Racing: Redline Time Attack Aug 29-30th at Englishtown NJ

[cul8tr]

Hello, I just wanted to introduce myself. Although I have been a

mini owner for about 5 years this is my first step into the online Mini world.

 

I just wanted to share with other Mini enthusiasts in the DC AREA to the world of Time Attack. Since I was the only Mini there I thought it was good to see what these little cars could do against the big boys. I hope to see you all at an event soon. My comments on the event are below.

 

Big Thanks to Brian Downey at Auto Expectations in Dulles, VA with helping me prepare for the event. They are good people and know how to prepare cars for driving events from 30 years of racing Datsuns.

 

Thanks for the space. :top:

Michael Ko

_______________________________________________________________

 

I have not competed since 2007 and I decided to take my R53 Mini out of its DD duties and finally see what it could do. I always knew it was very nimble and great on Auto X courses, but also knew that it had a tough time keeping up with many of its Japanese FWD rivals with turbo's on big road courses. When RTA decided to start a stock class for FWD cars this year and hold the event at the tight Englishtown Road Course on Sunday August 30th, I knew I had a chance to win it even though it really didn't count for any series championship.

 

Here are a few things about my car:

 

2004 MCS with the following mods done back in 2004 when I bought the car new with 15 miles and had everything installed by Mike at Mach V.

 

Alta 15% Pulley

Alta Intercooler

Alta One Ball Can Exhaust

Miltec Header with cat

Stock Suspension and bars

Stock Alignment from factory (never touched)

Stop Tech 12.9" Front Brakes

Momo Corse 18x7.5 Wheels with AVON Tech 500 Summer tires (Hey they are English)

Upgraded special Dual Friction Full face Clutch from South Bend Clutch - No chatter like a puck style and not too aggressive. I like it.

Qaife Diff - That is all they had at the time. I know the Cusco is better.

Orciari body kit with body color match & clear factory tailights

 

Sadly, I still have the stock tune. Like most Mini owners in the DC area we are quite limited to ECU tuning for R53's. I tried a shark injector when it came out in 2004 and it made the car run worse than stock. It also caused it to start throwing codes. I decided that the car ran ok with the stock tune

and just delt with the crappy throttle response and lack of top end. I am still researching on my options.

 

RTA NJ This Weekend....

 

I arrived at the track on Sunday morning after driving 4 hours from DC to find out that the Sat. Practice was a pretty soggy one. It was basically raining on and off all day with huge downpours from time to time.

Luckily on Sunday morning the rain stopped, but it was still very cloudy when I arrived. With no idea where the pit out was I just followed a few people cars that went out and followed them. The first session was quite a hairy one. With DSC turned off the course was very inconsistent in many areas since they decided to pave the track in what seemed like quarter mile sections combining new and old pavement. In between the pavement connections asphalt was crumbling in many of the critical braking areas making it tricky. Ohh well just deal with it right? I just put on these new AVON tires on and found them to be an excellent tire for rain, low noise on the highway and a great riding tire considering my last setup was on Pirelli's with a rock hard ride. For track tires I don't recommend them but this car is just my DD and grocery getter and they are cheap. Just before I started I decided to fill up on 5 gallons of 100 octane unleaded Sunoco race fuel mixed in with pump as a safety precaution since I was on the stock tune. From my experience, I decided to short shift and rev no higher then 6k since I could not afford to have any breakdowns (my ride home). Several cars later in the day blew motors, turbos, trannies, scredded tires, etc. It was a lot of mechanical carnage, so my earlier decision to take it easy and not risk it paid off.

 

The morning practice session was still very wet and it drizzled a little on a few laps but the weather soon got sunny. My fastest lap was a 1 min 27 sec. Not bad considering I had no idea of where the entry or exit points were. I made some adjustments on air pressure for the next round and ran a best of 1 Min 23 sec on my second practice. On both practices I had my girlfriend with me so I guess I was just taking it easy since it was her first time on a track.

 

The first round of real timed laps came around 11:00 AM. Well I guess I got a little too excited when the green flag dropped. I overcooked my first left turn off the front straight coming in around 110mph and the car understeered badly. I missed my apex by a few feet and went off course went into the wet grass.I nearly went into the main concrete wall area. Fortunately I saved it, but I almost pissed in my pants...lol Anyway I let a yellow EVO that was behind me by and began to follow him to use as an eye marker since I had very little track time (about 6 laps). By pacing a faster car I was able to clean up my lines and post a fastest 1 min 21.5 sec. I later realized that the reason the I nearly lost the car was that the stock suspension was wallowing badly and I badly needed some better control and stiffer springs. The stock stuff may ride rough on the street but the track it felt like a Cadillac. I knew that coming in that was the limiting factor as well as the "no power" after 6k rpm so I had to short shift the whole track. Just having fun? Yeah right I wanted to go faster and those handicaps really made it hard.

