The OneLapCamaro - Thoughts on SEMA and the Optima Invitational

[James OLC]

Now that I we are home and the OneLapCamaro is safely home and in my garage (awaiting some trouble shooting and a transmission tear down) I thought that I would post some thoughts, comments, and pictures from the last couple of weeks.
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As many of you know (or now know) we were invited by Optima Batteries to attend the SEMA show as their guest. We had been working to have the car ready for the show since mid-summer but it is amazing how quickly the show came up on us. About three weeks before the show I was ready to throw in the towel – I even went so far as to warn Optima that I wouldn’t be able to attend – because the last thing that I wanted to do was bring a car that was incomplete or less than satisfactory to anyone – including myself. After a long weekend of discussions around the shop - and across the country – we decided to pull out all of the stops and make a no-holds-barred run to get the car ready to go to ‘Vegas. At that point in time the car wasn’t running, wasn’t wired, had no glass in it, had no hood and was, to be honest, a long ways away from being together.



Chris Heighton at Heighton Restorations pulled out all of the stops, both personally and at his shop in Beiseker, Alberta, to get the car together in time for the SEMA show. For three weeks my days consisted of getting up in the morning, going to work, and then heading out to the shop until midnight to thrash on the car. Chris’s days were often 16 or 20 hours a day working to get the car together. Weekends were set aside, wives were abandoned, and everyone who we could recruit was called upon. I redid the tally today - in those three weeks before loading up the trailer we put no less than 600 hours into the build. We got the wheel alignment done at 1 in the morning a week before the show so we could test drive the car before the final assembly; when it was time to do the test drive, it was snowing but we went on with it anyways. Shane and Don at the shop set their own plans aside to help out in the last week - I can’t thank them enough for that – to make this happen.

[James OLC]

On Thursday morning before the show we loaded the trailer up and hit the road to Las Vegas. Calgary and Las Vegas are, strange as it may seem, a direct route practically from door to door. My driving directions were, essentially, turn on I15 and drive 1200 miles to the strip. No turns, no side roads, nothing but climb this hill, go over that mountain and stop when the neon lights get really bright. The 24 hours that we spent in the truck together was more time than my wife and I had spent together in the last month but, around noon on Saturday we arrived at American Touring Specialties.



On Saturday afternoon I had the pleasure of spending time with Curtis, AJ, Steve C, Steve R, and a host of others including Blake and the guys from Killer Customs before reluctantly skipping the evening cruise to try to catch up on some sleep.

Sunday morning it was back at ATS to meet the guys from Optima and help out however I could at the shop – which probably wasn’t much – before heading to the convention center to move into the show. Before heading over we snapped a couple of pictures with Penny and the ATS shop car in the parking lot…

[James OLC]

Sunday afternoon we got moved into the show and set up – we actually ran out of gas as the front tires hit the carpet because we spent what seemed like an eternity driving around the convention center trying to get to the right entry door. Monday we cleaned up the car and got a sneak peak around the show without the hoard of people milling about and without the booth girls slowing that same traffic down – definitely the easy way to see the show without distractions.



Most of the show from there was a blur. I can’t describe how cool it was to show people like the Ring Brothers the car and talk about some of the work that went into different parts of the build. It was unbelievable how many board members dropped by or called and stopped to look over the car – Anthony, Larry, Scott, Frank, and a host of others – it was great to see you all again or meet you for the first time. I think that is one of the coolest parts of this hobby and what I think makes this community so unique – the people and the ‘family’ that we become despite being scattered across North America.



On Wednesday morning I got a call from the guys at Sony Playstation letting us know that we had won the Gran Turismo award in the Domestic category. A cool honour to be sure but now a week later I am still not sure that we did or not. Long story, kind of confusing, but regardless, not the point if the show. Missed a great party that night though.

[James OLC]

Friday we dumped some gas in the car and headed over to Tyler’s for some last minute work before heading to Pahrump for the Optima Ultimate Street Car Invitational. When I got to ATS we were third or fourth in line for a turn on the lift. Bad Penny was there getting some work done on the front sway bar; Larry was there with MotiV8r for a little bit of everything and FUEL was there after an incredible thrash to R&R the clutch for some tweaks and a trip to the dyno.

We were there to try to troubleshoot a strange sound that we were getting from the transmission at around 60 mph. Checked pinion angle and everything else that we could see before packing it up and hitting the track with more hope than common sense. We did quickly scale the car after Rupp set the bar really low with something around 3200 and change (I think); we rung the bell at a hefty 3500 plus – not an impressive number but it is what it is.

Saturday morning at 5 am saw us at Tyler’s again, this time for the drive out to the track. Despite the early hour, the shop was a hub of activity. Tyler and Tom had spent most (all) of the night working on FUEL – rebuilding the rear end in the wee hours to get Dave on his way to event. At 5:30 Steve spun Bad Penny around and lead the pack to the track with Curtis close behind, I am so impressed by Steve and Bad Penny and can’t wait until I have the OneLapCamaro to the point where I can drive it 300 miles to an event like SEMA then drive it 75 miles at 5:30 in the morning to an event like the Ultimate Street Car Invitational (which he as we all know wins) before driving back to ‘Vegas at rush hour on Saturday night.

