Races

GHIT 0082: Laguna Seca With Lucky Dog and Mental

Unedited live episode from Laguna Seca after Day 1 of racing with Lucky Dog. We had a long day or racing and repairing. It was our first day ever on the Laguna Seca and Vicki’s first ever day racing a front wheel drive car.

We made a few mistakes, learned a ton, and loved every second. Most importantly, we think we made a whole bunch of new friends and we were able to catch up with many we already knew.

Lucky Dog is a great series, with great people, and some spectacular cars. Some are spectacularly good, some are spectacularly fast, and some are spectacular in their own way.

A tired crew describes our first ever race day at Laguna Seca with our friends at the Lucky Dog racing series, silliness ensues.

With Vicki, Bill and special guest Mental Ward

GHIT 0082: Laguna Seca With Lucky Dog and Mental

GHIT 0069: NHMS Race Weekend Review

NHMS Flag — NHMS 2019 – 24 Hours of Lemons race

Our podcast this week focuses on our race weekend at NHMS with the 24 Hours of Lemons teams. We had a bit of a struggle getting ready, but the cars eventually cooperated and raced well, at least for a bit. In the end, we had a great time and caught up with a lot of friends and made several new ones this weekend.+

Team at Tech — We confused Guitar Heroes with Garage Heroes, oops.

Mia as Death Doctor — We confused Guitar Heroes with Garage Heroes, oops.

On this episode, Alan, Jennifer, Kate, Vicki and Bill are still recuperating from the race weekend hangover, but did manage to discuss:

Vicki learns the alphabet, finally.
Pre-race prep and race car struggles.

We broke the first rule of racing and brought an non-prepped car to the track
El Jeffe/The Bad Hombre/The Trophy Truck/Race Truck was finished literally hours before the race.
The E36 BMW struggle did not complete until midday Friday afternoon when our great friend Bruce figured out a simple electrical issue that we could not find on our own
We had to pick up a windshield, which was in Canada
Bill learns to not joke with the border police
Normal race induced issues led to a lot of on track repairs and replacement for the race truck, especially related to our steering, power steering, and steering rack.
SpiderStang was almost brought into race trim since we had all hands on deck and needed two cars
We rolled the dice and brought the E36 to the track and hoped we could fix it with the aide of our friends in the paddock area
Friday testing went well with El Jeffe and we were able to get almost all of our new to NHMS drivers
Jennifer clears all prior NHMS demons from last year
Kate enjoys her first time on this track and then promptly has internet issues in mid story
Jennifer is very excited and saw many benefits of the Watkins Glen HPDE we sent to two weeks ago.
We may finally have solved our braking issue with the El Jeffe race truck
Bill creates a new word for the dictionary
Bruce saved our team having to get another engine and perform and engine swap by solving our issue and getting the engine in the E36 to fire.
Bill confirms that by fire, they meant to get it running and not that it had caught on fire.
Special thanks to the Thunder for Days team in their Folgers E36 BMW for all their assistance as well. Apparently, they travel with an entire parts store worth of spare parts to each race. Thankfully. And Wisely. We owe you all.

Team Folgers — Thunder for Days saved us

Our one time only Guitar Heroes In Training Theme for this race
Vicki confuses AC/DC and Kiss somehow
Mia tormented Craiggers as the Plague Doctor all weekend
Several other teams were theming hard this weekend including appearances by the Three Pedal Mafia’s Ambiguously Gay Duo themed new Pontiac Solstice and the entire gang that represented Baby Shark.

New Driver — Baby Shark team and new driver

3PM is not Ambiguous — 3PM is not so ambiguous

Solstice NHMS 2019 — Their new Solstice race car

Jennifer’s costume was very helpful in getting our cars to have no penalty laps
Harley Quinn and the harlequin GTI were also a big hit, ad it was quite fast on the track.
We had a run on power steering pumps for the race truck this weekend, using three total, and we also lost the steering rack/box
We then run through the race for the race truck and then for the E36 race car
NHMS this year was the most aggressive race we have been in and there were many incidents, especially Saturday
We also had a Guest driver this weekend, Jeff Wright, who we met at our Lucky Dog race in Portland this summer. We hope he had a great time.

Jeff at Tech — Jeff rocking out awaiting tech inspection

Our wheel spacers led to tire tracking issues in the El Jeffe race truck
We eventually (think) we lost the steering rack and had some steering difficulty that eventually led to the race truck parking for the last half of Sunday
Jennifer gets here first black flag in the race truck
Bill ran first in the E36 on Saturday and raced with several of our friends on the track for long periods of time
We peaked at 5th place overall, our highest position ever. Now we need to figure out how to stay there for the whole weekend.

Proof we can drive — Proof that we can drive a bit (5th overall)

We learn that there are two different style safety harnesses/safety belts
Saturday night dinner and post-race festivities
Vicki finally meets her girl crush, Amanda Tully, in full costume, in the Three Pedal Mafia’s hot tub, built for 4, but somehow managed to squeeze in 9 that evening. Hopefully, we will have her on as a future guest.
The festivities went long into the night.

