Chike's official 2007 AutoX Blog thread (D-Stock)

[Chiketkd]

Originally Posted by benebob

Hoosiers are that fast but they're very predictable and last! From my understanding you may need to get the Korean kids working harder to make you some more by the end of the year!

Hoosiers are fast, but unfortunately the A6 compound doesn't last very long on 3,000+lb vehicles. Lee Piccione cords the 285 Hoosiers on his BS 350Z in 30-40 runs, while my buddy Keith corded the front hoosiers on his Crossfire in 20 runs.

The Hoosier R5's I was using do last much longer, but aren't as grippy and can heat cycle out after 60-75 runs (tires had 90 runs on them when Karen and I drove the car).

Oh and btw, the Hankook Z214's are the real deal and actually wear much better than Hoosiers. It is not uncommon to get 150+ runs out of a set.

[Chiketkd]

As I mentioned a few posts back, I decided to compete in Sunday's AI event @ Ripken at the last minute, as I got my new Hankook racing tires mounted Saturday morning and I wanted to test them out before the 2-day NCAC event I'm doing this upcoming weekend.



The weather was dreary and wet, and part of me regretted driving 3 hours one-way to run and work in the rain. DS ran in Heat 1 along with AS, BS, CS, ES and FS.

By the time I pulled up to do my 1st run, the rain was coming down steadily and I had my wipers going full blast. Took it easy through the course as I had never raced on these Hankooks before, and finished with a reasonably decent, and clean 51.4. My friend Shawn Roberts who won the last WDCR event in his orange MSP, finished with a 50.2 second run that was also clean. Neither of us improved on our 2nd runs (rain was coming down pretty hard), but by our third runs, the rain had stopped. The drainage is pretty decent at the Ripken Lot, so there was no standing water on course.

Shawn went out for his third run and came back in with a clean 49.5 run! I went out a few cars behind him, ran my lines throughout the entire course and crossed the finish with a clean 49.1 second time!!! I had the provisional lead in DS.

Shawn and I chatted before our 4th runs and we both felt more time was out there especially as the rain was holding up and the course was starting to 'dry' in a few places. We both felt a 48 second run was doable, maybe a 47 if the stars aligned. Shawn was up first and was positively flying through the course - no cones were hit and he came back in with a 47.459!!! I was up a few cars behind him and headed out on course with the goal of turning it up another notch through each element on course. I +vely attacked the slalom, and seemed to be carrying some nice speed going into the final elements on course. Went around the final turn, floored it through the finish and crossed with a clean 47.365 second run!!!! Shawn came running up to my car, and asked me what I ran and told me congrats!

Final results in DS were as follows:

D Stock - PAX = 0.804 Best PAX Interval
1T 70 Chike Dellimore : Subaru WRX Silver 51.419 51.762 49.120 47.365 47.365 38.081
2T 96 Shawn Roberts : Mazda Mazdaspeed Protege 50.472 49.599 47.459 50.274 47.459 38.157 (0.094)
3T 13 Harry Hogenkamp : Subaru WRX Black 54.157 53.191 52.519 49.403 49.403 39.720 (1.944)
4 72 William Marsteller : BMW 328i Green 54.792 53.440 52.064 49.496 49.496 39.795 (0.093)
5 36 Rob Kiernan : Subaru WRX Red 57.024 60.849(1) 54.756 51.913 51.913 41.738 (2.417)
6 8 Dave Blood : Subaru Legacy Silver 59.974 57.220 56.094 52.778 52.778 42.434 (0.865)
7 [N]85 Cody Pennetti : Mazda Mazdaspeed 3 Bla 68.860 57.650 56.099 56.398 56.099 45.104 (3.321)

http://www.autocrossersinc.org/docs/...AI_Results.pdf

Summary:
1st out of 7 in DS
11th out of 116 in PAX

P.S. Next event is the two day NCAC being held this coming weekend at the Danville airport. Hopefully the weather will be dry and the times will be fast!

[Chiketkd]

I'll be heading out early tomorrow morning for Danville, VA. Weather is supposed to be 100F and sunny on Saturday ( ), and 92F with a stray thunderstorm on Sunday.

Run groups were sent out via e-mail from the event organizer and are as follows:

Run Groups:
1) all STOCK except FS, GS, HS
2) FS, GS, HS, STREET PREP, PREPARED
3) all STREET TOURING
4) all MODIFIED, SM, SM2, PRO, NOV, Tire

So while Stock gets to clean off the course for everyone in the 1st run group, I'll get to run in the coolest part of the day (probably will be 85-90F around 11am).