[James OLC]

The Optima Ultimate Street Car Invitational was an incredible event and I am honoured to have been invited to participate despite our relatively poor showing. We knew that we had transmission issues going into the event and they definitely hurt us on the road course. I had about 50 miles of highway driving on the car and a few shorts stints in Las Vegas going to and from the show and knew that the car was going to have issues. I was right. The first thing that I found was that there was an issue with the brakes; I would say that I had 80% of the brakes that I expected or needed. Could be pressure, could be fresh pads, could be fresh rotors, could be pedal ratio, could be master cylinder sizing - don’t know at this point. All I know is that while I had some brakes, I wish that I had more. That hurt a bit and definitely made me think twice at the end of the straights and heading into the curves. The much bigger issue that we encountered was with the transmission – or clutch – which slowed us up even further. While I had no issue up shifting, I could not get the transmission in gear while downshifting. There are a couple of 2nd gear corners at the end of some 4th gear (or more) straights so the inability to get the car into gear at speed hurt a bunch. I have a couple of not so fond memories screaming at the top of my lungs at the car while pushing or pulling on the shifter with both hands trying to find any gear. So, if you were there and were wondering why I seemed to be down on power in the turns 8 through 10, there you have it.

Telemetry from the Racepak dash would later show that although my maximum velocity on the back straight was only 104 mph, we did see 1.4 lateral-G’s on several occasion and there was one corner were we held 0.6 G’s or more for over 12 seconds.



The Autocross was a completely new experience for me. I had said before the event that I had never participated in one before – which was true – but what I hadn’t told anyone was that I had never even seen one live before. I talked to Mary Pozzi before my first run and she took the time to walk the course with me and suggested that I walk it a couple more times before running it with the car, She also gave me some really valuable advice on how to run it and how to make the most of the course. It helped and although it is too late now if I had another run or two I already know what I would do differently.

At the end of the day, I had a great time at the event and am more than satisfied with how the car performed on its maiden voyage, I hope that I have the opportunity to take another shot at the track once I have the bugs sorted out and have more confidence in the car’s abilities.



Tom Holt was great throughout the day, offering advice and assistance at every opportunity, Probably the greatest disappointment was when I took Tom out on the road course for a couple of laps only to be turned back at the starting line because the track had been oiled down.

[James OLC]

When the event was done we quickly loaded up the trailer and headed back for home. That night was a short drive to Mesquite because my wife was under the weather and we were both dead tired. I hit the pillow around 10 pm and was woke up at around 11 by the sounds of sirens. I took a peak out the window and saw the truck and trailer surrounded by police cars and fire trucks in the hotel parking lot. Damn. Thankfully it had nothing to do with me; it was just the Burger King next door which was now on fire. Damn. Ultimately no harm to the truck, trailer, or car. Twenty more hours on the highway with a mix of rain, sleet, and snow and we were home, safe and sound.

Recharge the batteries for a couple of days and I’ll start tearing into the brakes and transmission.

Sorry for the long winded post, lots to cover over the course of two weeks, before I end through I have to thank a bunch of people who made everything possible:

• Chris Heighton and Don and Shane at Heighton Restorations
• Tyler Beauregard and Russell at American Touring Specialties
• Pascual Marquez and Marquez Design for the awesome interior
• Rick and Hector at Rick’s Stainless for the killer gas tank
• Jay Harris at Littlefuse for giving us access to their new ISIS wiring technology
• Mark Magers at Lateral Dynamics
• Cam Douglass at Optima Batteries
• And all of our other sponsors including Ididit Inc., Tilton Engineering, and RFR Custom Fabrication (thanks Matt!)

Again, it was a pleasure meeting everybody and I look forward to the next time that we can all get together and shoot the breeze.

Cheers,

James

[Steve1968LS2]

One of my favorite cars.. truly stunning and it was an honor running with you at the track and even better getting to meet you.

I'm sure, once your car is sorted out, it will give Penny a run for her money. lol

Glad you made it home safe, keep in touch so we can get that photoshoot done. Man, how far was that you had to drive???

[mazspeed]

That is a beautiful car James. You should be proud and happy how it's turned out and the attention it has and will continue to receive. Congrats.

[ironworks]

It was great to finally meet you in person. The car was amazing and I wish I could have gone on saturday but we had a championship to wrap up in xtreme drag radial.

Rodger

[svp]

You did a great job with the car James, I know SEMA is a blur and we didn't have much time to talk...I could tell you were just overwhelmed with the whole getting ready and just getting to the show....but it was a pleasure meeting with you and talking breifly. The car is gorgeous!