Myself and a few others typically critique our bracket racing failures and victories via email during the race season, this year I'm going to go ahead and post some of the racing day details here on the forum in the hopes a few others may find it interesting.

Today was the 1st points event for the Outlaw Bracket racing series at Carlsbad Raceway.... I decide to race in the Street tire class. Typically I'm one of the quickest in the street tire class... and I'm feeling too lazy to turn my neck today, so I wanna do all the chasing.

My newly ordered ET streets aren't in yet, so I borrow a racing buddies ET Streets (Thanks Charles:)).... the track is very well prepped as they typically do for the Carlsbad Outlaw series, however the track typically goes away by the 2nd or 3rd round of eliminations.

My 1st trial, the DA is at a respectable 1100 ft.

1st trial

RT.............579
60ft.......... 1.567
330 ft........4.703
1/8et........7.358
1/8mph.....92.02
1/4et........11.602
1/4 mph....116.37

I was a little disappointed, the car hooked hard, but the trap was down and I expected a solid 11.5 on this pass.... oh well.

2nd trial pass

RT............617
60 ft.........1.590
330ft.......4.745
1/8et.......7.408
1/8mph.....91.86
1/4et.........11.654
1/4mph......116.41

Motor had a bit more heat in this pass and the DA rose to 1300 ft.
Still disappointed. My lights stink.... don't feel real comfortable today.

3rd trial

RT.........555
60ft......1.574
330ft.....4.711
1/8et....7.378
1/8mph...92.05
1/4 et....... 11.613
1/4 mph....116.69

mph went up a little bit, and the DA was still rising..... was topping out right at 1800-1900 feet.... so this wasn't bad.

4th trial pass

rt........540
60ft....1.577
330ft....4.719
1/8et....7.369
1/8mph....92.51
1/4 et....... 11.580
1/4 mph......117.34

We normally don't get a 4th time trial.... but I snuck it in. I was pretty happy after this pass, mph came up and hit a 11.5x with a DA near 2000 feet.... I'm convinced I can hit a 11.4x with a DA around 500 ft and a 11.3x with a negative DA.... someday I hope to find out. What I account for the better et even though the DA had rose, is that I actually pushed the pedal deep into the carpet.... I think I have the old throttle body not opening 100% problem. I should know better, I've had this problem before, but I haven't checked for it in a while.

1st round of eliminations I get a mid 70's smokey and the bandit type Transam with the 6.6 litre motor. He's dialed in at a 14.60.... I decide on a 11.62 to account for a little tire squirm, and if not, I''ll know I may have a few hundredths to dust off.

..........................me............ .......Trans-am
dial................11.62............... ...14.60
rt..................575................. .....682
60ft..............1.581................. .2.215
330ft...........4.735..................6 .144
1/8et...........7.395.................9.33 4
1/8mph........92.12................77.36
1/4 et..........11.642...............14.416
1/4 mph......113.40...............92.71
...................win.................. ....b/o

My light was a little late, but my opponents light was even worse...When I realized I wasn't going to catch him.... I dumped at 1250 or so and got rid of a bit of et...... I pushed him way over into a big breakout. By calculations, if I had stayed on the gas... I would have ran my dial on the #

2nd round I'm racing a muscle year Camaro dialed at 12.15, I decide to take out a hundredths and dial a 11.63.

....................me.................. ....Camaro
dial.............11.63.................. 12.15
rt..................507................. ....533
60ft.............1.588.................. 1.734
330ft...........4.738.................4. 988
1/8et...........7.399................n/a (timer problem)
1/8mph.......92.01................n/a (timer problem)
1/4et.........11.641...............12.196
1/4mph.....115.40...............110.87

This was a very good light and a good tight package, but I felt I got away with a mistake and dumped too little and too late, I should have held him a lot closer than the 1/2 car or so I took him by... but I'll take it.

3rd round I'm racing an early 70's El Camino, he's dialed in at 14.39.... I decide to drop a few more hundredths to account for a little more heat in the motor.

......................me................ ...El Camino
Dial in...........11.66.............14.39
rt..................517................7 51
60 ft............1.784.............2.191
330ft..........4.875.............6.003
1/8et..........7.647.............9.203
1/8mph.......91.75.............76.50
1/4et...........11.892...........14.303
1/4 mph.........116.19..........95.81

I blew out my tires real hard, and thought I was done for the day, because I didn't think there was anyway he broke out.... well I was wrong, he had a real late light and I got my big gift of the day.... I was happy with the light. 2 decent lights in a row.

