Races

Alex on PittRace with AER and Lemons

GHIT 0325: Race Review – Alex on Our Back to Back Race Weekends at PittRace with AER and Lemons

Alex Levinson drove both weekends for the team from the Skunk Oil Racing/Garage Heroes In Training team and missed our earlier reviews, so he gets to go over both weekends’ trials and tribulations. At the AER event, the team performed well on Saturday and finished P2 in our class and P4 on Sunday. The next weekend at PittRace was a 24 Hours of Lemons race and Alex drove with Dave and Jeremy for the weekend. It all started out well enough, but there were a couple of issues during the Lemons weekend, some minor and some major. Everyone came out safe and sound though.

If you would like to help grow our sport and this podcast:

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, that we would appreciate that very much. Even better, a podcast review, would help us to grow the passion and sport of high performance driving and we would appreciate it.

We hope you enjoy this episode!

PS If you are looking to stream or save your integrated telemetry/racing data with you video, Candelaria Racing Products Sentinel System may be the perfect solution for you. We are in the midst of installing the system in two of our cars. If this sounds like something that may help you and your team, please use our discount code “GHIT” for a 10% discount code to all our listeners during the checkout process at https://candelaria-racing.com/

Best regards,

Vicki, Jennifer, Alan, and Bill

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

HIT 0325: Race Review – Alex on Our Back to Back Race Weekends at PittRace with AER and Lemons

Our 2022 Lemons PittRace Event

GHIT 0322: Race Review of our 2022 Lemons PittRace Event

Tim, Vicki, and Bill are excited to review our latest race at PittRace with the 24 Hours of Lemons series. It was a great weekend and we were joined by Ben after a bit of intro discussion. This was Tim’s first Lemons experience but he is an accomplished driver, racer and instructor of instructors. We talked about Tim’s thoughts and critiques of the Lemons series and the field of cars and drivers at PittRace. This was our initial shakedown trial for our new to us 1993 Honda Civic race car.

If you would like to help grow our sport and this podcast:

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, that we would appreciate that very much. Even better would be a podcast review. This would help us to grow the passion and sport of high performance driving and we would appreciate it.

We hope you enjoy this episode!

Best regards,

Vicki, Jennifer, Alan, and Bill

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

Highlights for this episode include:

1) Tim’s response to the three primary (false) criticisms of racing in the 24 Hours of Lemons series: safety culture, driver skill, and the quality of cars. The cars are usually criticized for both being junk and for being too racey, a difficult thing to do at the same time, lol.

2) The weather was a series of just about everything except hot. Tim was also exposed to 110 cars on track Saturday during a snowstorm, sleet, rain, muddy track, etc. A true trial by fire in all the best ways.

3) Vicki was out for a quick Friday practice to acclimate to the front wheel drive car and shake off some winter cobwebs. Mother nature thought she was doing so well that she decided to bequeath unto Vicki almost an inch of sloppy snow/hail during her lap. Vicki returned the favor and trimmed some of the grass for her as well.

4) Tim was also able to cross off almost every type of weather during his Saturday stint. However, we still give him a little good natured ribbing about his two black flags.

5) The rest of the weekend was something you needed to be there to truly understand.

PS Tim is desperately looking for a recipe from the pot luck

GHIT 0322: Race Review of our 2022 Lemons PittRace Event

Our First AER Race at PittRace

AKA Bill’s Worst Race Weekend Driving – Ever

GHiT 0319: Race Recap: Our First AER Race at PittRace – Part 1 – AKA Bill’s Worst Race Weekend Driving – Ever

In the first part of at least three parts of a series, Bill goes over his first ever race with AER (American Endurance Racing) at PittRace last weekend. AER is a series that targets more serious racing and the cars on track were quite impressive. However, the team did well and we actually came in second in class on Saturday.

Bill on the other hand had his first ever bad track day and probably drove more in his head than on track. We thought it would be useful to do a quick race recap covering what happened on track and in his head, as well as what we are going to do and change going forward.

This episode deals only with Bill’s perspective and his internal issues. While he is still processing the weekend,

Also, Ben calls in for an emergency DwD episode to talk Bill off the cliff.

On an upcoming Part 2, we have another episode coming that will cover the race from the perspective of a friend who was working with AER this weekend.

On an upcoming Part 3, we will have the entire team from the weekend if schedules allow.

We also look forward to a future AER specific episode as well.

If you would like to help grow our sport and this podcast:

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, that we would appreciate that very much. Even better, a podcast review, would help us to grow the passion and sport of high performance driving and we would appreciate it.

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

We hope you enjoy this episode!

PS2 Please do not forget that if you are looking to add an Apex Pro to your driving telemetry system, do not 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 invaluable to safely increasing your speed on track and/or autocross, etc. The recently released second generation systems and app increases the capability of the system.

Best regards,

Vicki, Jennifer, Alan, and Bill

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

GHiT 0319: Race Recap: Our First AER Race at PittRace – Part 1 – AKA Bill’s Worst Race Weekend Driving – Ever

Race Bar Wins (?)

at Lucky Dog’s Spring Race at CMP

GHIT 0317: Race Bar Wins at Lucky Dog’s Spring Race at CMP

Our review of the Lucky Dog race at CMP continues with our friends at Race Bar. The tranquilizer dart was apparently very effective and we almost kept control of the podcast, lol. This was the first ever class win for Race Bar and it was great to share it with them. Enjoy this episode with Jandy and Richard Freelane.

If you would like to help grow our sport and this podcast:

We hope you enjoy this episode!

Best regards,

Vicki, Jennifer, Alan, and Bill

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

Highlights for this episode include:

1) A traditional Race Bar opening.

2) We cover the detailed prep that led to the Race Bar victory.

3) Dandy brings his own Top Ten list outline for the episode. A podcast first for us.

4) How it is to drive with a professional driver as part of the team and why professional drivers would want to drive with our amateur field of drivers.

5) How treating the maintenance of a car like an airplane can help reduce the issues that you may have at the track, even n a 1980’s BMW race car.

6) Ryan Susca gets a big thank you for all the help and his contributions to the Sunday victory.

7) Some of the greatest words to live by courtesy of our friends at the Track Walking podcast!!!

8) Who knew, we even go into some driving approaches to improve your times around the CMP track.

9) An example of classic Race Bar priorities in car repair. There is wisdom in there somewhere.

10) The response that you can get in Virginia when driving a Race Bar car home after a race. Some lessons of things to do and several things not to do.

11) We end with a bonus discussion of the intellectual property and team of skilled drivers contained by the Race Bar empire.

GHIT 0317: Race Bar Wins at Lucky Dog’s Spring Race at CMP

The Team From LDRL at CMP March 2022

GHIT 307: Race Weekend Recap: The Entire Team From Lucky Dog Racing at CMP March 2022

You have only heard a few of the stories from our Lucky Dog race at Carolina Motorsports Park a few weeks ago. Now we unveil the entire team that went to the race. Car owner David as well as the rest of the team including Alex, Ryan, and Matt. We think we have determined the root cause of the problem we had at the race and a path forward. As always, we all had a great time at the Lucky Dog CMP March 2022 event and cannot wait to return. There was a bit of feedback initially that sounds like a duck quacking but it ends fairly quickly and we are blaming Alex, lol.

If you would like to help grow our sport and this podcast:

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, that would be greatly appreciated. Even better, a podcast review, would help us to grow the passion and sport of high performance driving and we would greatly appreciate it.

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

We hope you enjoy this episode!

PS2 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 for this episode include:

Lara and Randy — **Our Winning Friends Lara Vernon and Randy Pobst**

1) We start with the important stuff: who wins the snoring award for the Lucky Dog CMP March 2022 weekend?

2) What we did, what we brought, what happened, and how we ended up.

3) What it is like to assemble a new team from several other teams and how the weekend went, what we learned and what we can learn from this weekend.

4) Our individual thoughts on how the “new to us” car behaved on its maiden voyage to endurance racing and what we each thought of the E36 BMW. Ryan and Alex are long time endurance racers, primarily in the Miata platform. Bill has driven the E36 platform many times but had not been to the CMP track until this weekend. David had also not been on CMP as well.

5) We spend way more time discussing the teams qualifying session than the session actually took. This is called foreshadowing.

6) We then have a recovery/repair plan and get started the race Saturday. Then we go into detail of the entire 8 hour race Saturday.

7) Now the fun begins, as well as the work project for the weekend. Ryan got a ton of really solid shoulder work welding above his head. The post incident CSI that we conduct and summarize also takes more time than our racing laps did in total. Perhaps the first reference of a brake caliper making sweet, sweet love to the rear suspension.

8) We did allow him to rest a bit by welding a friends team shifter that had failed (again). It should be problem solved from here.

9) The details of our parts search and repair program to get the car back on track for Sunday.

10) We also have a short example of Podcast In Training that couldn’t be edited out for your personal enjoyment.

And more

11) Even with a combination of team members with decades of racing experience, there is growing pains in coming together.

12) With everything going on at a race weekend, we each learned several details of how the race weekend went

13) After a brief trip off the rails, we eventually get to “Oh God, it sings”. We eventually get back to our story. Herding kittens.

14) We have the beginnings of a recovery plan and then cover our roles within the team. The importance of roles and areas of responsibilities is key to the performance of a racing team and cannot be overstated.

15) Apparently there will be a Cubano vs Meatball cook off. Book your spots early if you want to be a judge. Spots are limited.

16) Ryan shares his parts transport system and Vicki is dumbfounded. Bill has a new project.

17) An accounting of what we did vs what we should have done and what we will do at the next race.

Special thanks again to Kyle Lockrow and Giggles for their help in making the results of this debacle a bit better.

GHIT 307: Race Weekend Recap: The Entire Team From Lucky Dog Racing at CMP

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