[Jackal]

I’m finally getting the chance to go through the numbers on my first Auto-X (May 17 2015 Westerner) in what seems like forever. The event had two sets of runs and unknown to me until now it was the fastest run from each set that cumulatively made the days raw time.

Runs
ASP Duane J 2008 BMW 135i
Day 1 Set 1 65.518 63.145 (62.409)
Day 1 Set 2 62.490 61.524 60.246 (59.884)

Place and Raw time
34 ASP Duane J 2008 BMW 135i (122.293)
+16 seconds from leader (AS 2003 Corvette), and amazingly only +6.965 seconds from a SSM 2009 Nissan GTR

Place and Pax time
47 ASP Duane J 2008 BMW 135i 122.293 x 0.865 = 105.783

Fortunately there was another BMW 135i there, but not tuned so it remained in DS. We were very comparably matched in Raw time, but PAX treated him much better.

Place and Raw time
33 DS Kenneth P 2008 BMW 135i 121.965
34 ASP Duane J 2008 BMW 135i 122.293

Place and Pax time
29 DS Kenneth P 2008 BMW 135 121.965 x 0.812 = 99.036
47 ASP Duane J 2008 BMW 135i 122.293 x 0.865 = 105.783


Now some take aways.

-I am impressed overall with the car. I was afraid of wild over steer and a longer learning curve. The car feels remarkably planted ( tires considered) and able to turn quickly. Not one cone on the day means two things.... I'm not pushing hard enough, but I'm also able to feel the car at speed pretty well. The traction control mset to half was the way to go, as I kept breaking the tires loose anyway. For the foreseeable future, that is the setting I'll use.

-Tires were run at 44 PSI both front and rear.
- I didn't want to play with this much as I wanted to feel out the car and see how badly I drive before screwing with any of the variables. I will play with this in the
future, but have already started the search for a new set of rears.

-Classing
- I chose to stay in ASP with the AP married to the car. This obviously didn't do me any favours, but it did give me some valuable input on moving forward since
there was a very similar car there, and in the class I would be in without the AP. In DS I would be 6 seconds faster in PAX. (6 and change actually)
- In the SPREP classes only one competitor had a higher PAX modifier (SSP), So even among SPREP classes, ASP is pretty unforgiving to me/car as it currently
is.
- The extra 60 hp did very little for me. The tires broke loose so easily, and the boost came on too late to actually matter. I'll be changing on variable at a time
moving forward to increase the value of the data points.

This leaves me in the conundrum of how far to take the car, and if I should stay in ASP for the long haul. Next event I will likely stay in ASP with a new set of tires and get a few more data points. This year isn't about being competitive, but rather learning to drive again and finding direction for classing the car overall. There are still changes I can make to the car in DS and get more competitive, but for the moment, and for that day, I am satisfied.