Last weekend, Summit, the Speed Shop and catalog company held their Customer Appreciation weekend at the dragstrip that bears its name, Summit Motorsports Park in Norwalk, OH.
On Friday from 3pm - 9pm and Saturday from 10am - 5pm they held unlimited drag racing and an autox course. I was there from 3-6:30 on Friday and came back from 10-3 on Saturday.
Each day I managed to get in three sets of 3 run heats or 9 passes each day.
The highlight of my weekend was the stock Corvette C7 that couldn't beat my best time of 31.8 in my $2015 Infiniti Q45.
Lots of cool stuff on site. I think the grey one is a '67 Riviera. Full Riviera interior but very little Riviera left under that Riviera.
A great weekend.
Before I left the house Saturday, I had some help at home with checking adding air.
Beautiful crew member!
Just curious...what kind of reaction did you get on aristocrat Challenge car?
In reply to Ovid_and_Flem:
Thanks, she'll be 3 in Sept. It's going quick and great.
As for reaction it's the same as other autox events. As the car sits in grid before it runs it is mostly dismissed or looks out of place.
Once it hits the course there are a lot of wtfs.
It was best for me to run the whole course in 1st gear. I would get up to the 7,400 red line some times but usually not (though up there high). With the rear muffler removed (but still with the two mid mufflers) she would get up to "full song"
When it gets back to grid you will see people being sly trying to get a look at the rear badge. Some will ask what it is but many considering themselves as "car guys" are shy to admit they don't know what or why.
There were a few guys on site that I knew or have autoxed with before but over the weekend, two people approached me who recognized the car from the pages of the magazine.
The guy co-driving the Skyline is a Summit employee. I put him in the passenger seat for a pass and gave him some surprises.
In general, I had the staff cheering for me and they were cool on Saturday letting me get back in line and hogging a third set.
At one point one of the employees said something like, "haven't you run already?" I commented back that he has me mistaken for one of the other Q45s running. At any time there were 3 or more minis and usually a big number of Mustangs. Lots of Focus STs also and one RS.
I have so much fun knowing that I have less dollars in my whole car that what these guys spend on one set of rims!
We're all sick so... didn't happen. I even had Friday scheduled off to be there early.
In reply to patgizz:
Yeah, I was sorry to hear where you posted elsewhere that you were all down with the sickness.
OOOOOOOOH WA A A A A A A
My wife had something intestinal for 9 days. Just a bug, nothing really to help it and she still is not 100%. Luckily, it has not hit the rest of us.
That's awesome. Do you think you beat the C7 based on experience / driver skill or do you think your car is legitimately faster than a stock base c7 around an autocross course? I bet it sounded great, revving like that. Must have been a tight course.
In reply to dculberson:
Could have been all the reasons. The C7 owner was a cool retired guy. The car was bone stock. He said he has a 75 Corvette that he tracks and autox'es but as typical, when he went to pull the C3 out, it needed something so he just brought the C7.
Lets also realize that my "competition" with him was late Saturday and though I am sure he had driven one set (3 passes) I was on my 14th pass (over two days) before I set my best time.
The Q45 is close to stock but I an running RE71s (that have over 6k road miles) and are the same tires I ran at $2015. So, good tires but "old" comparatively.
Not a tight course. really set up for the GoodGuys and Optima guys in the classic iron. That Riviera was laying down 29 second times. There is a beige Nova in one of the photos that was putting down 28 sec times!
This is amazing! I really want another Q. I have been laying low on a challenge priced Q south of me for a little while that i was going to snag as a daily but just haven't. I actually shared it today on the $2017 classifieds. I WILL ONE DAY HAVE ANOTHER Q!
Im loving seeing you give the Q the beating it loves. They are such capable cars at a great price point. Cheers to big cars and big smiles.