4th round, I'm in the semi's and racing a very good racer in a beautiful 57 Chevy. I decide to roll back my dial wayyy back to accomodate for the track staring to give way, he's dialed at 13.40.

...........................me........... ............57Chevy
dial.....................11.88.......... ........13.40
rt.......................470............ ...........490
60ft..................1.615............. .......2.122
330ft...............4.779............... .....5.784
1/8et..............7.454.................. ...8.767
1/8mph...........91.58.................... ..82.96
1/4et...............11.713................ ...13.538
1/4mph...........116.00................... .103.13
left win....mov.326

He went red, giving me the victory.... I obviously went red too, but in defense of myself, I knew he had already gone red. I had a little tire squirm to knock the 60 ft out of the 1.5's and the motor was heated up accounting for a fairly poor et.... but at least I didn't completely blow the tires out like last pass. For those who don't bracket race much, one of the advantages to being the faster car in a bracket is that your opponent has the opportunity to redlight 1st.... if they redlight, the race is officially over regardless of what I do after that.

Final.... I'm racing an old Ford Falcon Wagon.... not sure if this thing was born a wagon or not, but the vehicle is butt ugly and baby blue to boot. He's dialed at a 13.50..... I back even further out to accomodate for potential spin and a lot of heat soak in the motor with a 11.92.... at this point they're pushing us back in to the lanes immediately.

................. butt ugly Falcon wagon....... me
dial..............13.50................. .......11.92
rt.................516.................. .........611
60ft............2.303................... .....1.595
330ft..........5.960.................... ....4.744
1/8et............8.935.................... .7.414
1/8mph..........83.89....................9 2.09
1/4et............13.629................... 11.950
1/4mph..........105.45..................10 4.74
right winner....mov .004

Before the final, a couple of racing buddies told me this guy hasn't cut a light all day and to just stay away from the redlight.... I'm thinking how did he get to the final if this is true, but I decide to take theire advise anyway and stay away from the red and I blew it and went to far out with a .611..... and he nailed a freakn .516...... I caught him at around 1000 ft mark and started playing fender tag with him and I almost screwed it up... I was trying to literally just keep a 1/2 fender on him and on one of my throttle blips I stayed out of the gas a hair too long and he was right there with me going through the traps..... when I looked over, I thought I had lost.... but the ticket booth gave me the winning slip by .004"..... very sloppy racing by me.... I got lucky again.... I also got lucky this guy couldn't run his dial and that I hooked up and easily had enough et to play with him.

Well this was my Sunday.... I had a couple of nice packages, but the other races I made a few mistakes and really got lucky to win the 1st event. .... but I have no pride, I'll take it. :)

Hope you enjoyed.

cheers,
Beach Bum

 

Hopefully I will be able to make it up there soon, so I can start running my car there too.

 

Thanks for the breakdown Todd, great racing!

 

Awesome! As soon as I graduate, I'm getting back into drag racing...unfortunately I have my priorities set on school and not car-parts. ;)

Looks like a really fun day. :)

 

I'd rather be lucky than good!!Looks like your a bit of both.Good show. :cheers:

 

Congrats todd!! :cheers:

 

Sweet Todd!! I will look forward to your blow by blow recollections of your races. Thanks for taking the time to do this, it helps us drag racing newbies (or at least this one) to uderstand some of the finer nuances of drag racing. Congrats on the win.

 

Raceway PArk opens on March 2nd, so soon we'll be able to join you in telling our racing stories again.

 

Any win is a good win. You were very lucky to have 3 gifts in the last 3 races. In my limited experience, most races are won or lost in the first foot. You can cut a bad light, or blow the tires away, or bog the engine all in the first foot. After that you are playing catch-up. When I was racing years ago, I was real good at the tree. I would be disappointed with a .530 light. .510's were normal. This is a huge advantage. Since I almost always had an advantage at the tree, I would dial in a slow time, and play fender tag at the top end. If the other guy had done the same, he would generally break out since I had an advantage on the tree. Funny thing, though, when I went to an automatic, I couldn't cut those good lights. Could only do it with a stick.

