Afterthoughts:
As I write this, it is now a full five weeks since the 2003 Open Track Challenge. Joel is back south, Christine is busy with her own racecar, and my truck was finally unloaded. The RX-7 lays untouched, with a flat battery and even flatter tire. I think it feels kind of lonely. Its always weird in the weeks after OTC, work seems fake and trivial compared to the adventures we had and the house seems empty without people over wrenching on the car everyday.
Compared to OTC 2002, 2003 was very different and although a blast, not quite as much fun. Finding out that Nitzan would not be returning placed a damper on the whole event, however finding out how many friends I had and would be accompanying us this year was an awesome experience. Nitzan, Colleen, Joel, Jason(M3), Christine, Jason (Cobra), Darren, Tony, all contributed and with the exception of Nitz, came along for the hectic ride either for stages or the whole thing (Darren, Christine, and Joel). Just like last year, I could not run the event without the help of all these people. If you have the means to have a trackside chef at your disposal, I highly recommend it.
Even with our touring circus, the excitement of last year was not there. Last year there were seven or eight teams in Touring 4 competing for the win with four different teams taking fastest laps at different tracks. This year things were pretty much worked out by the end of day 3. Last year we were tied going into day 7.
I think a lot of things contributed to this, the number one reason being the smallness of the field. With the exception of Young's team and us, there was no other competitive team in the class. A lot of this was due to mechanical failures (Eddie and Mike's team) but even then only 4 cars would be running. For OTC, and pretty much all racing, to be fun you need to have someone to compete against. Otherwise, its just seven days of HPDE events, which is fun but is not seven days of adrenaline rush.
We went into the event this year with a much faster car than last year. Unknown to our competition before the event, we started with about 250 rear wheel horsepower compared to, probably, 180 last year. We also added brake ducting but kept the suspension the same as last year, as we knew that we were not going to get any test days before the event. Our limiting factor was tires. We ran the entire event on 215 Azeni Sports, which although seemed to do fine on the 500 lb lighter Miatas just led to a lack of grip and lots of tire spin on our heavier car. It was to be our biggest weakness. At all the tracks we were faster in 2003 than 2002 even with the smaller street tires, it is yet to be seen how much faster the cars is with a set of race rubber on it.
Which brings us to the topic of tires. In 2002 we were allowed to run anything DOT legal with a treadwear rating of 60 or higher, for 2003 it was bumped to 140. All of a sudden tires became a lot more expensive and cornering speeds went a lot lower. If anything, I ask the organizers of OTC to allow DOT race tires in the touring classes. DOT race tires are what the vast majority of the touring drivers drive at the track, provide more fun, are street legal, and are cheaper for higher levels of performance than grippy 140+ street tires. The unlimited classes are already running race slicks and almost none of them use DOT legal tires, still leaving the separation between classes intact.
Along with tire choice, a lot was made during the events and afterwards of allowing professional drivers to be hired by teams. Honestly, without Foo driving we would have had a much closer race in Touring 4 and might have come home with the 1st place trophy. That does leave a slightly bitter taste in my mouth, but I can always say "I beat Roger Foo at Derek Daly." J Going into OTC I figured that I would be competing against other amateur drivers to see who was the best. I mean, I already know that your average paid for a living driver is better than me. Sure, you were allowed to use professional drivers but no one would do that in lowly Touring 4, right? Wrong… With a lot of the winning teams using professional drivers I think the trend will only increase. If this happens I see both side of the argument. Some people welcome it saying that it raises the level of competition for all involved. In theory this is great. However, I think that it is going to serve to drive away a lot of people from competing. In my mind I never thought that OTC was going to be a battle of amateur car owners with pro drivers. If you're not doing it yourself, what's the point? As was pointed out on the OTC web forum, the best way to compete in OTC is now to build a kick ass car and hire someone to drive it for you. I find that kind of sad.
The future of the RX-7 is kind of shady at the moment. Built for OTC 2002 and refurbished for 2003, the car does not really have a useful slot. With a cage going into it soon, it can compete in NASA's Super Unlimited class but there is no real series going on in that class. After pitting for Nitzan at Laguna Seca two weeks ago I find myself being drawn strongly to Spec Miata and their fields of 40-50 cars. Now that is some serious competition. Maybe I'll sell the RX-7 and buy a miata; maybe I'll keep it and run NASA super unlimited and time trials. The future is uncertain. Either way, I know for sure that we'll be back for OTC in 2004 and (here is a hint) we are hungering for multiple trophies this time. :-)
-Matt