Daily Driver Shootout - 12 October at Ripken Stadium, Aberdeen MD

Sadly I'll be over in Muncy, PA for the 2-day NEPA event. Or I could bring my DD Miata and likely get protested. "No way you DD that thing."

In reply to NickD :

Sorry we'll miss you.  It would have been nice to meet you - have fun at your event!  The protest point is not so much that your Meotter is your daily, but that it is your regular competition car... which is specifically forbidden.

I'll be loading all the T&S equipment in the V70 to spare my wife having to shlep it all down in the T&C, like she usually has to when I drive the Manic Miata.  So, technically, I'm racing the timing truck this weekend.

Darn... I work this weekend!

Thats like 15 min from my house. I thought they were done with autox at Ripken, as the Susq. SCCA doesn’t run there anymore. Nice to see though! Any more events planned there in the future? Would’ve loved to run my Focus!

Saron81 said:

Darn... I work this weekend!

Thats like 15 min from my house. I thought they were done with autox at Ripken, as the Susq. SCCA doesn’t run there anymore. Nice to see though! Any more events planned there in the future? 

This is our (Brandywine Motorsport Club) season ender for 2019.  But we had great response this year and Ripken management seems to like us, so we expect to be back for at least 4 autocrosses next year.

So, Saturday was BMC's final autocross event and the Daily Driver Shootout.  I ran the V60 in the DDS class with a G Street PAX index and placed 4th out of 14 cars.  First went to one of our faster drivers in a rented Kia Forte (HS), about 2.3 seconds ahead of me.

The first half of the layout was pretty tight, with the second half opening up a bit.  The course was about 0.53 miles long total.  Overall FTD was 47.772 in an SSM ///M Coupe with giant Hoosiers and a big wing.  I was about 10 seconds behind that with a 57.694.  Placed about 44th out of 90 cars in PAX.

I had to argue with the transmission all day, even in sport / paddle mode.  It insisted on upshifting to 2nd instead of holding 1st, so it was boggy throughout the whole first half of the course.  Later where it opened up and 2nd was more appropriate throughout it did much better.  With stability control off it would rotate decently under trail braking and didn't wash out under power.  I was hoping with all the low end torque it has it would dig out of the slow turns better, but it was too reluctant to downshift.  For spirited backroad driving it is fine, but it is better at carrying cones than it is at dancing around them.

It would let me pre-load the engine at the start, but it hated left-foot braking on course.  The one run I tried to keep the boost up in the corners freaked it out.  It kept pretensioning the seatbelt and by about a third of the way through the run I could no longer inhale.  I ran the whole back part of the course without being able to breathe - I didn't try that again.

My morning heat runs all hovered around the 60.2xx mark.  In the afternoon heat I was learning to work with what the car was willing to do and dropped about 2.5 seconds by the last run.

Dang, the FR-S would have been perfect for this. Too late and I wouldn't have been able to make it Saturday anyway, maybe next year 

In reply to NickD :

You ever make it down to any of the Pocono NEPA events?

Let me run the Ram, I'll even take the tools out from behind the seats.

In reply to Furious_E :

I went about 3 or 4 years ago. It was only my second year of autocross, I know. I'd like to get back to one, but after this last trip, I'm not sure it'd be with the Miata. I think that is getting restricted to shorter trips from here on out