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213 - Do Better Than Seth
About this episode
Scott and Seth reflect on their racing season with tiny bikes, sharing insights on bike modifications, team dynamics, and the challenges of endurance racing. They discuss upgrades made to improve performance, particularly a new close ratio transmission that enhanced lap times. The conversation highlights the fun of racing, overcoming mechanical issues, and the importance of teamwork. They also touch on the mental aspects of racing, including managing expectations and learning from experiences. The episode wraps up with a discussion on tire management and how to maximize performance on used tires.
Topics:
57 second laps
brake shoe wear
brake situation
bump steer
cable stretch
caster
coil
derometer
disc brakes
drum brakes
Cars:
Mazda MX-5 / Miata
Seth gets a t-shirt for all his efforts... Scott thinks he couldn't have had fun unless he tried hard... and we talk about tires...
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Technical
Too Afraid to Ask
Car
Mazda Miata
"It's like a, like a Miata, right? Like it's not fast, but it's a really good, like it's really good to go"
The Mazda Miata is a small sports car that many people love because it's fun to drive, even if it isn't the fastest car out there. It's known for being light and easy to handle.
The Mazda Miata is a lightweight two-seat sports car known for its agile handling and fun driving experience. While it may not have the highest horsepower, its balance and responsiveness make it a favorite among driving enthusiasts.
Term
lap times
"lap times come in. Um, and yeah, we were just having a good, it was"
Lap times are how long it takes a car to go around a racetrack. Shorter times mean better performance.
Lap times refer to the amount of time it takes for a vehicle to complete a lap on a racetrack. They are crucial for assessing performance and competitiveness in racing.
Term
gearing issues
"the problem with these motors is we run into gearing issues. Like there's only so much gear in the transmission."
Gearing issues happen when the car's gears aren't set up right, which can make it harder for the car to go fast or accelerate well.
Gearing issues refer to problems related to the gear ratios in a vehicle's transmission, which can affect acceleration and top speed. If the gear ratios are not optimized for the engine's power band, it can lead to performance limitations.
Term
transmission
"there's only so much gear in the transmission."
The transmission is what helps the car change gears and move. It connects the engine to the wheels.
The transmission is a system in a vehicle that transmits power from the engine to the wheels, allowing the car to move. It can be automatic or manual and plays a key role in vehicle performance.
Part
spark plug
"We had a new coil and plug together"
A spark plug is a small part in the engine that creates a spark to help ignite the fuel and air mixture. It's important for starting the car and keeping the engine running smoothly.
Spark plugs are essential components in gasoline engines, providing the spark that ignites the air-fuel mixture in the combustion chamber. They need to be replaced periodically to ensure optimal engine performance.
Part
coil
"We had a new coil and plug together"
An ignition coil is a part of the car's engine that helps create the spark needed to start the engine. It takes a small amount of electricity and turns it into a much stronger spark.
A coil in automotive terms usually refers to the ignition coil, which is responsible for converting the battery's low voltage to the high voltage needed to create a spark in the spark plugs. This is crucial for starting the engine and maintaining its operation.
Part
drum brakes
"...that is it has drum brakes front and rear. So it has cable actuated drum brakes which are..."
Drum brakes are a kind of brake that uses a round drum to create friction and stop the car. They are usually not as strong as the more common disc brakes.
Drum brakes are a type of braking system where friction is applied to the inside of a drum to slow down the vehicle. They are generally less effective than disc brakes, especially in high-performance situations.
Term
disc brakes
"...with good disc brakes hit the brakes in front of us it was pretty sketchy..."
Disc brakes are a type of brake that helps slow down a car. They work by squeezing a flat disc to create friction, which stops the wheels from turning.
Disc brakes are a type of braking system that uses a disc-shaped rotor and calipers to slow down or stop a vehicle. They are known for their effective heat dissipation and consistent performance under various conditions.
Term
horsepower
"...we found ourselves with 12 horsepower going damn near 60 miles an hour at the end of the straightaway."
Horsepower is a way to measure how powerful an engine is. The more horsepower an engine has, the faster and stronger it can make a car go.
Horsepower is a unit of measurement for power, commonly used to quantify the power output of engines. It indicates how much work an engine can perform over time, with higher horsepower generally translating to better performance.
Term
cable stretch
"...what they refer as cable stretch..."
Cable stretch happens when a cable gets pulled tight and becomes longer. This can cause problems in cars, especially with things like brakes or gas pedals, where everything needs to work just right.
