July 7th, 2001 (Nelson Ledges Road Course FUNDAYZ)

Autocrossing is fun, and pretty inexpensive, but every now and again you've gotta splurge. Nelson Ledges is a road course in Ohio, about 90 minutes from Pittsburgh. They have a program called "Fundayz", where for 100 dollars you get to race for a pretty significant chunk of the day. Matt and I have been looking forward to doing this for a while, and before he leaves for school in Florida we figured we'd better get out there. We picked a beautiful day, not too hot, lots of sunshine, and a decent pack of cars. There were probably 40-50 cars racing on the day we went, and we ran in 3 groups of about 20-30 minutes each, cycling through the day. There were no classes, but let's call them Race, Street, and Novice. Thee race group consisted of heavily prepared RX7s, Corvettes, and a couple of track-only cars...all of which were driven by people with experience. The Street group was for exprienced drivers in more tame cars, if you call BMW M3s and Audi S4s tame. Finally, there was the novice group, which consisted of our Type Rs, John Wagner's GS-R, a few Mustang V8s, a Miata, even a brand new GS-R sedan with 1000 miles on the ODO!
The track isn't the glass-smooth surface you see on your big-name racetracks, but the course is easy to pick up (hard to master, so they say), and has a rewarding mix of high and lower-speed turns. We checked the fluids, put some tape on our lights, and watched the race group take off for their first 20-minute session...we were all giddy. Hearing the race-prepared tube-frame late 60s Corvette Grand Sports disappear down the track, and hearing their vicious unmuffled lake-pipes as they blasted by on the long straight...it was fantastic. The street group was next, and we started to get ready for our first taste of legal 100 MPH speeds. Matt decided to use his Kumhos, and I've been looking forward to killing my stock RE010s for a while now. We got in line, and an experienced driver in an older Audi Quattro lead us on our parade lap. A couple laps later, John Wagner was getting antsy on the yellow mustang GT in front of him, and was waved by (apparently, he climbed all the way to the lead car, where he was signaled quite emphetically to SLOW DOWN...) after about 5 laps, people were up to a reasonable clip, and I tried to encourage the Yellow Stang to let me pass...but my car isn't as loud as Johns, and it took a while before he got the idea. It was probably for the best that I was held back for a few laps, it forced me to learn more about the course before getting too hot. After the first session, we all looked in disbelief at our odometers and fuel tanks...about 35 miles, and more than a quarter of a gas tank!
The Type R is truly in its element on a road course, it moved confidently, and very quickly. The straightaway at Nelson follows a long right-hand banked corner called the Carousel, and we were in the 120+ range before tapping the brakes to slow for a 100+MPH right-hand sweeper. Lift off the gas or hit the brakes in this corner, and things get hairy...so it's full throttle and a completely exhilirating sensation before braking hard and dropping to third, and then second, for a left-right pair of ever tighter turns. In all, we had 4 sessions on the track, some felt longer than the standard 20 minutes. Brakes were a little weaker at the end of each session, but of the novice group, Matt was easily the fastest on his Kumhos, and John and I were the quickest street-tired cars in our group. There is nothing so rewarding as being waved by a "faster" car, like a Mustang Cobra or 3rd Gen RX7 Twin-Turbo. Matt's friend, Chris (who has a 3000GT-VR4 and regretted not bringing it, a little) took most of the pics, so thanks go out to him. All of the pics show me in front of Matt, which I'd like to say is true, but the stopwatch says differently; Christ timed John Wagner and I in the 1:27 range on our last session, where we were pushing each other and having our own fun above 8000RPM (his GS-R accelrates like it's welded to the Type R). Matt was on fire with honest-to-god warm, sticky Kumhos, putting in 1:21 laps, which are apparently jiffy-quick for Nelson Ledges! Two cars met with Mr. TireWall, but none of the novice group had any bad adventures. We all had a fun, fast, and safe weekend, and we're all dying to go back.

Heading into Ohio...there's too many tolls.

At the Sunoco, it was time for some NOS Octane Booster. As the Fast and the Furious say, "I need NOS. Two of everything. By Tonight!"

Nelson Ledges is a pretty relaxed environment, we were given basic flag and passing instruction, and left to our own devices.

Lookit them pretty blue eyes (high-quality masking tape is alot cheaper than a new headlight assembly, and we'd been told that Nelson Ledges was a debris pit...it was clean as far as I could tell tho).

I went with the full-on darth vader look, front bra, masking tape over lenses, and black duct tape over that. Evil!

Mmm...Horsepower...

One of the fast group goes by, but again, it's not Karen Rafferty...so who cares :) (Kent did show up to try out his new 95 M3)

Ready To GO!

These guys had some forward momentum.

He lost the roof on the back straight.

This Supercharged Ford Lightning had no exhaust note, just a high-piched whine...it was eerie.

That tire was is a bad place.

This is the Grand Sport that didn't run last week in Akron, good to see it really move here. Most gorgeous sounding thing I've heard in a while.

Almost there...

WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEowwww....

Mmm...911 Carrera S

John is itchin to get that uber-prepared GS-R out on the track.

Another kit-car Grand Sport

A view of the infield, looking towards the back straight I believe.

Matt and Mark's brand new GS-R sedan are ready to flex the VTEC cam.

Near the end of the long straight. Once in the clear, I was around 120 MPH here, Matt was into the mid to upper 120s.

Yup, Matt lookin at my taillights, like usual (thppbt!)

Matt and I are eager to get past the domestic iron :)

Here she comes!

There she goes! Changed color too!

He's got more engine than the two of us combined!

Nice asses!

The big left turn that leads to the Carousel...check out the giant bug in the upper right corner of the shot :)

waiting to go again

Matt and John lookin sharp

Mm...lunch time!

The cars needed fuel as bad as we did at this point.

John is hardcore. I am a pale honkey.

Didn't leave VTEC once we were out there..heaven!

I'm comin 'ta getcha!

John reels in another one.

Heh, you can tell it's a Type R, because the wing is visible from 8 nautical miles!

This 911 is lonely

Once I let the S4 by, we both passed the mustang, and it was quickly apparent that he was not a novice. I was able to hang with him a few laps and learn his lines before my brakes started to fade, then I had to let him go...next time, Quattro-boy!

Matt was enjoying some serious cornering capability on his R compound tires.

John had a hairy moment at this corner, but he straightened it, shed speed, and then cut the corner in just before entering grass-land...whew! I was right behind him, sending positive energy..."saveitsaveitsaveitsaveit...whew!"

lovely!

it warmed my heart to see my first VTEC car out there banging on it...he was getting some crazy roll, but he was movin!

I was amazed how the S4s tires were all working so hard...you could see it in the corners, that quattro stuff ain't just a badge!

matt has left the pack to pound out some serious laps

The Audis are out in force!

John and I had some great cat and mouse going on for the last session...our cars seemed very nearly matched. I mean, his slo-ass GS-R was blockin my junk all day, man...move that rust-bucket! ;)

He's got a raised redline, so our engines were matched quite nicely...we had a great harmonic going everywhere...it felt like speedvision!

Matt enjoys nature by hitting bugs at over 120 MPH.

lean in an autocross is fun. Out here, it's crazy!

The Type R is a beautiful thing in motion.

Matt's friend, Chris, was pretty sure this was Matt's lap time one round. Of course, they're both engineers, so who knows what buttons he was hitting :)

WE WILL RETURN!!!
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