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Thanks for the photos. I didn’t have any of me because we were in different run/work groups for once.
I have video my 8th and best run (44.200) http://btwyx.com/Movies/AxBMWFunJan14Best.mov
Cathy’s best run,also her 8th (45.221) http://btwyx.com/Movies/AxBMWFunJan14CBest.mov
How early do you need to be there for tech? We usually only make it to Marina by 8:30 or so. I do tech for the SCCA.
@Marc: Yes, the chapter published a new site last week. Lots of improvements!
The subscription feature doesn’t seem to be working, I’m not getting any emails. I resubscribed and the forum seems to think I’m subscribed.
You could try RaceRender. http://racerender.com there’s a free version of that.
Assuming it works the same way it does on a Mac, you’d add the file to the project then trim it to the bit you want. If you don’t have any data, you don’t need to add it. When you ask it to create an video file, you can choose the output format and bit rate (3Mb works for me). There’s even something about a YouTube uploader.
The rate of entries is slowing down. There were 19 entries at 12:05, up to 34 now 14 in the following 70 mins.
I’d guess [url=http://racerender.com]RaceRender[/url]. [url=http://gps-laptimer.de]Harry’s Laptimer[/url] on the iPhone will also do that.
The laptimer already flashes at me when it thinks its time to shift (which is at the limiter). Though I don’t notice that, I do notice the engine sound and the tach which is right in front of me. Knowing it may be advantagous to change up isn’t the problem, when to change down is what concerns me.
For the most part I’m happy to hit the limiter for brief periods, that limits my top speed, its a soft limiter so its not disruptive. But I’ll probably lose more time shifting up then down again (i have some data to support that, theory). If I don’t shift down I’ll lose power. The MINI has very little power, so I need to be making most use of what I’ve got. The gearing difference from 2->3 is substantial (1.5x), so being in the wrong gear here is very bad. I did try the whole thing in third for my third run, to avoid the change downs, but it was half a second slower overall and only faster on track during the last slalom (the negative offset one).
The big problem is knowing changing down is an expensive operation and I’m not practiced at it, to make it even less palatable as an option.
I haven’t had the opportunity to practice shifts much at autocross, it hasn’t been needed (much). The 3->2 shift is the most awkward one. When I’ve been driving on track with the MINIs, there are a few places where I do need a 3->2 shift (like turns 11 at Laguna and Sonoma), but there there’s a straight leading up to it, to give you time to get your act together, and I’ve done it so many times I know exactly where I need to shift.
Shifting in autocross is much different, there’s no time to think and I have to get the right shift pattern within a few runs. Without much practice at it, I was a bit lost there. I was trying to work out a shift pattern looking at the data on the lap timer, but I got it wrong. A shift somewhere along the long side, and on the final “straight” (negative offset slalom) would probably have worked, so I’d need to have shifted down going into the final sweeper.
It was a fast course. I’ve setup the MINI with short tires in with the assumption that I won’t need to go that fast. I was hitting the limiter in second everywhere. Most courses I can shift into second and not worry about it, I haven’t had much if any practice shifting down again. The one time I have tried shifting back to second from third was a disaster.
That course needed several shifts up and down. As I said I was hitting the limiter everywhere when I tried it in second, when I tried it in third it was slower. I needed more shifts. I probably would have done much better with our other tires which are taller.
I don’t know what the new system was. It had a dot matrix display (a not terribly big one). I assume they had it for the test and tune event so they could have one timing system for each course. On the day it was giving you split times for the first half of the course.
The course was very long and thin. It didn’t suit the MINI’s setup, and I wasn’t fond of it for several reasons (not least of which was it didn’t suit the car I was driving). I think they had 13 station, the worker’s walked out to their stations. They were all relatively close to the center.
My laptimer map this map for me:
[img]http://btwyx.com/Pictures/Crows.jpg[/img]
I’m surprised to see that Cathy’s best run (her 3rd, 43.062) is credited with +1 cone. Looking at the video (around 0:45 in) I do see a downed cone at the track out point of the final corner, and she didn’t get close to any other cones. I’m wondering if she got credited with someone else’s cone. I’m assuming if that’s the case its just a bad break and nothing could be done about it.