Cable stretch refers to the elongation of a cable under tension, which can affect its performance and the operation of connected components. In automotive contexts, this can relate to brake cables or throttle cables, where precise tension is crucial for proper function.
Term
housing compression
"...more like housing compression..."
Housing compression is when the outer part of a cable gets squished down, which can make it harder for the cable inside to move. This can cause issues in cars, especially with brakes or gear shifts.
Housing compression occurs when the outer casing of a cable system compresses under tension, which can lead to reduced performance or responsiveness of the cable inside. This is important in systems like brakes or shifters where precise movement is needed.
Part
brake shoe wear
"but yeah brake shoe wear and cable housing compression are the two main things"
Brake shoe wear is when the parts that help your car stop start to wear out. If they wear down too much, your brakes won't work as well, and you might need to replace them.
Brake shoe wear refers to the degradation of the brake shoes, which are critical components in drum brake systems. Over time, as the brake shoes make contact with the drum, they wear down and may need to be replaced to maintain effective braking performance.
Concept
57 second laps
"we had been running like 57 second laps something like that at that track earlier in the year"
A 57 second lap time means it takes 57 seconds to go around a racetrack once. Faster lap times usually mean the driver and car are performing really well.
A 57 second lap time refers to the duration it takes to complete one lap around a racetrack, which is a measure of speed and performance. Lower lap times generally indicate faster and more skilled driving, as well as a well-tuned vehicle.
Term
brake situation
"if you guys get the brake situation sorted and maybe different gearing like we have..."
The 'brake situation' is about how well a car can stop. It includes things like the condition of the brake pads and how the brakes are set up.
The term 'brake situation' refers to the overall performance and effectiveness of a vehicle's braking system. This can include factors like brake pad condition, brake fluid levels, and the design of the braking system itself.
Term
tire temps
"...what data is being collected you know tire temps for sure even..."
Tire temps refer to how hot your tires get while driving. Knowing the temperature helps you understand if your tires are performing well or if they might be wearing out too quickly.
Tire temperatures are critical for understanding tire performance, as they affect grip, wear, and overall handling. Monitoring tire temps can help drivers optimize their driving style and tire management during races or spirited driving.
Term
lateral
"...tire temps for sure even lateral longitudinal..."
Lateral means side-to-side movement. In driving, it describes how a car behaves when turning or going around corners.
Lateral refers to movement or forces acting sideways on a vehicle, particularly during cornering. Understanding lateral forces helps drivers gauge how well their car handles turns and maintains grip.
Term
longitudinal
"...tire temps for sure even lateral longitudinal..."
Longitudinal means forward and backward movement. In cars, it describes how the vehicle accelerates or brakes.
Longitudinal refers to movement or forces acting in the direction of the vehicle's length, such as acceleration and braking. Understanding longitudinal forces is essential for optimizing performance during straight-line driving and stopping.
Term
derometer
"the derometer if you're taking derometer readings on your tires when they're new versus you know a couple of heat cycles old and tracking the temperature when you take them and stuff like that"
A derometer is a device that checks how hot your tires get while driving. Knowing the temperature can help you understand if your tires are working well or if they are getting worn out.
A derometer is a tool used to measure the temperature of tires, which is crucial for understanding their performance during use. Monitoring tire temperature can help in assessing tire wear and optimal performance under different driving conditions.
Term
heat cycles
"when they're new versus you know a couple of heat cycles old and tracking the temperature"
Heat cycles are the times when your tires get hot from driving and then cool down again. Each time this happens, it can change how well your tires work and how long they last.
Heat cycles refer to the number of times a tire heats up and cools down during use. Each heat cycle can affect the tire's performance and longevity, as tires can degrade over time with repeated heating and cooling.
Term
caster
"depending on your caster and bump steer and stuff like that that can"
Caster is an angle related to the front wheels of a car. It helps the car steer straight and makes it easier to turn corners.
Caster is the angle of the steering axis when viewed from the side of the vehicle. It affects the steering stability and self-centering of the wheels, influencing how the car handles during turns.
Term
bump steer
"depending on your caster and bump steer and stuff like that that can"
Bump steer is what happens when the wheels change direction as the car goes over bumps. It can make the car feel unstable or harder to control.
Bump steer refers to the change in the angle of the wheels when the suspension moves up or down. It can affect handling and stability, especially during cornering.
Select text to request an explanation
Hi, I'm Scott.