Alan eventually gets into a on race CSI investigation that gets edited out a bit.
Vicki proves that numbers are hard
We end up talking all over each other during the review of Alan’s Sunday stint
The Egan’s new car modifications led to a lot of fun but also a lot more gas usage
We ended our day in the BMW E36 when we lost either a wheel bearing and/or a hub
Team improvements for next year were abundant
Radios for each team member if possible
Earlier starting prep on race day morning with more people
Training matrix will be developed and monitor our progress towards overall team knowledge and skill improvement for next year and the future
New Pit Crew Chief election for 2010 season is very likely
Spares parts for the BMW for next season
On site car alignment verification capability within our team
We begin planning our off season and our 2020 season, including re-theming several cars for the 2020

NHMS 2019 is Over — NHMS 2019 and our racing season is over

Thank you to all our friends, we can’t wait to see you again next season!

GHIT 0069: NHMS Race Weekend Review

GHIT 0068: NHMS 2019 Prep Week

Our ineptitude continues

Our plans are unravelling — Our preparation plans are unravelling

NHMS race weekend prep status.

One race, three cars, none working. The rest is good though.

On one hand we have the BMW E36 3 series from 1998. Issues, yes. It won’t start. It seems to not be getting power to the computer system and won’t turn over. We found one wiring issue and are tracking down any others, slowly. One good thing is that the prior owners live very close to our race, so as a last resort, we may ask for some assistance.

El Jeffe/The Bad Hombre: Braking issues abound. Still. The caliper/pads do not fully release from the rotors, which may be the issue we have been battling this entire season.

On this episode:

Alan breaks up into a game of boggle with things like DME, EWS2, etc.
Vicki breaks back in and tries to get us to explain what is going on
Bill breaks down the entire battle we have been having with the brakes on the race truck
El Jeffe brake theories, plan, and a review of the current status
An El Jeffe Transit story for the books
Alan talks about flashing ECU’s and seeking additional help to get the E36 running well again.
Alan does his best weatherman impression and forecasts clear skies for the E36
Kate even makes a quick guest appearance towards the end

It seems to be a standard week before the race. Now will this turn out? Tune in tomorrow, same bat channel, same bat time.

Or actually when we record at the track this weekend.

GHIT 0068: NHMS 2019 Prep Week

GHIT 0058 Thompson 2019 Race Wrap-Up

New Drivers and a New to Us Car

Alan, Jennifer, and Bill with our “new to us” BMW E36 race car

This episode is dedicated to our friend Aaron Leinemann. He has had some unexpected bad medical news and a GoFundMe page has been started to assist. Please share whatever you can to assist Aaron and his amazing family.

On this episode, our team reviews the 2019 24 Hours of Lemons race GP du Lac Chargoggagogg(etcetera) AT Thompson Speedway in Northeastern Connecticut. We entered our Race Truck “El Jeffe” a 2004 Chevy S-10 with many Isuzu Hombre body panels and our new to us 1998 BMW E36 3-series car for our first race with it after buying it about two weeks prior. El Jeffe was updated from the former Stan Lee livery to and Avengers Endgame livery and the E36 was quickly themed in the paddock to be a Captain America car.

Bennett Rocketing Deadpool — Alan as Spidey

We review Friday practice and spend most of the episode covering the race on Saturday and Sunday. Highlights include:

New Drivers, several first timers at Thompson
Thompson track walk and review
Saturday and Sunday within El Jeffe
Saturday and Sunday in the BMW E36
El Jeffe brake issues and a potential fix and path forward to alleviate this ongoing problem.
Our 4 black flag debacle and how it impacted our position in the race (HINT not well)
Bill got to make two signs with Connor to slow the cars in the pits
A minor incident where a car came across the bow of the El Jeffe and removed moist of the front end facia
Saturday night’s Potluck Dinner hosted by the Three Pedal Mafia team for Stuntin’ and Explodin’ fest
We show our exceptional math skills several times this episode
Team awards for the weekend
Hella Sweet or Butt Terrible idea of the week
To do’s and improvements for our next race
Radio and Helmet communication issues
Then things devolved from there

GHIT 0058: Thompson 2019 Race Wrap-Up

GHIT 0050: Our Lucky Dog Race and Portland International Raceway – 2019

We came, we saw, we were conquered.

Alan, Jennifer, Vicki, and Bill with a few drop ins cover our race weekend with the Lucky Dog Series at Portland International Raceway. It starts with a review of practice Saturday morning, then our 7-hour endurance race Saturday and our work to get back out late Sunday.

We compare Lucky Dog to our home series the 24 Hours of Lemons. While similar, there are differences, pluses and minuses for each, so we compare the two in the continual pursuit of the perfect low budget amateur endurance car racing.

There were a ton of great teams there, most of which passed us on Saturday as we were towards the slower end of the field.

We recorded this shortly after we completed Sunday so there is a bit of echo since we were in the pit. However, we did manage to give out our team awards for the weekend.

Racing Results for those who are keeping track at home:

Saturday: We were in 37th place when our engine went away Saturday and ended up at 41st for the day. We did not get to participate in the 2 Saturday enduros due to the engine issue. Our fastest lap was 1:38.664 by our guest driver Randy Pobst, but we managed to 1:45.870 as our internal team best. (Randy was able to get to 48th fastest lap of the day and Alan’s time would have placed us as the second slowest car in the 60 car field that ran a lap Saturday )

Sunday: We ended up getting on track after a long day of engine swapping and rebuilding and finished 3 laps and ended up finishing around 48th out of the 64 cars this weekend and 48th fastest of the 48 cars that ran on Sunday.

Fastest lap of the race weekend was 1:29.932 by Blue Bayou for reference to the relative performance to the field.

We came, we saw, we were conquered.

GHIT 0050: Our Lucky Dog Race and Portland International Raceway – 2019