Kim and Per autocrossed this past Sunday down in Ft. Pierce at the Indian River Community College lot. Per actually designed the course for this event and while we did get a lot of favorable response to the design, we were a little surprised by how horsepower friendly it wound up being. (note to Per: If you’re driving a MINI, don’t put long straights in that are preceded by tight turns!)
We finished fourth and sixth on index, with a well-driven S2000 in the top spot (possibly clinching the year-end PAX championship for Terry Tabor) and an also well-driven Porsche GT3 in the second spot (proving that although Garry Poindexter is stepping down as the Solo chair for CFR, he can still hustle a car through the course.)
This was our first event on the 16x6.5 Rota wheels and 215/40R16 Kumho V710s on our MINI, after we brought this wheel and tire combination to Nationals for use on Greg Lee’s MINI. We found that this wheel and tire combination really helps eliminate wheelspin coming out of hard corners, enough so that we don’t think we’re going to change from the 24mm front bar to the smaller 22.5 bar that some MINI drivers use. Our front V710s now have 24 runs on them and are holding up very well.
In a “I guess that’s a good sign” kind of thing, Kim was asked to stop riding along with Per on his first run, as this was giving her an unfair advantage (an extra look at the course.) We’ve been doing that to give Kim an idea of what the car will feel like at speed, since Kim hasn’t been autocrossing that long. Now with her finishing in the top bunch on index, well, she’s not really a novice any more. “Sorry, Kid, gotta cut you off.”
Next up, we’ll be replacing the shock absorbers with Koni’s new FSD design.
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