Races

PGR Racing: An EV in the 2021 OLOA

GHIT 0208: PGR Racing – Racing In an EV in the 2021 One Lap of America EV Race Car: Ready or Not

“Tony Stark” was the obvious lead in to this episode with PGR Racing and their EV racing car that recently competed in the 2021 One Lap of America. On this episode, Andrew DeKoning and Chad Martin go into the pluses and minuses of racing an electric vehicle in the One Lap of America and racing an EV in general. We really had no reference to racing an EV, except for those unfounded rumors on several golf courses. Bill was stuck late at work so he sounds a bit “tinny” for most of this episode. We learned a ton during the episode about racing EV’s and we even know what PGR stands for now.

In this episode of Dominating with Dawson,

we go over what a contact patch is and how it is the key to driving and racing. The contact patch is the portion of a tire that is in contact with the track surface, and the contact patch is influenced by the weight transfer during the driving. The control of the contact patch through the control of the weight transfer is the key to maximizing your traction and use of traction during driving and is a direct measure of the potential speed and track time that you can achieve. And we may have ended up planning a race with Ben Dawson.

You can subscribe to our podcast on the podcast provider of your choice, including the Apple podcast app, Google music, Amazon, and YouTube etc.

Also, if you could give our podcast a (5-star?) rating or even better, a podcast review, we would greatly appreciate it and it would help us to grow the passion and sport of high performance driving.

For instance, leaving an Apple Podcast rating is very easy. If you go to your podcast library, under shows and click on the podcast you can leave a (5?) star rating and enter your review.

A link to the episode is: https://tinyurl.com/PGRRacing

We hope you enjoy this episode!

PS

Please don’t forget that if you are looking to add an Apex Pro to your driving telemetry system, don’t forget to use our discount code for all Apex Pro systems you will receive a free Windshield Suction Cup Mount for the system, a savings of $40. Just enter the code “ghitlikesapex!” when you order. They are a great system and truly invaluable in safely increasing your speed on track and/or autocross etc. The recently released second generation systems and app increases the capability of the system greatly.

Best regards,

Vicki, Jennifer, Alan, and Bill

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training Podcast and Garage Heroes In Training racing team drivers

Highlights from the PGR Racing episode include:

1) We have never driven an EV on track so Andrew and Chad review some of the differences that they feel, hear, and the driving changes that are required related to changing from an internal combustion engine (ICE) when transitioning to an electric vehicle (EV). Regenerative braking is also another significant difference between the two, along with the weight associated with the batteries.

2) Where an EV excels currently and where there are still limitations and challenges to racing EV’s.

3) What PGR Racing modified on their Tesla Model 3 to help with the challenges of the One Lap of America and why they chose the Model 3 vs the other available EV options.

4) Details on the upcoming test of autocross’ing a Tesla in Autopilot. No back seat driving though, thankfully, lol.

5) Bill fights not to make the Tesla model name joke. He may even have succeeded. (Hint: the model names are S, 3, X, and Y)

6) A recent market change is the availability of several options for making the car suitable for track use and there are several more expected to be coming in the future.

7) The downside of changing tires right before the start of the first event on the One Lap of America. Key word: mold release.

8) Everything you ever wanted to know about charging for the transits and at the track.

9) Did the Tesla have any mechanical issues and what the PGR team did to prepare the car for the event.

10) Tips that they have learned from their One Lap of America experiences in an EV.

GHIT 0208: PGR Racing – Racing In an EV in the One Lap of America EV Race Car: Ready or Not

GHIT’s Race at NJMP 2021

GHIT 0207: Our race at NJMP – June 2021 Our 24 Hours of Lemons Race at NJMP Thunderbolt for 2021

We are all suffering from a serious sleep deprived, post-race weekend hangover, and we are all calling in from across the US with varying internet speed and connections. It starts with the somewhat normal Race Bar takeover and then we go into the NJMP 2021 race. For this event, our drivers consisted of Vicki, Alan, and Jennifer and our two adopted teammates Aaron Diamond from the Saabs of Anarchy racing team and Elazar Mann from Race Bar. It was a great weekend with many, many highs, and a few notable lows. It was almost back to normal, well as normal as a Lemons race can be, and it was great to see everyone again.

In this issue of Dominating with Dawson,

we start off with our latest GHIT swag t-shirt that we made for the Dominating with Dawson and how we surprised Ben with it a few weeks back. We then try to get back into our topic for this episode where we go into several things that you can practice on the public roads and during your normal driving that will improve your track driving or refine skills that you may want to start to employ on the track. It is a great time to practice driving with left foot braking, heel-toe downshifting, as well as other less obvious areas of high performance driving. Luckily for Bill, Vicki missed his joke, so he did not have to sleep in the tub after this episode, leaving a bit more room for Bill, lol.

