Garage Heroes (In Training)

Learning as we go. Come along with us and Enjoy the Ride!

Endurance Racing

Jaime Garcia’s Sonoma Endurance Race Review

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GHIT 0270:  Jaime Garcia from the Race FF Podcast Reviews their Sonoma Endurance Race

Jaime Garcia from the Race FF podcast returns to review his recent endurance race at Sonoma with the 24 Hours of Lemons.  His team prepped their Toyota Corolla for the race for the last several weeks and had a great time at the event.  They had a series of good and bad events during the race but ended up bringing home some well earned hardware.  Was it a perfect race?  Of course not.  We aren’t even sure that is possible, but each race you learn a bit more and how to solve a few more problems.  The Sonoma race was no exception.  Please download and learn what Jaime’s team battled through and learned.  They were a great group and really exemplified the true spirit of an endurance racing team.  We hope to see them on the track at an upcoming event.

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 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. 

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 Sonoma Endurance Review episode include:

1)  How did the prep go for Jaime’s team

2)  Jaime learns the joy of actually having to travel to a race track as opposed to his normal local tracks. 

3)  How did check in, tech inspection, and BS inspection go 

4)  Why you should listen to the announcements and attend the rookie and drivers meetings.

5)   How Saturday go and what did the team have to do after their first racing day.

6)  Overall thoughts on the Sonoma track

7)  What their team learned and what they are looking to improve.

8)  Our traditional Good, Bad, and the Ugly

To follow Jaime and his team, please go to:  

Instagram:  @raceffpod

His podcast is:  Race FF Pod

The teams Vlog is on Kelvin’s YouTube channel at:  

https://www.youtube.com/user/driftmonsterr

GHIT 0270:  Jaime Garcia from the Race FF Podcast Reviews their Sonoma Endurance Race

GHIT 0120: Christina Lam is our special guest driver

  • Christina Lam Behind the Wheel

Christina Lam is a racing driver for several series, is an instructor for Skip Barber and NASA, as well as a frequent contributor to GrassRoots Motorsports magazine.  We first started following her as her “After A Crash” 9-part series started a few months back and became instant fans of her approach and her dedication to racing, education, and giving back to the racing community.  On this episode, we go over how she started to be involved from a point of little knowledge and car/racing influences to where she is not only competing at national events, podium’ing many times, and instructing others to improve their skills.  It is a fantastic and quite rapid journey from newbie to racing veteran and her latest challenge last season will inspire you and hopefully get you to reach further towards ever higher goals. 

Christina Lam on the Podium

On our Dominating with Dawson, Ben goes over the difference in driving approaches for endurance racing, autocross, as well as various types of sprint racing. 

We hope you enjoy the episode!

Best regards,

Bill, Vicki, Jennifer, and Alan

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training podcast

and team members in the GHiT

Immature Endurance Racing Team

Highlights from the episode include:

1)  We have had a long, long work week in the garage, so long that Vicki blanked on her name for a moment and Bill can’t spell SCCA, lol.

2)  How she started off racing in Autocross one weekend and then had the opportunity of a lifetime drop in her lap a short time later (driving on a little place known as The ’Ring).

3)  Christina’s first time on track was her first time driving a stick.  This may be a good rival for what we ended up doing to Jennifer at her first race at Thompson Speedway.  Not our best plan, but we did learn from it.

4)  We share post-race hangover stories and several great ideas for further race cross training.  Rally, V8 supercars, Ice racing, so much fun to be had, so little time.

5)  What is involved with being a one-person team and how she accomplishes all that is required for a race weekend.  The big key is prep.  Second rule, prep.  If you need a third rule, be prepped early.

6)  We go into her accident last year and how she recovered, both physically and mentally, as well as her new race car.

  • A slightly used E46
  • Wheel took quite a hit
A “Lightly Used” E46 BMW Race Car

7)  What is involved with an SCCA protest

8)  How Christina found her #46 M3 shell to start her new build

9)  How much sleep she lost while working to prep for new car the upcoming 2019 national SCCA Runoffs in 60 days.