And I am the F7 Expert Endurance Champion for 2025.
That's Seth.
Giving away the whole show here.
Yeah, definitely did not bury that lead.
No.
Yeah, we're track walking.
Oh, yeah, we're that too.
Yeah, Seth and I were pre-show we're just talking about and kind of bemoaning just how busy life is.
You know, like, when you're a kid, you just don't have responsibilities.
Like you have your chores and like that kind of sucks, but like laundry.
You got time to be bored.
Yeah, just got laundry all the time.
Dishes.
Every time you eat, you make a dish and you have to clean it.
Yeah.
It's the worst.
Countertops.
You said floors.
Floors.
Yeah, because if I go outside, I track something inside the end.
Then I have to clean it up.
But tonight we want to talk about tiny bikes.
We do.
Had a good season.
Had a good season.
Yeah.
So coming into this season, you guys were going to do this season a little differently.
Once you, once you remind us about all the like preseason thoughts.
Okay.
Last season was a season that Sonya and I alternated soloing basically so that we
could do the season together.
We ran that on a 70 that we put a little more power in.
And we just had a good time.
Had a really good time during the year.
One of our, one of my good friends in the paddock and his son were there to do
sprint races and we talked to him through the season.
And at the end of last season, I said, how about you guys?
Endurance race on a 70 with me next year because they both have written the
70.
They both like the 70.
His son who's 16 now has written a Yamaha TTR 110 same size bike.
That's what has been his race bike since he was like 11.
And so they both had fun with it.
And so I said, do you want to ride with me slash Sonya next year?
I have a few things to do on the bike.
We'll ride.
We'll just have fun.
We'll just go have a good time.
Not a, not a high pressure situation.
And they were both like, yeah, let's have fun.
Let's race for fun.
I feel like everybody goes into it with those pure intentions.
Yeah.
Cause we finished the season in a different headspace.
I'll get to that.
But so the, the only significant upgrade for the bike this year was
I split the cases and I put in a close ratio transmission.
We liked everything about the bike except for the distance between second and third gear.
It was, it was a giant chasm of space between second and third gear.
And so you either geared the bike to run, you know, to have third gear be the top
gear on the track.
And then second was just too short to do anything.
Or you geared it to race the, you know, the tighter sections in second gear and
then shifting to third on the straights was pointless.
Like you just, you changed RPMs, but you didn't really change speed.
So I took the motor down to its constituent components, replaced a few gears,
put it back together and it was awesome.
It was exactly what the bike needed.
We went lap time wise.
I think we, Sony and I figured out we maybe picked up half a second in lap time.
Okay.
But the bike raced so much better.
I was about, I bet out of corners and stuff like that.
That was exactly it.
If you got somebody slow in front of you, you know, if you got slowed down a
little bit in the corner, you were, you could really dig out of the corners
in, in race around them.
You weren't, you weren't relying just on really carrying corner speed to be
able to do anything, which is hard to do in a race situation.
We were still going an okay speed on the back straight.
We were functionally the slowest bike out there top speed wise.
And we were running, I guess at the beginning of this year, if you'd
have 20 teams and you looked at what our fastest lap was, we were generally
down like 15, 16.
So we weren't, we weren't fast.
Like the bike is not fast.
Lowest part of our bike.
Like 15 or 16 laps or?
No, 15 or 16 place.
Like if you said like fastest bike here, slowest bike here, we're
towards the bottom of the list.
Like the bike is, is not fast.
It was good though, if that makes sense.
It's like a, like a Miata, right?
Like it's not fast, but it's a really good, like it's really good to go
race.
And, and we can race well.
We could run two hours on a tank.
So we only needed to refuel once during the race.
We could do our switches really, you know, our rider changes
really fast.
And so we just decided to go race well.
The beginning of the year, Sonya was able to do the first
race of the season with us over her spring break.
So we got all four of us, winded laps, had the best time.
I can tell you where we finished, but I don't really care.
That wasn't really the point.
The point was we just, we raced and had a good time.
That was the first one, right?
First race this season.
Yep.
All four, all four team members were there for the first one.
I raced the second race with, with Seth, the, my other,
other friend is also named Seth.
I don't know that many sets I happen to race with him
right now.
He's, he's been nicknamed Fast Seth.
I, I saw that in the post and I assumed you were talking
about someone else.
Yeah.
We have Fast Seth and his son.
And so Fast Seth and Sean and I raced, um, did good.
Sean did longer.
