Iconic

http://www.vettes4vets.org/

Event held May 24, '14. $60 buys you a session of 5 laps. You can buy as many sessions as you wish. Verts allowed! This is not a HPDE, rather a non passing parade lap session with "advertised" speeds of "around" 90 mph. Ahem..

Lodging can be had in nearby Pell City Al for $79/night at both the Holliday Inn Express and Hampton Inn next door. Must ask for the vettes4vets discount. Last year I stayed at the Holliday Inn and it was very nice with a full complimenary buffet style breakfast.

This is a charity event with proceeds going to our veterans, and you get to drive the high banked super speedway. Win Win.

A bunch of us corvetteforum.com members ran in the same group. See the thread in the southeast forum if you want in.



Some video and pictues from last year..











Last years CF group lining up

JoesC5

My "parade" laps. You need to run two sessions though, as you need the first session to get a feel of what it's like to drive on the 33 degree high banked corners. Going WOT in the middle of turn 2 at 140-145 MPH and doing a high speed run down the 4000' backstretch is something everyone needs to experience.

Iconic

Nice pic. I think I know who took it

JoesC5

yep, great shot you did. One of my favorites of my car. we do have fun at Talladega, don't we?

Jeff does a terrific job running the event and deserves all the he gets.

Shame that the cost has gone up, but still worth every penny.

Iconic

I can't take credit for the pic. Soslow1 (Tim) took it and I snagged it from his photobucket album..

He takes great pics and video every year and posts them.

You're right Joe, what a blast.

I thought we'd have a few C7ers drop in by now... camaro tail lighted vehicles are welcome to Talladega!!

Iconic

Bump for the weekend crowd.

Racerdj

What an experience you guys had! Great pictures

~Stingray

Do they do this every year?

KY Brian

Wow I am seriously thinking of going. This is on my birthday! So do you just show up and register that day?

edit: I found the info I needed in the southeast section.

thanks I'll register today.

JoesC5

You need to register in advance as they fill all the slots up quickly. In the past, they were limited to 250 cars. I don't know if that is still true for this year.

Iconic

I think last year there were 270 slot available. .but not trying to split hairs.

Like Joe says, if you are reading this now and know that this is an event you'd like to attend, you might want to pull the trigger on registering soon.

Vetinvett

Do you have a chance to open your car up? My fear would be to get behind a sight see'er that is going 30 MPH…..Really would like to do it! How does it work, I know you can't pass.

Blown-C7

Sounds like fun...

Iconic

I have only been to this event once and that was last year. As for opening your car up that is always subjective and as I understand things the track officials have the say in the speed of the pace truck. Last year the pace truck did somewhere around 80-90 mph steady but everyone spaces out a bit to get a run down the backstrech. I never experienced or even heard of anyone getting stuck behind a 30 mph car. Personaly I believe that 80 mph in the high banks is to slow as you're still turning the wheel slightly right. At 100mph the vette steers itself in the high bank.

How it works in a nutshell is they group up 15 cars to go out per session and do 5 laps then come into the pits. Then the next 15 go out. This continues all day. You can buy as many sessions as you want. You don't even need a vette. Last year there were some camaros, chargers, 'stangs, etc.

This is a very well organized event and it's an absolute blast. I thought we'd have picked up a few C7s in this thread who signed up. Maybe they did but just aren't talking LOL.

tavaresv

I hate to be A "Negative Nancy" here and this all sounds like fun but am I the only one insulted at the idea of a PICK-UP TRUCK setting the pace? Isn't that like an adult taking children to a playground and monitoring them to make sure they don't get too rambunctious?

I guess what I am saying is that it's bad enough driver have to be nannied (and I get it for insurance reasons) but nannied AND insulted?

Iconic

I suppose the brass who makes the rules for this vettes4vetsTalladega event could have a ZR1 as a pace vehicle but due to insurance it would still only lead the pace at 80-90 mph just like the pickup truck does.

After running this event last year, and seeing how everything operated as whole be it the organizers of this charity event, be it the volunteers, be it the track staff, be it the lunch food service personel, be it the veterans of our militay who attended. ....I can honestly say that the word "insulted" never entered my mind.

Andrew

Hey, that's me standing next to the Atomic Orange C5Z! It is a great time and my wife and I are making the trip once again. Hope to bring a few others from the central MO area. See y'all there.

Vetinvett

Have my reservations and ready to go.

Iconic

It looks like you and I took pictures of each other...only took 6 months for us to figgure that out

I think you took this one. I'm standing on the yellow line

JoesC5

The pace car drives 90-95 MPH all the way around the track. That means that every car behind him is going to AVERAGE 90-95 MPH around the track. If you're towards the back of the group and you are able to run 150 MPH on the 4000' backstretch, then you can expect to have to slow down to 50-60 MPH on the front stretch as all the cars bunch back up behind the pace car, and then start slowing down in order to spread out for a good run down the backstretch on the next lap.

If you want to run a more consistent speed all the way around the track, abet slower, then volunteer to run behind the pace car(you can still achieve 120-130 MPH on the backstretch if you're in the first three slots).

The farther you run back in the group, the higher speeds you can normally reach, but remember that not everyone can run in the last slots, so it takes some give and take with the other's in your group of 15 cars. Don't position a 300 HP C4 in the tenth slot and then a 638 HP ZR1 behind him, as that will **** off the ZR1 as he will run down the C4 before the C4 runs down the faster car in front of him. If you end up with slower cars towards the rear and they can't keep up with the faster cars in front of them, then the pace car at the rear will radio the lead pace car to slow down so the slower cars can catch up. That pisses everyone off.