To put the times in better perspective a fully modded 2300lb Scion XA with a built motor, turbo kit, Progress Coilovers, 190whp 200wtq, on Toyo Street tires got a 1 min 19 sec lap time. The top FWD street class car was a 450whp Neon SRT 4 with 285 30 18's all around. This car is well sorted car with a Koni race suspension, gutted interior and pulled an amazing 1min 14 sec lap time. Well at least I beat a stock 2007 S2000 with an experienced driver behind the wheel (he is a local).I got him by .5 sec. I hate it when people make excuses afterwards. He was kinda hurt and told me his tires were worn out or something. I also beat a stock 98 Mustang GT with big tires on it. Hey you win some you lose some. I was just having some fun.

 

Fortunately, I knew early on I had no chance in the STREET FWD class because power mods were basically unlimited as long as you hid them well. Many of the top cars had at least 350whp (yes to the front wheels) I decided to enter the STOCK FWD. Won First Place even though I was the only competitor. Even if I went to the STREET FWD class I would have place 5th out of 10 cars in the class.

Not bad considering I drove this car for all it was worth. .

 

Some comments on the AVON Tires. They are great for spirited driving but don't use these tires on a track. They chunk and the stock alignment didn't help with sidewall life but hey I just wanted to see what the car could do I went away very satisfied with the overall performance. As for weight I supposed the car weighs around 2700lbs. All I need now is a good tune and it will really rock on the top end.

 

I attached a few photos of the car at he event as well as other cars that attended including a few new modded new GTR's. The AWD cars were to top dogs as usual. FTD was a 1 Min 7 sec run by AMS driven by the "Alien" Mark Daddio.

 

RESULTS:

 

Overall:

Mark Daddio - AMS Performance/NOS Energy Mitsubishi Evo X - 1:07.222

 

Overall Unlimited:

Mark Daddio - AMS Performance/NOS Energy Mitsubishi Evo X - 1:07.222

 

Overall Modified:

Ryan Gates - Gates311.com/AMS Performance Mitsubishi Evo X - 1:09.156

 

Overall Street:

Tony Weisenhahn - Turn In Concepts Subaru WRX - 1:12.643

 

Overall Stock:

Anthony Perry - Dent Sport Garage Mitsubishi Evo - 1:15.661

 

Unlimited AWD:

1 Mark Daddio - AMS Performance/NOS Energy Mitsubishi Evo X - 1:07.222

2 Phil Grabow - Element Tuning Subaru STI - 1:10.498

3 Bary Bodine - Draco Performance Subaru STI - 1:21.759

 

Unlimited RWD:

1 Jeff Ricca - 240SX Motoring Nissan 240SX - 1:12.821

2 Ben Salasko - Honda S2000 - 1:13.101

3 Ramana Lagemann - Dent Sport Garage/Stance/BFGoodrich Nissan 240SX - 1:13.277

 

Modified AWD:

1 Ryan Gates - Gates311.com/AMS Performance Mitsubishi Evo X - 1:09.156

2 Whit Staples - Fortune Auto Mitsubishi Evo - 1:11.027

3 James Elterman - Takata Time Attack Subaru STI - 1:11.997

4 Sharif Abdelbaset - Forged Performance Nissan R35 GTR - 1:12.042

5 Ryan Doi - CBRD/Blouch Turbo/JMFabrications Mitsubishi Evo - 1:13.286

6 Ron Adams - DSG/Visual Assault/Tomei Subaru Impreza - 1:13.422

7 Jay Stoops - Forged Performance Nissan GTR - 1:13.831

 

Modifed RWD:

1 Thomas Hiromoto - Fuji Racing Mazda Miata - 1:14.717

2 Ryan Tuerck - Gardella Racing Pontiac Solstice - 1:15.856

3 Antonio Gigante - Wired Chevrolet Corvette Z06 - 1:16.663

4 Dave Hary - S-Max/RT Tuning Nissan 240SX - 1:19.641

 

Modified FWD:

1 Ross Miller - Ptuning/Lustine Scion Scion tC - 1:15.744

2 Jose Mercado - Acura RSX - 1:16.876

3 Eric Cheng - Acura Integra - 1:17.688

4 Steven Ansty - Westbury Scion/J&J Associates Scion tC - 1:18.480

5 Nicholas Leung - Dent Sport Garage Acura Integra - 1:19.156

 

Street AWD:

1 Tony Weisenhahn - Turn In Concepts Subaru WRX - 1:12.643

2 Jake Namer - Hamfist Racing Subaru STI - 1:14.384

3 Barry Bodine - Draco Performance Subaru STI - 1:14.458

4 Brian Golstein - Hamfist Racing Subaru STI - 1:15.086

5 Daniel O'Donnell - MA Performance/Professional Awesome Mitsubishi Evo - 1:15.514

6 Alex Sharanevych - Slick Motorsports Mitsubishi Evo - 1:15.813

7 Scott Nelson - DG Motorsports Mitsubishi Evo IX - 1:16.495

8 Ian Pemental - Ptuning Subaru STI - 1:19.621

9 Mike Rossey - FISIX Motorsports Subaru WRX - 1:19.690

10 Alexander Neves Jr. - Ptuning Mitsubishi Evo VIII - 1:20.901

11 Steve Baez - Mitsubishi Evolution IX - 1:22.646

12 Aaron Lee - Wired Subaru Impreza - 1:28.701

 

Street RWD:

1 Jeff Bender - Tri-State Racing Nissan Nismo 350Z - 1:16.299

2 Brandon Anandan - Nissan 350Z - 1:18.135

3 Joseph Richichi - Nissan 350Z - 1:18.992

4 Eugene Ho - Nissan 350Z - 1:19.029

5 John Cui - Honda S2000 - 1:21.157

6 Luis Milan - Nissan 240SX - 1:22.261

7 Suchat Suwannakam - Ptuning Nissan 240SX - 1:25.432

 

Street FWD:

1 Doug Wind - Forced Performance/Continental Tire Dodge Neon SRT-4 - 1:16.206

2 Nik Bender - Tri-State Racing Honda Civic Si - 1:17.582

3 Gary Fratianne - SeriousSpeed/Hawk/Fidanza/CPE Mazdaspeed3 - 1:19.421

4 Justin Crenshaw - Ptuning Scion xA - 1:19.515

5 Nick Garbau - DSG Honda Accord - 1:21.301

6 Wimmer Cui - Wired Honda Civic - 1:25.576

7 Nino Perez - Wired Honda Fit - 1:28.419

 

Stock AWD:

1 Anthony Perry - Dent Sport Garage Mitsubishi Evo - 1:15.661

2 Kahlee Aguilar-Ramos - Subaru Legacy - 1:20.108

3 John Torres - Mitsubishi Evo X MR - 1:21.716

 

Stock RWD:

1 Raphael Santos - Nissan 240SX - 1:21.092

2 Bryan Hedian - Honda S2000 - 1:21.814

3 AJ Hartman - Ford Mustang GT - 1:22.109

 

Stock FWD:

1 Michael Ko - DTM MINI Cooper - 1:21.544

 

 

New 2009 Overall Street Class East Champion:

Tony Weisenhahn - Turn In Concepts Subaru WRX

 

New 2009 Overall Street Class AWD East Champion:

Tony Weisenhahn - Turn In Concepts Subaru WRX

 

New 2009 Overall Street Class RWD East Champion:

Gregory Haye - Challenge/GTMotoring/Bridgestone Honda S2000

 

New 2009 Overall Street Class FWD East Champion:

Douglas Wind - Forced Performance/Continental Tire Dodge Neon SRT-4

 

New 2009 Overall Stock Class East Champion:

Brian Flannagan - Tracks Unlimited/Fastech Nissan 350Z

 

New 2009 Overall Stock Class AWD East Champion:

Anthony Perry - Dent Sport Garage Mitsubishi Evo

 

New 2009 Overall Stock Class RWD East Champion:

Brian Flannagan - Tracks Unlimited/Fastech Nissan 350Z

 

New 2009 Overall Stock Class FWD East Champion: Tie

Shane Simmin - Honda Civic Si

Michael Ko - DTM MINI Cooper

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 2, 2009 by cul8tr

[Isadinho]

sorry to bring this from the dead, but I really enjoyed this post. Im really looking forward to make this mini win some events!

[Scavenger]

Seeing that this is his ONLY post and it's been almost two years ago, I doubt it's going anywhere.

[Isadinho]

I meant my mini

[Pazuzu]

I just noticed this. I take my 09 JCW to the track and often am the only MINI there ( I have never done a time attack) , had the JCW to NJ Motorsports Thunderbolt last Thurs -a pretty fast track, with Mustang Challenge Cup cars, Lotus Elise, M3s and the JCW did great. I hope to see more MINI's on track.Good luck with you Time Attack!

MARK

[FWD or Bust]

While I'm not currently involved with racing, once I get my full set up, it is something I am very interested in. I'll have to pick your brain when the time comes.