Palmer oh Palmer

 Well it was back on the track and this time at Palmer.  Justin could not make it so this was the first solo run for me and the car in 3 years.

Got up early on Saturday and the guys in tech were great with a quick annual.  I had paddocked close by and that spot worked great all weekend.

The first qualifying/Practice session was cut short after 4 laps as one car blew it's engine and another couple spun in turn one, littering the track with bodywork.  Since I had not been there in 3 years, I was hoping for some more time, but was in the top 50% for qualifying time.

Note: We talk about the difference between sit up and laydown cars in FV.  I had only driven the track in my Citation (sit up) and now driving the Caracal (laydown).  Since Palmer has lots of hills and blind turns, I had to relearn all my track markers!

First race was a learning experience - for some reason was not getting a good jump at the start.  I still say the Start Tower is in a bad position and the green flag gets lost in the background of trees. But we had 3 laps under yellow while they removed a car that made it all the way to turn 2...

When the flag dropped, I settled in and got a decent 13th with a fun race behind Guy Bellingham and ahead of Mike Sampson.  No thrilled with the lap time, but there is always tomorrow.

Tomorrow dawned with the threat of rain.  Now I needed Justin.  The rain tires were out, partially on and then off for the race.  The track was "dry" but with occasional sprinkles. The turns that got wet first were T1 through T3, the fastest on the track.  On lap one, into T3 one car locked up and punted another and 3 cars went around.  I took it easy with the track damp in places as others went around.  In the end I finished 10th and the lap time, while no better than the day before, was closer to those in front.

BTW - Great video was lost when my helmet cam stopped working.  Will probably be running two cameras from now on!  The fantastic moves only exist in my head right now...

The third race was, from my POV the best, but others had issues.  There was a spin and crash after turn 5, and 3 or 4 cars got caught up in that.  Guy Bellingham got the worst of it, but in the red flag that followed, several other cars sustained damage....

Back to the race and it was quiet until Kevin caught back up.  He had to start at the back, but when he Jeff and I got together, it was the perfect drafting train.  At the end Kevin got in front and threw a perfect pick with a lapped car.  So I finished 10th again but knocked 3 seconds off my fast time.

Thanks James Ray for the picture

Just before Kevin took the lead of this group.

So for me the weekend was almost perfect - just add gas and check the tires.  Did get to do some tuning and the changes made seem to help.  Now some more tweaking and then off to Thompson for the last race of the year.

Return to the scene of the crime

 We left Torrington on the way back to New Hampshire for the Paul Faford Memorial/Racing against Leukemia (RAL) weekend

Justin had his new truck and my old trailer and we were off.

In the meantime I had fixed the bad block stud on his car, as well as a bunch of other things, and put a new steering box on mine.  

Getting to the track we got his car through tech, and prepared for the next day.  I was worried about his car being untested, but little did I know.

The first session out was qualifying - I made it 2 turns before I knew something was wrong.  After almost taking out a competitor, I pulled into the pits not having done even one lap.  Checking the car, the steering box had come loose due to a manufacturing defect.  This was actually a blessing in disguise as after I changed the steering box, I found a split oil cooler that was dumping oil on the ground!

Now I have to change a hot oil cooler also!  

In the afternoon here we go with Justin starting in the top 10 (his car was running well) and me starting from dead last.....   When the green flag fell I passed 5 cars and headed into the first turn, and this was also the first time I had been at speed.  The new tires still had part of their stickers on them.  But it struck and I worked my way to a respectable 15th  place finish.  BTW - Justin finished 8th.

The next day Team z was ready to go

This time I started middle of the field, got a great start and was passing cars until.... I developed a miss going over the top of the hill.  It was sporadic, but enough to take away my primary passing zone.  I soldiered on and finished 15th again, but more work to do.  I found a loose wire and sure that that was the problem and tuned the car for the last race of the weekend,  BTW - Justin finished 7th and went a second faster than he ever did before.

The last race was another hot one.  The temperature all weekend was over 100 degrees.  Even  brief downpour did not cool us off, just made it more humid.  I again got a good jump and was looking at a top ten finish when - the misfire cam back.  Knowing it was not a electrical problem, I played with shifting and throttle to see if I could work with it.  This let 3 cars slip by me and I finished 12th.  BTW - Justin finished 6th.  

So the weekend was over - the car I thought would give me problems ran like a clock - we just added fuel and check the tires.  My car was the one that gave me all the aggravation.   But both cars finished and went back on the respective trailers in one piece.  Back home we are going to skip the night race to work out the kinks and get ready for Palmer in September.  Time to take a summer break, just like F1 and come back for the 2nd half of the season.

Up to Speed

 Well, it has been a busy summer so far.

Justin had his incident at New Hampshire, we purchased a project car to get him back on the track,  missed Lime Rock (but I got help announce the race with Greg Rickes) and then came Thompson.

We decided to do the test day as a shakedown of Justin's car.

The problem was, he would do about 3 or 4 laps and the oil light would flicker due to low oil.  The first time he went out there was no sign of a leak.  The second time, we showed some leaks.  So we took a couple of sessions off to attack them.  The last time we went out, he did two laps and saw his own line of oil being dropped.  Back at the pits we were lucky to have our engine builder, Dave Carr, show up.  After close inspection, it turned out that the lower rear stud on the left hand side of the engine was slowly pulling out of the block.  Thus on right hand turns, under acceleration only, we were dropping oil out if the engine.  

But in the little the car ran, it went straight, stopped well and on old tires the handling showed promise.

The next day I ran my car in the Majors.  The first day was practice, qualifying and a race.  Only the third time out for the car and the first with the rebuilt engine.  I was not looking to set the world on fire, just to break in the car - on old tires.  It was  decent finish and we put the car away for the night.  Next day I switched tires on one side for some newer ones and went out for the practice and found out I had no clutch!  It would not disengage.  It was either clutch failing or the clutch slave so we went about changing the slave with about an hour before the race.  Got it done with about a half hour to relax and then off to the races.  It was a fun race with some other drivers until I made a pass and carried a little too much speed into turn one.  I spent the rest of the race playing catchup, but the good thing was I turned a lap 1 second faster than the car had gone before.  So we were making progress.

On to New Hampshire.

Quick update

 Here is a quick update on the Zarzycki Racing exploits

Justin ran at New Hampshire in May but had an unfortunate meeting with a lapped car and basically the car was a write off.   

We purchased a project car with the idea of getting it on track for Lime Rock.  We came close but did not make it and the additional work prevented me from running at Lime Rock also.  Sigh.

He tested it at Thompson on July 7.  Murphy has been with us the entire way and a pulled head stud resulted in a oil leak that kept us from running more than a few laps.  But the potential is there and we are looking forward to (fingers crossed) debuting the car at New Hampshire in August.

I finally got out at the Thompson Majors - this is only the 3rd time out with the car and it was tougher to say if it was the car or the driver that was holding things back.  A bad slave cylinder just before the main race (Murphy jumped cars) made that a thrash but it was all fixed and ready to go.  The race itself was not the best but after a driver error, he put his head down and on old tires went 1 second faster than last year.  

With some more tuning and fresh tires, maybe we will be back in the hunt again.

More to come - with pictures.

Chris