There is no car...

Mid-Ohio is is one of the tracks that when I saw it as a teen it intimidated me. It is now the track that I have had the most success on with 2 1st places in class. So I guess it is only fitting that it was at this track that I learned another important lesson in racing. for the sake of mental part of it we are going to call this lesson "there is no car".

The weekend started out like any other racing weekend with a car that hasn't been run for year. We had pulled the engine in the off season and had it rebuilt, anytime a change like this done there can be teething issues. When the car cut out on me heading down the straight it was not a surprise. I pulled it off and looked it over and deemed it a voltage issues and charged the battery. The next sessions brought more of the same where after a few laps the engine would start missing and feel like I lost a cylinder. It turns out the Piston was striking the Spark Plug and creating the miss. We solved this with a washer that prevented the Piston from striking the plug node.

I began the 1nd (qualifing) race 14th overall. Starting directly behind my father, green flags drops my father goes hammer down to the inside of the track. I should have followed, I was held up by slower people in front of me. That is when it happened coming down the straight I get a Datsun2000 pulling on me so I lifted a little and gave the guy room. Bad mistake, Datsun2000 proved to be much slower than the Alfa GTV, but the Datsun didn't care he blocked and chopped every passing attempt tried, until out of desperation I finally passed on the outside in the carousel. It was hairy but it worked. Then I laid down my fastest lap of the race and 4th overall fastest lap.

I was angry when I came off the track with Datsun driver feeling he was out of line, some of the guys laughed about my anger. They explained to me that I was driving erratic and over driving the car to get past someone who was clearly slower than me. I spoke to the driver of the Datsun a Fat Old Limp Man, who clearly didn't care that I thought he was blocking. I wanted to punch him. That night I carried the anger till I was nice lit.

In preparation for the final feature race my dad gave me one piece of advice, go like hell on the starts. I started the feature race 10th overall. When the green flagged dropped on the feature race the Datsun was gridded next to me and I dropped the Hammer and didn't look back. This race went much smoother. I was able to get within one position of my dad, finishing 9th with a 1st in class.

I have been racing for close to 12 years now and learned so much in that one session while be held up. I learned to calm down, run clean and not erratic and that if you are a better driver and in a faster car you will get around them. The Datsun was not holding me up I was holding my self up by over driving the car and not focusing on my line.

-D racer