Spring Into Solo 2008 (Indy Points Event 1)

The trophy was a little different than what I was used to. Instead of a placard, they handed out cone trophies. It was pretty cool. Here are some pictures of the trophy and the time slips I received on each run: 1, 2, and 3 respectively:

I arrived 30 minutes after registration opened and surprisingly, I had to park pretty far away because for some reason there were a lot more people in this event (125 drivers) than the last one (107 drivers). I overheard a board member mention that this event had the most attendance than any other Indy region event. Pretty cool. While I was looking for a parking spot to unload, I noticed that everyone was taking their time to get into tech. So I took advantage of this and set up as fast as I could; then I drove to tech before everyone else piled up there. heh...

Thanks to my speediness, I had 30 minutes to walk the course before the drivers meeting. This course was a lot more technical than the fun event course. In the beginning, there's a pretty long straight which at the end of the straight, leads downhill and into a sharp left turn. It was hard to gauge where my braking point would be with the downhill in the equation. The first slalom was placed sideways on a downhill slope which was pretty interesting. And just like the previous Indy event, the same sweeper was used at the same location, but with a little twist in the way they placed the cones. The end of the course had an offset slalom which I have never driven before. But I felt confident that I could handle it with the practice I got at the Columbus event.

Before I ran my first run on the course, I followed my cousins mentality and drove my first run like it was my last run. I felt confident with the way I drove until my competitor in the Mazdaspeed 3 came in a second faster than me but with a cone. Banking off the trend that I usually I drive faster on every run, I thought that I could best my first run. But on the second run, I jinxed myself when my tires lost grip while entering the first slalom which almost cost me a cone. Though I didn't hit the cone, it did slow me down about a second and a half just trying to avoid it... The driver in the Mazdaspeed 3 came in faster than his last at 49 seconds flat but with another cone. So I was still safe with my first run. In the third run, I drove clean but still ended up being about a half second slower than my third run. The Mazdaspeed 3 DNF'd which meant that I took first by a very small margin (.187 seconds). I was crazy to think that I won on my first run!

Indy Region Fun Autocross

I arrived at the site early with plenty of time to set my car up for the autocross. While I waited for tech to open, I took a couple pictures of my car with the new magnetic numbers on. I was glad that the numbers and letters fit on one door and that I wouldn't have to re-cut them to fit.

The site was in much better condition than the previous one I went to as far as missing pavement. The site was a large parking lot that surrounded the Bush Stadium. I noticed that the parking lot wasn't level- it was highest near the stadium and then sloped down further away from it.

The course was pretty straightforward and simple. There wasn't much choice of line since it was pretty tight with a good amount of slaloms. So the only way to drive it would be to take everything tight.

I feel like I drove the course pretty well besides when I accidentally turned on the windshield wipers. Overall, I drove consistently faster on every run except the last run. I came in too hot at the barricade near the end of the course and almost wiped out a couple cones. If I didn't make that mistake near the end, I felt that I would have been faster on the last run. To test my guess I made a comparison video of my third and fourth run to see whether or not I would have been faster. The video supported my prediction.

Here are some other pictures of my car and the others who were there at the event: