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Thread: ECR Recap

  1. #1
    Senior Member Grass-Passer
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    ECR Recap

    This was a long week for Flying Bandito Racing and #34. Thanksgiving/XMAS decorating and family stuff got in the way of any weekend work on the car prior to Sunday before the event. Started Monday night with a light rewire of the interior to try and figure out why the car kept having weird ignition events — eventually found the ignition relay and relay socket were bad as well as a bad ignition switch and a few other things I’m forgetting. Worked until 1am from M-Wed when we loaded up.

    Work duty called and I missed half the test day due to having to attend some conference calls in the ever swanky Decatur La Quinta hotel room. Returned for the afternoon to find awful brake moan from the new rear pads (diff compound) and a very pushy car. Removed rear spacers to fix the push, scotchbrited the rotors to try and make the moan better (it wasn’t) and the test day was over.

    Saturday qualified on pole with a 2:11.8 with Mosty .033 back and Martin just over .1.

    Race one my reptilian brain decided a burnout would be cool on the start and Mosty got by me for the lead — I worked hard to stay with him but missed the tire pressures and there was nothing I could do to get close enough to make a move. Coming out of the last turn for the checkered flag I went for third and found out it was now a neutral as well as 4th so I coasted across the line and now own a 3 speed Astro with 1,2, and 5th gears.

    Race 2 since I was in the points battle with John decided to start and park and collect what points I could before changing the tranny. My spare is a 10-spline input shaft versus the Astro’s 26 and a clutch change would take too long between races. Matt White let me borrow the lift in his stacker after the race to change it out which made that job infinitely easier and Ryan Mcfall stuck with me and helped me with the whole job which was awesome and a huge time saver. Ended up taking us over 3 hours due to a galled starter bolt that fought us for over an hour. Eventually heat and vice grips won the war though. Huge thanks to Matt and Ryan for the help!

    Then it rained Sunday night. Qualifying was akin to driving on Vaseline, a total blast and the CMC field outqualified every SU car which was funny. I almost hit a thunder roadster who decided the apex of T3 was a good place to stop and smell the Roses and killed my fast lap, but qualified P3 behind Martin and White.

    Race 3 was absolute insanity. Mosty and I touched tire to tire leaving 13A resulting in me going agricultural for a hot minute and losing a spot, then managing to catch back up and get into the lead. Last lap Curtis tried a hero move on the inside of the left hander to the back straight that I wasn’t prepared to cover and got the lead. Going into 14 he got his RR on the curbing and spun the car around handing me the lead and the race win.

    Race 4 was also wild. I think there was contact in 3 of the 8 remaining cars (I stayed clean this one) and Gernon led most of the race until an impressive spin leaving turn 15. At that point it was Curtis in P1 and me P2 leaving a battle of the #34’s. He had some axle hop into T1 which gave me an easy pass for the lead and was able to hold on and win R4.

    Great weekend.

    As most of you know I’ll be moving to the newly created American Muscle Car Masters series next year and hope it’s half as much fun as this weekend of CMC racing was. I’ll also add that there’s no way I’d still be racing if it wasn’t for the CMC paddock and looking forward to hanging out with you all almost as much as racing every race weekend.
    Daniel Records
    CMC # 34

  2. #2
    Senior Member Carroll Shelby
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    So, I guess prep for ECR 2020 started for me sometime back in 2006 or so when I saw how you goobers stick together and race so close and hard in CMC. All those years running in AI in the same race group, but watching from a distance having our own "battles" on other parts of the track, but always somewhat wondering what 6 or 10+ car battles would be like. Had a couple of those experiences in AI National Championship races in 2008 and 2009 but those usually still got strung out with gaps. Then in early 2018 we got the opportunity to snag Glenn's old 4th gen after it hibernated in a garage here in College Station for over a year while that Owner wanted to race in CMC but never got a free weekend to do so. For a couple years we raced it in WRL with a couple former CMC racers and had a blast doing it. All along I kept the car as close to CMC spec as possible if I ever got the chance to just pull the trigger and do a weekend with you guys. Well, the "stars aligned" and our entry for the WRL event at CoTA which was also this past weekend got put on a very long wait list and I got tired of the layer of dust on the car and decided to finish Misty's ASA car and prep the Camaro for the NASA event. Well, I got both done but the ASA car was a bit of a basket case suspension wise so we left it at home which turned out to be a blessing....because suffice to say, I was a bit rusty at this NASA sprint race weekend stuff with just ONE car. Two would have been a disaster especially with one being a new to us basket case.

    We arrived Thursday around 5pm and got settled in. This was my first NASA event in 5 years and our welcome back was met with Will asking us to be the asshole that closes the gate at 10pm. When have I ever turned down the opportunity to be an asshole?! LOL! Friday morning rolls around Misty drove the car on some street tires in practice to knock off some cobwebs because she hasn't been on track in a couple years at this point and she promptly spun the car in T11 on lap 1. Woohoo! got that out of the way. I ran the last session on Friday to scuff in a brand new set of RR's which was my first session ever on a new set and I was happy to say that I went slower than I did on a 3 year old set Jerry Jordan gave me while I was getting some CBP just two weeks prior. I apparenlty unlocked an achievement we will never discuss again.

    Saturday morning sun up and someone forgot to turn on the heat. It was 30 or 31F. Daniel starts his car and it looks like he is doing a burnout from the exhaust steam. I fire up the defroster on the windshield and warm up the car. Guess at some tire pressures and go qual an impressive 7th. Thankfully someone weighs 4# under and I get bumped to 6th and get robbed of the opportunity to scream "I WAS SEVENTH!!!".... My first standing start since 2007 or 2008! WOW! First in this car. Mostly super happy the 10 bolt didn't explode. Launched at 1800. dead hook. Anyway, Race 1 was very uneventful and finished 6th. Yay...I finished.