You know, he, at this point he was, I think he hadn't
turned 16 yet.
So he's 15.
So he was the fastest of the three of us.
He was doing longer stints on the bike.
He was just becoming really good at endurance racing.
He'd done a few races with the kids team before,
but hadn't really done a consistent season with anybody.
Um, third race of the year, I was in Alaska.
Um, so Sonya raced with, with the two of them.
Um, I stuck, I was stuck to race monitor.
I don't even remember where I was in Alaska,
but I was like looking at race monitor, watching
lap times come in.
Um, and yeah, we were just having a good, it was
one of those things where like we set out to have fun
and we had a really good year.
Um, the one thing that happened is just before I left
for Alaska, we were hanging out and, and Seth was,
was saying, oh man, if we just had a little more power
and I said, well, you know, the, the problem
with these motors is we run into gearing issues.
Like there's only so much gear in the transmission.
The gear, the bike is already front and rear sprocket wise
as high as it goes.
Like, like you really need to build a super exotic motor
to get around some of the fundamental limitations
of what Honda built into these motors.
I said, or there's a Chinese 110 motor that they put
in the little GP bikes that I had sold to him.
It's called, they're called Ovales.
And when I sold him Sonya's old Ovales for his son to
ride, I had two spare motors that I had picked up
at various places.
I'm like, in those motors, instead of producing the
five and a half to six horsepower that we were making,
make an honest like 12 horsepower.
That's more.
Yeah.
Considering the bike, the bike came from Honda with
three and a half horsepower.
Like an optimistic three and a half horsepower
is what it was built with.
So on different bike chassis and stuff,
like I know there are certainly with cars when you,
you know, double the horsepower on them,
let's say that the chassis itself kind of shows some
of its limitations at that point.
And I'm not just talking about flex and stuff like that.
Right.
Are there like with this particular bike is there,
are there issues with strapping that much more
horsepower to it?
The big issue starts to come into play with suspension
more than anything else.
Suspension and grip, because the bike was never meant
to run big sticky race tires at high speeds.
Sure.
And it was certainly never meant to go as fast
as we were, we were going with it and just loading
the chassis up with that.
And so like, the chassis is a little noodley
and a little floppy, but the biggest problem
is the fact that like, you're trying to stiffen
the suspension enough to not bottom things out,
but still have enough compliance to ride the bike
and you know, not transfer all of the motion from,
you know, make the suspension super hard
and you're like, cool, now the suspensions
and moving all the movement is just in twisting
the forks and the chassis and things like that,
which is, they become a unit that moves
together at some point.
So yeah, there's, there's a lot when it's,
things start to get weird real fast when you add
a lot of grip and a lot of speed to it.
So I mentioned to him, I said that those,
those two spare motors that you have in,
they bolt right into this chassis.
They use a Honda bolt pattern and you watch
his eyes get real big.
He was like, are you serious?
I'm like, yeah, go home and try to like,
go measure it.
They bolt into a 70 and then I went off to Alaska
and he was messaging me.
He's like, oh my God, you're right.
It works.
I'm like, I know it works.
I just haven't built one because it's kind of stupid
to put 12 horsepower in a children's motorcycle
that's supposed to have three horsepower in it.
I mean, we might die.
Maybe.
And so.
I might go real fast.
Yeah.
So over the summer, the first summer race,
the three of them race together had a really good time.
Then I think I talked about this on the show
where Sonya had Sonya was home for summer.
She was working.
She had oral surgery scheduled to have her wisdom teeth out.
The same weekend that there was a race,
it wasn't going to be a problem because
Seth and his son could race the week before the race.
It turns out that they had a family thing come up
that they legitimately couldn't justify racing
instead of doing the family thing.
Sonya was trying to figure out if she could
in solo endurance a race the day
after getting her wisdom teeth out.
She was like, I think the nerve block will still be strong
enough the next day that I can race.
Literally everyone thought that was a terrible idea.
Yeah.
And then the Thursday of that week,
her oral surgeon had something come up
and he's like, I can't do surgery that day.
We need to reschedule.
I apologize.
Just, you know, doctor stuff.
These things happen.
I grew up as the kid of two doctors, I understand.
That sometimes life gets in the way
and you need to reschedule these things.
And Sonya was so happy.
So happy.
So she went and soloed race number four.
Got lapsed in, did really well.
Did her, she was able to...
She's been soloing races for three years now
and like the guy who runs the whole organization,
Jeff, loves to watch her solo races.