You can subscribe to our podcast on the podcast provider of your choice, including the Apple podcast app, Google music, Amazon, and YouTube etc. Also, if you could give our podcast a (5-star?) rating or even better, a podcast review, we would greatly appreciate it and it would help us to grow the passion and sport of high performance driving.

For instance, leaving an Apple Podcast rating is very easy. If you go to your podcast library, under shows and click on the podcast you can leave a (5?) star rating and enter your review.

A link to the episode is: https://tinyurl.com/LemonsNJMP2021

We hope you enjoy this episode!

PS Please don’t forget that if you are looking to add an Apex Pro to your driving telemetry system, don’t forget to use our discount code for all Apex Pro systems you will receive a free Windshield Suction Cup Mount for the system, a savings of $40. Just enter the code “ghitlikesapex!” when you order. They are a great system and truly invaluable in safely increasing your speed on track and/or autocross etc. The recently released second generation systems and app increases the capability of the system greatly.

Best regards,

Vicki, Jennifer, Alan, and Bill

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training Podcast and Garage Heroes In Training racing team drivers

Highlights from this episode include:

1) The Trophy truck/El Jeffe/Bad Hombre/Loki truck made its way to the track a bit late, but the theming of the truck and our drivers was a big hit in the paddock and with several of the young fans at the track.

2) The race weekend started off with some small issues with the El Jeffe that we worked through the entire weekend. Then we had a few other issues as the weekend progressed. In other words, a normal endurance racing weekend.

3) Aaron does his best robot impressions, but the connection improves after a few minutes.

4) We had an issue with the engine losing power and having difficulty starting. Unfortunately, we were not able to diagnose and fix the issue at the track, but let us know if you have any suggestions.

5) Our two guest drivers describe the glory involved with driving the El Jeffe Trophy truck. Since Aaron usually races a front wheel drive (Saab) and Elazar is usually in a mid engine car (Toyota MR-2), the truck is a bit different. It is not what anyone expects. We think Aaron and Elazar are both hooked.

6) In addition to our power/electrical issue, we also had a continuing issue with our new exhaust design. We fixed it Lemons style to keep racing and then we made a plan to fix it permanently, of course this was after sending Jennifer out for her stint.

7) Bill makes a terrible American Pie joke. He says he was really tired.

8) Aaron has raced in Lemons for almost 5+ years and had only two black flags in the entire endurance racing career. However, in true GHiT fashion, he managed to get two more in a single stint on Saturday. As Mars Blackman said, “Its got to be the shoes.”

9) Elazar describes how he dealt with a total brake failure going into the high speed turn 1, truly an example of dealing with a brake issue in one of the best ways possible. To add a bit to the weekend, Elazar was again subjected to a loss of the mounting bolt on the upper front control arm on the passenger side.

10) Alan goes for donuts, well just one donut, on our door. He may also have to adjust the HANS device or seek another design.

11) So in the end, we missed the checkered flag on Saturday by about twenty minutes and we missed it by again by about the same amount. Cue the sad trombone.

We had a great time, we learned some more, and we were able to spend some time with our old friends, our new friends and our soon to be friends.

A special shout out to our sister Jennifer who came to her first ever Lemons race and saw how much fun this can be. We hope you come back again soon.

GHIT 0207: Our race at NJMP – June 2021

Peter Hopelain and the Thunderhill 25

GHIT 0204: Peter Hopelain from the Technik Podcast about Racing and the 25 Hours of Thunderhill

Our second ever non-PG podcast, but it was so worth it.

Peter Hopelain joins us to discuss Bill’s bucket list goal of racing in the Thunderhill 25 endurance race. Peter has raced in the Thunderhill 25 nearly every year and recently won his team’s class. We had a great discussion of the background of the race and how to prepare and compete. Peter was also kind enough to stay on with us to discuss racing in general, his non-profit racing team, as well as some of his goals going forward. We are so appreciative of Peter taking his time out from his incredibly busy schedule and giving us so much of his time. He even put up with some of our Fast and Furious Storytime Questions. We would love to have him on again and cannot wait to go into more details of his driving history and exploits.

In this episode of Dominating with Dawson,

Vicki eventually asks Ben a question (after perhaps the longest intro of all time, lol) and we start to cover some of the adjustments that are available to your car. Each of these can help to dial in a car’s handling on track. We cover some of the basic changes and the effect that they will have on the way the car feels and handles. If you ever had a car that you wanted to adjust but were unsure how, this episode may be very helpful to you. Adjustment areas we reviewed included: Sway bar/anti roll bars, tire pressures, wheel alignment, etc. This is the likely the first of a many part series.

You can subscribe to our podcast on the podcast provider of your choice, including the Apple podcast app, Google music, Amazon, and YouTube etc.

