend to to spin to the inside initially... I offer the info - use it if you wish...:)

[Shane001]

No worries Seldo :) I appreciate u sharing your experience with a newbie to motor racing, wasn't trying to come across as suggesting you were wrong. Hopefully I won't run into too many of these incidences to have to worry about it ;)