Loves to watch this five-foot-tall girl
with two pigtails put on her helmet
and just beat the crap out of teams of grown-ass men
who think they're good at it.
It's her favorite thing to do.
It's his favorite thing to do to watch her do this
and she did really well.
She went back to school.
We raced before I went up to Michigan
this fall, I stayed extra long
so I could race round five with them.
And we had two things happen in round five.
One, Seth had put the big bike together.
He'd gotten a hold of the 70 himself,
ripped the motor out, put the motor in,
put the new motor in.
And we were in the, like we have no idea
if the gearing's right.
He just didn't have a chance to test it.
He's too much dad stuff to do.
Didn't know if the gearing was right.
Didn't know if there was going to be problems with it.
We went out and ran it.
The gearing was not right,
but the bike was quicker than the race bike
we had been using.
And so we decided to run it.
Right before the race started,
when we were doing practice laps,
the spark plug wire fell onto the exhaust,
melted it to the point that the core was exposed.
We wrapped it back up with electrical tape,
zip-tied it out of the way,
went out and ran four laps,
bike ran fine.
We were like, cool, we're going to race the new bike.
Got 12 minutes into the race
and the spark plug wire was like,
no, we're not doing this today.
Didn't have a spare?
No, we did not.
Because we weren't,
we were in that like,
we'll race the bike if it's okay.
We didn't really have spares.
We weren't ready to race the bike,
but we thought, why not?
Sure.
But I think I talked about this before.
The rule structure lets you
substitute in a bike,
but you have to start at zero laps at that point.
Yes.
So we took my 70 out
and we put the transponder on it,
took it out, ran it,
found out partway into the race
that the clutch was dying,
nursed the bike through
collected laps like we didn't,
like nothing about that race was special
other than we overcame adversity
and collected a whole bunch of laps.
Did you have fun?
Yes.
That was probably the least fun
that we've had all year.
Because we wanted something out of the race
and we didn't get it.
The other races we just wanted to go
ride and have fun
and we rode and had fun
and all of a sudden we were like,
we could go fast.
And then we couldn't go fast
and that made us feel bad.
Yeah, I've got a working theory here
on the ability
to have fun at the track,
but keep going.
So we're supposed to have
seven endurance rounds a year.
We're supposed to have a six hour round
at the track right by my house
due to scheduling conflicts
and other things that just
didn't happen this year.
So they scheduled
another endurance round
for
this very last event.
Usually they do sprints at the last event.
They decided to do endurance at this last event
to give us our six,
or to give us six full rounds of racing.
So that was this last Saturday
we had our last endurance round.
We showed up, the header was
wrapped in heat resistant stuff
so if anything fell against it was less likely to melt.
We had
a new coil and plug together
because they're all one assembly with those bikes.
Everything's zip tied out of the way.
We had to spare one of those.
We had spare levers.
The bike had been regeared.
It's not perfect yet, but it was way better.
We still need to add a couple teeth on the rear sprocket.
But we went out and ran it
and the bike was good.
Not perfect, but really good.
And this is where I point out
that the rear running has one
huge fundamental flaw with it
that makes it difficult
to go fast in a safe manner.
And that is
it has drum brakes front and rear.
So it has cable
actuated drum brakes
which are
absolutely dope if you're riding
a three horsepower bike
around the yard as Honda intended.
They're great.
They work great.
We weren't
and when we were riding our other bike
because the bike we had been riding
for the last two years because
we rely primarily on corner speed.
We don't have a lot of straightaway speed.
And so the difference
in speed between the
straightaways and the corners that we go into
aren't real high. You can scrub a lot of the
speed just by tipping the bike in.
So we weren't using the brakes a lot
on the bike we've been running the last two years.
We were well aware
of the fact that if somebody hit the
with good disc brakes hit the brakes in front
of us it was pretty sketchy
because we couldn't slow down the way they could.
But as long as we kept ourselves out of those
situations we were like that's fine.
But all of a sudden we found ourselves with 12 horsepower
going
damn near 60 miles
an hour at the end of the straightaway.
And you had been
going. We had been
in the low 40s.
Yeah.
Like the difference between like
I think when I put data on the bike I could see
43
with a really really long straightaway.
And
the bikes we were riding around
especially Sean he's
20 pounds lighter than me
there weren't
bikes faster than him
at the end of the straightaway.
