So I've had a day or so to decompress after the Goodguys 21st Southwest Nationals and thought I'd share my feelings. Last spring I attended my very first Good Guys autocross and loved it, but I knew I had to make some changes to my car so it would handle this kind of course better. With a much stiffer front sway bar to control the roll better, bump stops to limit front suspension travel to keep front tires off the fenders, and steering stops to keep the front tires off the frame...I felt we were ready. After watching the first run, Chris Smith suggested a major shock change, then we made another major shock change after the 2nd run...picking up almost a second on each subsequent run. Before the 4th run we made one more major change going to the stiffer front bar setting and it woke the car up. That run got me within 0.162 seconds of making the top 32 spots and the Duel in the Desert and I'm pretty happy with that. I'm certain that if I had a few more runs in the heat with that last change, I could have gotten into the show.
I have to talk a bit about my StopTech big brake kit on the car. I still run a 1985 master cylinder and booster along with a 1985 disc\drum distribution valve aided only by an add on rear brake proportioning valve and the Stoptech brakes. With the rest of the car now very sorted, I can adjust the front to rear bias with about a turn and a half on the prop valve, going from locking the fronts first to locking the rears first...or somewhere in between. And this brake pad\rotor combination works perfectly...ice cold to last lap on a 20 minute road course track session including low dust street driving. I've had them on the car for a year now with a LOT of events under my belt and the pads and rotors still look almost brand new. Stoptech is adding more and more muscle car application brackets to adapt their big brake kits to the cars we love...and I highly recommend them as a fantastic all around brake package.
The new R-Joints from RideTech in the rear suspension really helped tame the back down. I had zero issues with lifting the rear tire last weekend. In fact, I never touched an adjustment on the rear of the car all weekend...it just flat out worked. The new valving in the Ridetech shocks worked out great as well. I now have a base setting to make them perform great on both big SCCA style courses as well as tight tough Good Guys style courses...with just a slight twist of a couple knobs.
The rest of the car just did what it does...horsepower is good, all systems held up to the abuse, FORGELINE wheels look awesome, and the car seemed to be right in line time wise with the rest of the owner\driver cars in a stacked field of competitors from across the Country. The driver actually needs more work now than the car does in order to really be competitive.
Here's a video of my fast lap of the weekend.
Thanks to Allison for taking the picture below, can't wait for a few more on track pics to make their way to the web for viewing since I know there were several great photogs there snapping pics.
Now I'm on to getting ready for the next event...once I rest up..