[DeTomaso] Another great day at the track....

[MikeLDrew at aol.com]

Hey guys,

I awoke to find fantastic weather once again, and left the hotel for the 
nice 30-minute drive to the track.   Spectator attendance was well down from 
yesterday, due to the host of competing events such as the paddleboat cruise 
on Lake Tahoe, tour of the custom wood boat restoration facility, etc. etc.

Things got off to a quiet start; Brett Santos helped me jack up my car, 
pull the left wheel and replace the missing collector bolt and header gasket, 
which had disappeared during my track run yesterday.

I didn't really go out on the track much before lunch, but afterwards I was 
determined to enjoy my car to the most, and share it with as many people as 
possible.   I would pull off the track, eject a passenger, have that person 
help belt in the next passenger, and then head right back onto the track.   
During the "A" run group, I dashed back into town to fill up the gas tank; 
when I came back to the hot pits, Russ Britschgi leaned into the window and 
saw my gas gauge, and said, "Oh no...."

For I have a well-deserved reputation of absolutely refusing to leave a 
perfectly good racetrack.   By about 3:30, many drivers were just worn out and 
ready to head back to the hotel, but not me.   I went around and around and 
around, literally the only car on the track for quite some time, only taking 
very short breaks for passenger swaps.   The weather was perfect but I 
could see clouds looming on the horizon, and in fact some virga fell overhad the 
track but no moisture ever made it to the ground.

Eventually, after 5:00 p.m., it started to get dark, and finally the 
checkered flag was thrown on me.   I pulled into the hot pits and raised my 
headlights and offered to continue in the darkness, but they were having none of 
that!

Sometime during the run, my muffler gasket blew out again; I think the 
too-soft suspension is hitting the underside of the passenger side tailpipe and 
stressing it, crushing the donut gasket between it and the header, for the 
bolts are all still there, and still tight (with stover nuts).

Ah well, it sounds like an old farm truck now, but it's running!

My motor is still incredibly weak, and my ancient BFG Euro T/A tires (in 
the rear, equally ancient Z-rated BFGs in front) are next to useless.   So my 
car was among the slowest out there, certainly in terms of acceleration and 
cornering speed.   But my Wilwood brakes are simply awesome, and passengers 
were shocked at how well the car slowed down, even though I wasn't using 
them overly hard.

There is one particularly nasty downhill off-camber right-hand corner, very 
slow, with deep compression in the bottom, and my left front tire whanged 
the underside of the fender lip hard enough to crack the paint.   Oh 
well--paint can be fixed relatively easily, and I've got a new set of Koni shocks 
from Pantera East sitting on my livingroom floor, ready to go onto the car (no 
time to change them out ahead of the event unfortunately).

Yesterday I was fairly proud of myself for logging 140 miles on the track; 
today I managed 168 miles, and would still be out there now if they'd let me 
keep running!

We had no incidents or mechanical maladies of any kind, and everybody 
agreed it was the most perfect day at the track they could remember.   

Upon returning to the hotel, I quickly changed and then walked about 15 
minutes down the street to the National Automobile Musem, where we enjoyed a 
fantastic dinner in the company of some of the finest automobiles in the 
world--people were extremely impressed.

I just returned to my room to ditch my camera, and am now heading back to 
the hospitality suite for what promises to be a long, long night. :>)

I cannot begin to convey the enthusiasm for the Reno event being expressed 
by the people who are here.   They are simply amazed and dumbfounded at how 
great the facility, location, and activities are.   I have yet to hear from 
a single person who would even remotely entertain the idea of returning to 
Las Vegas next year--the people here are totally sold on Reno!

Mike


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