10)  Christina goes into the plusses and minuses of an E46 M3 vs E46 330’s etc

11)  Christina shares some of her nerves and almost PTSD after the wreck, what she had to work through and  getting back into the car on track at VIR

12)  What it is like being a female in a predominantly male sport at the track.

13)  How Christina’s first car quickly turned into a second car.

Honorable mentions and sponsors that have helped Christina along the way:

Drive Gear Racing:  for arrive and drive ice racing.  Seems like a terribly great idea.

Hugh Stewart from High Speed Motorsports:  http://www.hispeedmotorsports.com/

Katherine Legge @ www.KatherineLegge.com

Simona De Silvestro @ www.Simonadesilvestro.com 

TC Designs @ www.tcdesignfab.com

Hoosier Tire @ www.hoosiertire.com

Epic Motorsports @ www.epicmotorsports.com

Racing Harness Technologies (856() 912-1237

Skip Barber Racing @ www.skipbarber.com 

GHIT 0120: Christina Lam is our special guest driver

Judge Phil from the 24 Hours of Lemons

Judge Phil
Judge Phil at “work” during a 24 Hours of Lemons race

GHIT 0078: Judge Phil Greden from the 24 Hours of Lemons

On this episode we started out with one show idea and quickly flexed into another when Judge Phil Greden from the 24 Hours of Lemons was able to join us after some scheduling issues.  Judge Phil is also an automotive journalist and often uses the pen name of Murilee Martin and writes for a variety of venues including Autoblog, Autoweek, Jalopnik, Truth About Cars, Car and Driver, Roadkill, and the 24 Hours of Lemons.  We had been hoping to have Phil on as one of our original bucket list guests and we were not disappointed and we really hope we can get him on again, soon.  His stories are priceless and seemingly endless. 

Highlights and discussion topics of the episode include: 

1)  New installation of the permanent 240V line for the welder is complete

2)  Alan tries to blame Chrissy for his mess and no one buys it, ever

3)  Alan defines what’s a bucket load of shims and then decides we aren’t going to use them

4)  We may have a plan for our long-awaited female only race car entry

5)  Tips for working in the cold temps/potential items for Christmas gifting.  Hint layers

6)  Phil’s latest junkyard finds and exploits and several tips for finding things of interest  

7)  Phil’s Lemons history and how he came to be a judge at over 160 races so far

8)  Tips for how to improve at lemons, as if that matters, lol.

9)  Where Murilee Martin originated, the full story is at his website below

10)  How the Lemons series has progressed and the culture came around to the present day

11)  Our next Miata with a HT4100 engine

12)  Lemons hopeful entries in the coming years, especially several late model Detroit offerings

13)  Tips for finding cars particularly suited to Lemons racing

14)  Theories on what makes certain car surprisingly good or surprisingly bad in endurance racing

15)  The difference between the $500 limit rule as written vs as interpreted in Lemons

16)  Various fruitless paths to “domination” that have been shown to be lacking

17)  Which of the automotive journalists are really good drivers off the top of Judge Phil’s head

18)  Should GHiT be interested in a Lada, Phil knows a guy….

19)  Potential leads and guidance on our 1974 Capri never-ending build

20)  How lucky we were to start our racing team with assistance from the Three Pedal Mafia

21)  Parts selling on the internet stories from over the years

22)  Crazy Lemons racing stories including lightning strikes and tornado chases

23)  How the post-race hangover is real, even if you aren’t racing

24)  The internet famous Lemons Wrap-up videos and what goes into them

25)  How the driver fields differ across the US

26)  Splash Gate makes a come back

27)  Our traditional Good, Bad, and the Ugly per Judge Phil

28)  How to get started in endurance racing and resources that are available

29)  The relative importance of team/pit organization vs driving skill

We will put out another short episode to discuss the AIM Data Acquisition and Analysis seminar Bill attended last weekend that we started. 

Now if only we could get a weekly segment of “Story Time with Judge Phil”.  Maybe we can bribe with a seat at our races?  Please let Phil know if you’d be interested.    

[email protected]

http://www.murileemartin.com/

Best regards,

Bill, Vicki, and Alan

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training podcast

and team members in the GHiT

Immature Endurance Racing Team

GHIT 0078: Judge Phil Greden from the 24 Hours of Lemons