Chike

[Chiketkd]

I competed in the 2 day NCAC over the weekend, held in Danville, VA. I drove like a mule's father pure and simple - especially on Saturday (Day 1). It also didn't help that everyone in the 1st run group was expecting 4 runs - but found out we would only get 3 after our third runs were completed... Looking at things conservatively, I easily left a low 48 out there on Saturday, as I wasn't downshifting to 1st during the slow 180 turn-around at the end of the runway.

Day 2 was slightly better as I downshifted in the turn-around from the get go! I just happened to tap 2 cones on my final run which if it had been clean, would have put me 0.2 seconds behind Buckley -- and 0.6 seconds behind Buckley's & Vail's fastest raw times (FWIW, Buckley finished 5th at Solo Nationals in a B-stock RX-8 last year).

While Vail and I were on older tires (Keith had 40 run V710's IIRC; I'm on 3 track session heat-cycled medium compound C51 Z214's), Buckley was on fresh tires which he was scrubbing in for Topeka.

I can't wait to add konis and run fresh C7 Z214's next season!


'D Stock' - Total Entries: 6 Trophies: 2 Day Times Total

1T 87 Aaron Buckley 06 Chrysler Crossfire 90.444
D1 48.726 49.050+1 47.120
D2 42.967+2 43.324 43.582

2T 57 Keith Vail 05 Chrysler Crossfire 91.672
D1 49.099 47.665 48.035
D2 44.007 42.910+1 43.213+1

3 28 Chuck Branscomb 03 BMW 330i ZHP 92.986
D1 50.349+dnf 49.120 49.181
D2 45.329 43.866 44.369

4 70 Chike Dellimore 06 Subaru WRX 93.951
D1 52.190+dnf 51.399 49.921
D2 44.729 44.030 43.551+2

5 729 Shane Warren 06 Subaru WRX 97.282
D1 55.976 52.300 50.274
D2 50.440 47.008 46.128+1

6 24 Steve Dasher 06 Subaru WRX 97.660
D1 54.187 52.908 51.796
D2 46.309+dnf 46.595 45.864

Link to complete Final Results: NCAC Final Results

Summary
4th out of 6 in DS
26 out of 145 in PAX

[SVXRide]

Just to put things into a "speed" comparison.....kinda makes you think all the full-bodied car videos are being run in slow motion

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8F5eJLYccjY

-Bill

[Chiketkd]

Event #6 is now behind me. Several of the turns were off-camber which made my back-end extremely loose -- had to counter-steer to keep the car from spinning on each of my 4 runs when going through the slalom at the top of the course! I easily lost 0.5-1 second on each run in that section alone (as well as the corresponding loss in speed/momentum)!

Kraus won DS by 0.1 seconds over Matt Arnold - she was in the '06 black WRX she'll be driving at the Pro Finale and Solo Nationals later this month -- she was also on fresh "sticker" 245/40/17 Hoosier A6's that she was scrubbing in for Nats.

My good friend Shawn, finished 4th in his "Spicy Orange" MSP (he also had oversteering issues on course), while I finished up in 6th place. Definitely felt like a low 56/high 55 was within my grasp that day.

Final results in DS were as follows:

'D Stock' - Total Entries: 15 Trophies: 3 Times Total Diff.
1T 34 Kraus, Karen 2006 Subaru Impreza Wrx Black 55.974 56.175 56.457 55.542 55.542 -
2T 57 Arnold, Matthew 2003 Bmw 330I Blue 56.193 56.373 54.972+1 55.614 55.614 0.072
3T 37 Spector, Larry 2000 Acura Integra Type-R Black 56.325 56.208 56.460 56.311 56.208 0.594
4 99 Roberts, Shawn 2003 Mazdaspeed Protege Teh Spicy 57.964 56.521 56.771 57.413 56.521 0.313
5 80 Radford, Tommy 1994 Bmw 325Is Black 59.406+DNF 56.804 56.638 56.867 56.638 0.117
6 70 Dellimore, Chike 2006 Subaru Wrx Grey 59.110+2 57.928+1 57.541 57.878 57.541 0.903
7 7 Little, Carroll 2006 Subaru Legacy Gt Silver 63.679 57.639 58.038+1 63.561+DNF 57.639 0.098
8 71 Staples, Curtis 2002 Bmw 330Ci Blue 58.846 58.056 58.400 57.659 57.659 0.020
9 180 Radford, William 1994 Bmw 325Is Black 61.629 59.151 59.250 58.624 58.624 0.965
10 46 Redington, Alex 2001 Audi S4 Black 60.859 60.066 60.338+1 60.241 60.066 1.442
11 13 Hogenkamp, Harry 2006 Subaru Wrx Wagon Black 63.562 60.267 60.245 60.483 60.245 0.179
12 42 Cuellar, Roland 2005 Subaru Wrx Wagon Silver 63.522 62.605 62.039 60.357 60.357 0.112
13 48 Williams, Phil 2001 Bmw 330I Orient Blue 62.195 61.483 63.117+1 60.984 60.984 0.627
14 17 Walker, Don 2004 Volkswagen R32 Black 63.653+DNF 62.452 62.373 61.792 61.792 0.808
15 3 Rollison, John 2006 Chevrolet Cobalt Black 66.029+1 62.935+5 62.375+4 63.008 63.008 1.216
http://solo.wdcr-scca.org/results/20070902.php

Summary:
6th out of 15th in DS
73rd out of 223 in PAX

P.S. That's an awesome FTD video by Brian Garfield Bill - he was flying out there on Sunday afternoon!