 

Beach,you are off to a good start.It very nice to see some early season racing from the West Coast.Our local track was open for T&T Sunday.Great weather with temps in the lo 50's,but only spectated.
See Ya.
Phil

 

Todd

We start racing this Sat.. this week its only a T&T day, so no real racing, Thats ok with me sa I'm running my new 1.6 RR for the first tim. & I plan on using the small 26" tires to see how I hook up, & IF there is any track, the weather should be - 500 at least, so with some track I'm looking for a new best ... ??

 

Beach, way to go!!! :) :) :)

Sorry i couldn't help you on the tire clearance question, but i didn't look at email all weekend. I guess it worked out as i didn't see any mention of destroyed quarter panels.

I'll email you later today.

 

Beach, great post. Congrats! :cheers:

 

I enjoyed it immensely!!! Keep it up as a weekly feature. Good job, too. Congratulations on your first win of a winning season. Winning the first race can only be a good omen.

Ditto.

Oldbies too!

We finally get our first test & tune April 13th. Our Street Legal points series starts April 26th and the Summit ET Series starts May 3rd. I will live vicariously, through your reports for the next two months. I'm chomping at the bit.

Up here, we'd KILL for those DA's. We should see some mid to upper 5000's in May, but after that we beg for, but rarely see, anything starting with a 6. During the summer, 8000 is not uncommon.

Keep up the good work. I look forward to meeting you in October.

 

Good job Todd!!! Getting off to a good start is really important. A couple great lights and that 2nd round package is a keeper. That's such a tough track to get that kind of package. How many races in the Outlaw series? When does Irwindale (sp?) start up? Any conflicts between the two? Keep up the good racing...sure there was a little luck but experienced racers seem to get all the luck :D (or so I'm told) LOL

:cheers:

 

Thanks everybody :) This racing stuff can be fun. I look very much forward to hearing some other racers track experiences this year, including the guys new to the sport.

Regarding the Outlaw series.... I wasn't planning on running the full season in this series this year, but was instead going to run in the NHRA Summit Division 7 series at Irwindale, but after yesterday I might stay with the Outlaw series instead.... not because of my good start (These points may not even count toward the season series).... but because of the details they gave us.... Carlsbad raceway recently became a IHRA sanctioned track, and thus starting in April, the Outlaw series will become the IHRA Summit series.

A quick schedule check tells me there will many schedule clashes between the 2 series. The NHRA Summit series at Irwindale only has 7 points events... with your 6 best point showings couting towards the points. However, the IHRA will have approxmiately 12-14 points events. ( Not all dates are set yet)....

A quick comparison of the two series.... The IHRA as according to Carlsbad will have a street tire class that is unlimited et, meaning a 11 second car can run in this class.... therefore I will typically be one of the quicker cars in this class, however the NHRA street tire class is capped for 12.00 and slower cars, thus I would be forced to run in the Sportsman catergory, therefore being a middle of the pack at best et racecar. This is not super important but is a factor to think about. It is harder for me to compete against dedicated racecars that have made chassis improvements that give them much more consistent launches, that I cannot possibly make on my street driven Corvette. The vast majority of the Sportsman racecars here in Southern California are Dedicated cars. I feel my stock suspension corvette belongs in the street tire bracket.

Irwindale is only 1/8th mile, Carlsbad is 1/4 mile.

Carlsbad has more events, equaling more fun.

I know the techs at Carlsbad on a 1st name basis, including the track manager.... I can get away with murder their. :) I know nobody at Irwindale.

Carlsbad events are money makers, plus points, plus trophies. Irwindale is points only.... no payouts. Carlsbad will also have contingency money every race.... Irwindale zero.

However, the NHRA series is vastly superior to the IHRA series out here on the West Coast, though they're trying to make the move out here.... I think back east and in the midwest the IHRA is doing pretty good.

So which series should I race in ? Its actually a tough decision.

cheers,
Beach Bum


[Modified by Beach Bum, 5:23 PM 2/25/2002]

 

Beach, youre killing me over here, us east coasters gotta wait till mid april before the track opens :(..................a wins a win, nice work :chevy

 

Todd

Very cool and entertaining post.

I was just thinking that we have not had much updates from forum members about track times and new mods.

The tracks will start to open up for the East coast guys soon so hopefully we get some updates.

Vic

 

Great way to start the '02 season! :smash:
Keep it up,
Dave

 

I have to go watch you one of thes times...congrats!