What a crazy fun weekend. Jim Schenck and I drove down to Mark Dougherty’s exit, picked up my car and Brendan Dougherty, then headed down to Atlanta ready for the 8hr enduro. Rafe Baskin met us at the track as he will be also driving with Jim and I in the 8hr enduro. He also gave us great news, Rafe proposed to his girlfriend Anna the day before Congrats to both of them!
Friday AM before the enduro was a practice session, so Jim takes out #52 to make sure all is OK and to get re-acquainted with Road Atlanta. He promptly comes back in after just a couple of laps with bad news, the cars temp gauge is pegged and is whistling like a tea kettle! doh, not a good way to start the day. With my car just sitting there we swapped tires off Jim’s car to mine, and I got in to start enduro in #48. A couple of laps down, no big deal, we have 8hrs to make it up, unfortunately my engine expired with only 30min into the race.. video here:
Engine had 2yrs on it, and I was due for a refresh this off-season.
Meanwhile as I an waiting to get towed in the Atlanta crew (Joe Camire and friends) were working on Jim’s car to see what was wrong, they found the coolant overflow line completely clogged with crud/rust/mud/etc, replaced it, waited for engine to cool off, then added water back into cooling system. Low and behold the car did not overheat, stayed at 150deg in the pits, purring great. I finally get back to the pits, we swapped tires back from #48 to #52, now 20 or so laps down, and after talking with the NASA-SE regional director Jim Pantas who felt bad for us, radioed into timing/scoring changing our entry back to #52 so we could still get some track time. I hopped into #52 and started to do my 1hr 15min stint, Rafe then got in, then repeat. #52 ran great for 5-6hrs, Rafe and I setting very consistent laptimes, having a great time around Road Atlanta. With the race almost to a close, 30min left, Rafe was driving, and then suddenly #52 engine expired in a spectacular fashion right in front of us on the front straight. We hear tire lockup, then see #52 skidding off track in turn 1 stopped by the gravel trap, and luckily see Rafe jump out of the car throwing gravel in the vent louver cutouts to quench out a small oil fire. Video here:
He gets towed back in, Jim’s crank broke up front, as opposed to my crank which broke in the back. We joked that taking #48’s and #52’s good crank pieces, some JB weld, we would be fixed in no time
Even with all of this carnage the 8hr event was such a blast, great crew as always, good pitstops, consistent times set on track, a great time had by all! I cannot wait to do it again next year. New engines will be installed in #48 and #52 during the off-season ready for 2014!
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