    Race 2. car pushed like hell in race 1, took off the big front sway bar and put the medium bar on. reconnected the rear bar. started inside of row 2. cobwebs are gone now and the starter flinches and I am gone. I own T1 and lead most of the race. I think Mosty gets me in T15 of the second to last lap. I take 2nd. I've destroyed the right front tire at this point. They have 5 heat cycles.

    It starts raining at about 3:20am on Sunday morning and finishes around 5:30am. I put a new tire on the right front hoping to cycle it in during practice and have it ready for qual. THAT plan is out the window. Thunder and Blitz warm up combine and there are less than 10 of us on track. I throw a set of rains on the car and go out to recon the wet track to see just how diabolical it is. VERY. Oddly there is no advantage of a wet vs. dry line. Curtis and McFall go out on RR's and we are all pretty close so the rains are not an advantage. I let McFall go by and he promptly looks for a route to Dallas off track right at T11 and I do my best impression of formula D championship through the canyon section. In prep for Qual I put RR's back on hoping the sun would dry the track some and HPDE traffic would move some of the water. it helped but....

    Sunday qual. I got to grid later than I wanted and the ST/SU guys were all in front as were Martin, Mosty, Curtis and Records. Damn it. We get on track and it seems like the RR's are WAY better than the rains were so I get with it and start hunting for grip...and find it. Mosty, Curtis and Records point me by and most of the ST/SU field are doing 30-40% at best. Track starts drying as the laps wear on so time are dropping and I can see I'm gaining each lap on Martin. On the last lap (fast lap) I got balked by a radical between T12 and T13 for a solid 3 seconds so not sure what that translates into lap time but at the end of the session Martin took pole with me trailing by .494s. Not often CMC takes the overall pole!

    Race 3, standing start. Martin takes the inside and becomes the meat in a Records and White sandwich. I take T1 and run for my life. The next 5 laps are the most intense defensive driving I think I've ever had to do in my career but I'd like to think it was clean and respectful and I did my best to leave more than enough room. By the last two laps, I had boiled the rear tires off the car running so defensive and lost 3 or 4 spots. Bryan Curtis went off late in front of me and I ended up 3rd.

    Race 4 Invert. I had an amazing start and ran up the inside of just about everyone. The wall was quite close and I had to hold my ground as McFall was being moved over from someone 3 lanes to the left so there was a slight contact. somehow I cleared all that and got up to 2nd or 3rd had a slew of Mustangs lining up to take swings at the last step on the podium. It started getting comical after a while because every one that tried to out brake me ended up going long, ran out of track or made a mistake and went off. Misty said it looked like I had a Mustang Death Ray on the front of the car from up in the stands. Not Jander flew by me in T11 like he forgot to turn the JATO's off and I giggled all the way through the Canyon section and most of the next lap. Was the main reason Jerry Jordan was able to sneak by in T15....only to throw himself off the track under brakes shortly after in Turn 3. Seriously, I'm putting a button marked "Mustang Death Ray" on the dash!!! Again, 2nd funnest race in my life only to Race #3!

    Hats off to the group and yeah....I have been bitten. I didn't get anything done for work today because I'm sitting here thinking about what I need to do to get this car up to 2021 instead of 2015. I need to figure this out....
    Last edited by AI#97; 12-07-2020 at 10:12 PM.
    Ah, fugg it.

  3. #3
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    Fun rear view of the last race... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MlVwMgUWFQ

  4. #4
    Senior Member Carroll Shelby
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    Only race that I got the camera to come on was race 4. Just a smooth Sunday drive. Need to overlay some raygun sounds for the last couple laps when the mustangs spin or go off in front of me!!! https://youtu.be/Eie4UxEqHrI
    Ah, fugg it.

  5. #5
    Senior Member Carroll Shelby
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    Wish I could have come out to ECR to see everyone! I had a bizarre dream Sat night, Richardson and Francis were hooning a 4dr sedan around ECR, I jumped in the car and my added weight caused the brakes to fail and we went backwards down the hill across FM 51, everyone was ok though!
    Tyler Gardner
    CMC #13 2015-2017
    SM #013 2018
    www.dfwmustangs.net

  6. #6
    Senior Member Carroll Shelby ShadowBolt's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by mach1 View Post
    Wish I could have come out to ECR to see everyone! I had a bizarre dream Sat night, Richardson and Francis were hooning a 4dr sedan around ECR, I jumped in the car and my added weight caused the brakes to fail and we went backwards down the hill across FM 51, everyone was ok though!
    Was it a Camry?

  7. #7
    Senior Member Carroll Shelby Fbody383's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by mach1 View Post
    I had a bizarre dream Sat night, Richardson and Francis were hooning a 4dr sedan around ECR...
    That hits too close to home... Camry was never completely backward, must have been somebody else.
    #39 CMC Camaro
    Orange is Fast!
    CMC-NT01 FTW!

  8. #8
    Senior Member Carroll Shelby AllZWay's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by ShadowBolt View Post
    Was it a Camry?
    I have that nightmare too.

  9. #9
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    Made a recap video. Lots of excitement this weekend, lots of really hard racing as well. So much fun!

    https://youtu.be/ACMDhtDxel0
    Daniel Records
    CMC # 34

  10. #10
    Senior Member Carroll Shelby
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    Quote Originally Posted by drecords View Post
    Made a recap video. Lots of excitement this weekend, lots of really hard racing as well. So much fun!

    https://youtu.be/ACMDhtDxel0
    Nice video, great racing, congratulations on the wins!!
    Tyler Gardner
    CMC #13 2015-2017
    SM #013 2018
    www.dfwmustangs.net

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