Also, if you could give our podcast a (5-star?) rating or even better, a podcast review, we would greatly appreciate it and it would help us to grow the passion and sport of high performance driving.

For instance, leaving an Apple Podcast rating is very easy. If you go to your podcast library, under shows and click on the podcast you can leave a (5?) star rating and enter your review.

A link to the episode is: https://tinyurl.com/PeterHopelain

We hope you enjoy this episode!

PS

Please don’t forget that if you are looking to add an Apex Pro to your driving telemetry system, don’t forget to use our discount code for all Apex Pro systems to receive a free Windshield Suction Cup Mount for the system, a savings of $40. Just enter the code “ghitlikesapex!” when you order. They are a great system and truly invaluable in safely increasing your speed on track and/or autocross etc. The recently released second generation systems and app increases the capability of the system greatly.

Best regards,

Vicki, Jennifer, Alan, and Bill

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training Podcast and Garage Heroes In Training racing team drivers

GHIT 0204: Peter Hopelain from the Technik Podcast about Racing and the 25 Hours of Thunderhill

Ross Bentley’s 2021 One Lap of America

On our latest GHIT podcast, episode #198: Ross Bentley talks about the recent One Lap of America Event

Ross Bentley returns to the podcast to review the 2021 One Lap of America event that finished last week. This was Ross’s first One Lap and he seemed to have a blast. I think the hook has been set and Ross’s inherent competitiveness will likely lead to him trying to win it in the future. We go into the event as a whole, its history, how the 2021 event went, and every detail we could think of to scout for Bill’s eventual entry in a coming year. It sounded like a great time and should probably be on almost every high performance driver’s bucket list. Now which car should we enter, hmmmm.

On this episode’s Dominating with Dawson,

Ben clarifies what people mean when they say the term “pedal fest”. Bill first heard this related to drag racing. Vicki had heard it but not a clue as to what it meant. We also go into what the goal should be on track, the usual causes of the “fest” and ways to think about re-applying the throttle to minimize the issue. Ben also demonstrates the sound that your car may have if this happens to you, lol.

You can subscribe to our podcast on the podcast provider of your choice, including the Apple podcast app, Google music, Amazon, and YouTube etc.

Also, if you could give our podcast a (5-star?) rating or even better, a podcast review, we would greatly appreciate it and it would help us to grow the passion and sport of high performance driving.

For instance, leaving an Apple Podcast rating is very easy. If you go to your podcast library, under shows and click on the podcast you can leave a (5?) star rating and enter your review.

A link to the episode is: https://tinyurl.com/RossBentleysOneLap

We hope you enjoy this episode!

PS Please don’t forget that if you are looking to add an Apex Pro to your driving telemetry system, don’t forget to use our discount code for all Apex Pro systems you will receive a free Windshield Suction Cup Mount for the system, a savings of $40. Just enter the code “ghitlikesapex!” when you order. We have two systems for our team and Bill is looking to add a third for this season, pending CFO approval from Vicki. They are a great system and truly invaluable in safely increasing your speed on track and/or autocross etc.

Best regards,

Vicki, Jennifer, Alan, and Bill

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training Podcast and Garage Heroes In Training racing team drivers

Highlights from One Lap of America covered in this episode include:

1) We start with a display of a bit of podcast time travel involving Ross’s appearances on our podcast.

2) Ross summarizes how the original “Cannonball Run” event transformed into the current
One Lap of America” event and how it is structured.

3) The event consisted of a scheduled ~20 events at various tack facilities across the country that change from year to year. This year the total travel distance was almost 4,000 miles in the week, not counting any of driving within the events.

4) Tracks consisted of: Tire Racks’ Skid Pad, Grissom AFB for an autocross, Memphis International Raceway, Eagles Canyon, NOLA, Atlanta Motorsport Park, the Lanier Oval, Summit Point, and Gingerman.

5) What to pack, what to bring, how to prep, car and tire selection, etc. Yep, it’s in there.

6) Great stories abound about the cars, the drivers, the track events, the transits, and even some good hearted sponsor induced bounties for the event.

7) We hope to have a few other teams on the podcast as well to discuss the event in coming episodes.

GHIT 0198: Ross Bentley on his recent One Lap of America Event

PittRace 2021 Post Race Review

GHIT 0194: Our Post Race Review

This is our PittRace 2021 Post Race hangover Episode Notes. We will replace later with a normal review when coherent, likely later this week.

In this episode, we go over how our first race weekend went for 2021. We had a great time racing and meeting all our friends.

Oh yeah, we WON our first race ever in the S10 El Jeffe Trophy Truck in Class C!!!!

Further proof that anyone really can do this. Why not start today? We’d love to see you on track with us.

GHIT 0194: PittRace 2021 Post Race Review