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Garage Heroes (In Training)

Garage Heroes (In Training)

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

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Garage Heroes In Training

GHiT 0127: Our Team Answers the Fast and Furious Question – By Request

We try to give answers to questions our listeners want to know, usually to help them progress as drivers, but sometimes we get requests to answer questions that are not going to help you drive any better, ever.  This is one of those times and one of those episodes.  Several of you have asked us these questions at the track or via the inter webs, so here they are, as requested.

Throttle steering is the subject for our Dominating with Dawson segment this episode.  This is one of the ways that you can make a car turn without using your steering wheel.

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)  Somehow we combined the Fast and Furious questions with the Newlywed Game during this episode.

2)  Who has driven the fastest on our team.  Any guesses?  Unfortunately, not all have hit triple digits, yet.  New team goal for our next HPDE!

3)  Alan wanders off during the podcast with his wireless microphone.  Can’t even herd cats on the podcast.

4)  Jennifer stretches the limits of what a car sound is, just a bit.

5)  What were some of our team members “Ahhh Hahhh” moments.

GHiT 0127: Our Team Answers the Fast and Furious Question – By Request

GHIT 0124: GHIT Flashback to Thompson 2018 with the 24 Hours of Lemons

Award Winning GHiT Team
We Won (well, at least we got an award)

On this flashback episode, we cover our team’s second ever race at Thompson with the 24 Hours of Lemons series in 2018.  How did the race go?  Well, it was our first ever two car race.  It was the first ever race for half of our team (Alan, Jennifer, Casey, and Pete).  It was our first time on track with the SpiderStang and our friends at Prompt Critical showed Liam and Cassian how to “adjust” the boost on the SpiderStang.  The Capri died and is still dead to this day.  We won the “I Got Screwed” award.  Details of our weekend and what we learned shall be provided.  PS Never show your new to racing teen age team mates how to adjust the boost.  Also, on this episodes Dominating with Dawson, we go over car control and what it means when someone refers to a car “rotating”.

  • SpiderStang Makes its Debut
Capri’s dies while the SpiderStang makes its debit

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 quickly gloss over the new raspberry additions that Alan and Bill added to Vicki’s garden area.

2)  We cover from post-race of our first race at NJMP to the conclusion of our second race at Thompson

3)  How our team grew from our first race with 4 drivers to where we had a two-car team with 8 drivers.  Our preparation was not quite up to what it should have been. Especially with 4 additional drivers, two of which that had never driven a manual transmission before.

4)  The advantages and disadvantages of a teen drivers on a racing team

5)  How a perfectly performing a running car from our last race did not stay that way during the trip back from the track, to the great surprise of all involved. Carburetors are not our center of expertise and decided to let us know.

6)  How the SpiderStang theme came to be and what we learned in doing it.  It ended up looking great, but the process was not one we would recommend.  Sometimes you learn what to do and sometimes you learn what not to do.  We also mention how we built “Bondo”, a PVC and spray foam version of a mannequin to be used as Spiderman on our car.

RV Plumbing Fitting
RV Plumbing Fitting, not Automotive Grade, lol.

7)  Vicki’s trials and tribulations for her first time driving to a race with a race car trailer.  It did not go very well.

8)  How our first time trying to stay at the track went.  In a word:  poorly.  We have come up with much better sources for renting RV’s to stay at the track since then.

9)  How our new drivers first time driving went.  Quick checklist, panic attack at being strapped in, panic attack about going on a racetrack in the pit lane, first ever racing in the rain and heavy fog, and how to be a rolling chicane on the track.

10)  Prompt Critical helped us with our cars but gave away a bit too much information to Liam and Cassian.  They now knew how to adjust (read as increase to maximum) the boost of the turbocharger.  After all, more is better, lol.

11)  How to dial in a brake proportioning valve during testing.

12)  Alan’s chipmunk powered internet popped up again, a few times.  Bill had no idea on how to edit this, but it seems pretty funny.

13)  How we became an award-winning racing team at this event.  It all started with Jennifer and her license in driver tech inspection.  Well on our way to minor internet celebrity status.  Still on the way to this day.

14)  Things we learned at our first ever rain race and our first ever fog race, all at the same race.

15)  The story of the death of the Capri and the birth of El Jeffe, The Bad Hombre.

16)  We share the secret concoction to keep fog off your windshield that was shared with us by the Three Pedal Mafia.

17)  Alan treats his body like a temple?  And we finally found the root cause for why Alan doesn’t want to work on the Capri.

18)  Bill tries to avoid sleeping in the bathtub even though we won the coveted “I Got Screwed” award.

19)  Finally, we go over the post-race awards and the trials and tribulations we went through to get home afterwards.

SpiderStang Glows
SpiderStang Glows, Who Knew?

GHIT 0124: GHIT Flashback to Thompson 2018 with the 24 Hours of Lemons

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

The Night Before NASA HPDE Pitt Race

GHIT 0053: The Night Before NASA Pitt Race HPDE

Honda Challenge
Plenty of Cars

Expectations and Goals

Mazda RX-7
Even some Older/Classics

Bill is going solo this weekend but going to cover what he is expecting at the HPDE event with NASA Great Lakes at Pitt Race.  Having raced here earlier this year, it may have helped, but we shall see.  Hopefully the brakes will not catch on fire this time.  Bill is driving a 2017 Toyota 86 TRD this weekend for the third time ever on a track.  And hopefully home after Sunday, lol.

The NASA Great Lakes region has some of the best instruction we have been able to find and we love going to their events. While Bill attended this solo for the Garage Heroes In Training team, we did have a bunch of great friends that attended and this event has become the highlight of our season. We cannot wait for next year and we promise to have many more attendees for the next Great Lakes event at Pitt Race. (Now if we could only add a second event here, lol)

GHIT 0053: The Night Before NASA Pitt Race HPDE

GHIT 0054: NASA HPDE Day 1 in Review

Our First GHiT Year In Review

For this episode, we wanted to look back on our team’s first year racing Lemons and what we did, what we did well, what we did poorly, and begin to refine our plan for the coming year. So this episode is our first GHiT Year In Review.

AT Thompson 2018
Our endurance racing team at the 2018 Lemons race in Thompson CT

Alan also covers his recommended tool of the week.

GHIT

GHiT Podcast 00424: Year in Review

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