[Chiketkd]

I'll be at the 2-day South East Division Super Regional being held in Verona, VA at the Augusta County Gov't Center. In DS, the biggest names I'll be up against are Karen Kraus in the black '06 WRX as well as Curtis Staples in his 330i (I run with him a bunch at WDCR events).

Course maps are posted for both days and are shown below:

9-8-07 Course


9-9-07 Course

[Chiketkd]

Completed the 2 day super regional event, and ran against Curtis Staples (I compete against him regularly at WDCR events). I drove okay all weekend making some little mistakes that cost me a 1/2 second here and there, but this was the first time I've ever beaten Staples by such a solid margin (last WDCR event I beat him by just 0.1 seconds).

After winning DS on Sunday, I was chatting with one of my autocross mentors - Anthony Hodges. He mentioned that beating Staples was no easy feat as he has 8+ yrs of autocross experience and has been to Nationals multiple times and even trophied one year!

Saturday 9/8/07:
DS - D Stock Pax: 0.804
1t CHIKE DELLIMORE 06 SUBARU WRX 58.131 -- 46.737
2 CURTIS STAPLES 02 BMW 330CI 59.392 1.261 47.751
3 BRIAN JONES 03 INFINITI G35 SEDAN 62.007 3.876 49.854
http://www.brr-scca.org/sep0807.htm

Sunday 9/9/07:
DS - D Stock Pax: 0.804
1t CHIKE DELLIMORE 06 SUBARU WRX 58.349 -- 46.913
2 CURTIS STAPLES 02 BMW 330CI 58.895 0.546 47.352
http://www.brr-scca.org/sep0907.htm

Summary:
1st out of 3 in DS
7th in PAX Saturday; 13th in PAX Sunday

Some pics from the event -

[newsvx]

CONGRATULATION, Chike!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now if you were only driving a SVX!!!!

Harry

[newsvx]

BTW, Chike,
On my first autocross after my extended layoff, I finished 2nd of 4 in G Stock and 11the overall in the local Mercedes autocross here in Winchester yesterday. Not too bad for an old fart, I guess. And Mike Wirt (RUFUS here on the network) also beat me in his Porsche.

A VW GTI beat me. His "index'ed' time was 41.785 sec and mine was 42.706 sec. And the fastest time of the day was a very accomplished autocrosser in a 2005 S 2000 with an index'ed time of 38.736 sec.

It was a fun (but hot!!) day, and it was great to get back in the saddle again!!

Harry

[Chiketkd]

Thanks Harry!

Glad to see you're behind the wheel again. It would be nice if I could compete competitively in an SVX, but I realized it's very hard to do given the weight of the car and tall gearing. Looking forward to seeing you at the Scooby Challenge later this month!

Btw, after the Saturday event, the top 16 drivers in PAX had a shootout. I made it all the way to the final and ran against Justin Rest in the STS neon. I ran a time that would have won, however, I hit 2 cones which cost me the win!

For my efforts, I won a free SCCA hooded sweatshirt - a $30 value!



Some more pics from the Super Regional event:

[newsvx]

Great job on the "Shootout"!! Damn those cones! They just jump right out in front of us, don't they!! BTW, I only hit "ONE" yesterday!!

Also, Ron Mummert finished 3rd in G Stock yesterday in his 240SX. He is really improving!!

Harry

[Chiketkd]

Originally Posted by newsvx

Damn those cones! They just jump right out in front of us, don't they!!

LOL! Yeah those little "orange people" have a way of doing that!

[Chiketkd]

Will be the 2007 Mid-Atlantic Subaru Challenge held at Ripken Stadium in Aberdeen, MD this Saturday! It should be a blast as I'll get to meet up with several members on this board. My ultimate goal will be to finish in the Top 3 in D-stock and make it into the Challenge at the end of the day.

I always have a blast running at the venue and lots of fond memories come to mind...



-Chike

[newsvx]

Chike,
Great shot there at Ripkin!

BTW, are you traveling north on Interstate 81 in going tto the Challenge this year? If so, would you like to hook up here in Winchester Sat morning?

Harry