And it was real scary
like
real scary. And so
we got about halfway through the race
on Saturday
and we had our first
moment where the brakes stopped
braking
and
Seth was on the bike
went into corner one the fastest corner
attempted to do a pass
at the same time he was doing it
did not work
luckily didn't wipe out the young lady
he was trying to pass
definitely
hit the pavement
hit the dirt tumbled got back up
came in and he was like
I'm fine we just definitely need
to adjust the brakes they
don't work anymore
so we took four or five minutes
adjusted the brakes
which is all you know moving
manually moving nuts and adjusting
lengths of cables and things like that
went back out
So had the shoes worn
shoes had worn
what they
what they refer as cable stretch
which is more like housing compression
so it's it's basically just
like a really sturdy bicycle cable
as what the brake cables are
and you
you kind of can't stretch the cable
but you can compress the housing
which is accomplishing
the same thing because it's the ratio of cable
length to housing length which
you know controls how that stuff squeezes together
and
I have a tendency to be a
pretty gentle breaker
it's just the nature
of how I ride bikes I'm a high entry speed
gentle breaker and
neither Seth or Sean are like that
they're like all the brake at the last moment
and so they were
pulling hard
and I'll get into the
the mode of failure was a little peculiar
but yeah brake shoe wear and
cable housing compression are the two main things
so we went back out
we were
Seth and I were running pretty quick
normally at that track we had been running like
57
second laps something like that at that track
earlier in the year
what's that
can I guess
what do you think Seth and I were running
how long is the track
I don't know distance wise but it's a 57
second track is what we were running so
I guess 54
I got down into
the mid
53s
and I think Seth might have been a couple
10s faster than that
now
the thing that is
impressive
is that sorry I have to turn that
off
is that Sean
who is young and
amazing
down into the low
51s
oh jeez
and
that was about a second
and a half off the fastest
lap set by any team
which is really scary on a bike
that has not good brakes to start
with and
failing brakes
on top of that
yeah do they make a disc conversion
for those
we're definitely looking at that
so we get to
I went out and I had
my second session on the bike
40 minute session
one of the best
sessions I've ever had on a motorcycle
like
I was passing everybody I was doing it
safely
everything was good like it was so good
and by the time I
came back in we were in fifth place
overall like legitimately
fifth overall
so you made
up ground during your session
it went from eighth to fifth during my
stint
and that left us one stint Sean to go out
for the last
stint 40 minutes do his thing
overall
we were
at that point
just after Sean went out he passed
the bike in front of us who
I'm not going to say
they're not within the rules
of the class but they're probably
slightly outside the rules
of the class
which is fine it's all in good
fun we're the only other ones they're racing
against
and
he caught them and he passed them
and
that was
yeah so then we were between somebody else
had bleeped frog the two of us who were still in fifth overall
and
he was just like
his times were getting lower the times were getting lower
he was going so fast out there
he was passing everybody as if they didn't
exist he was having one of those
like just
beautiful
stints that you see people do in a car
you know and you're like oh my god
they're just one with the track
everything is amazing
we had 16
minutes left in the race like I'm taking
off my leathers I'm like everything's good
we've done it we're
so good today
we're probably the best people at racing here
and then he lost the brakes
yeah
lost the brakes
came in
we did a
half s adjustment that gave the bike a little bit of brakes back
and
Seth hopped back on the bike and went back out
for what the last 12 minutes were
and then we finished in eighth overall
stupid brakes
stupid brakes
we do think we have a brake
a front end solution we have to put a whole new front end on the bike
which is
a little bit annoying for them because
he bought the pimpest
set of wheels for the bike
had to have wheels laced up for the bike on the stock hubs
these beautiful gold rims
like they're so good and now
we're not going to be able to use that front wheel at all
so it's
slightly annoying but
nice
so we went from
the dedicated idea that
we will race this year we will have fun
we'll get Sean a ton of seat time
we'll go back to the basics
of just doing a good thing too
by the end we're like no
we should go fast and we should beat people
and we should find the weak points
and
yeah
here's the thing though Seth
is
you kind of did that from the beginning
you just knew what
you were getting into
and here's been my working theory
about going out there and having fun
you can only do that
and I'm just
saying this in general and this might not hold water
but I think you can only really do that
if you've got
a vehicle
that does it
reliably
and does it well enough
that you're not having to
worry about the vehicle
itself
like the vehicle isn't
the weak part
in the equation
because you guys had been racing that bike
and you knew
you said that the gearing
was
kind of what was holding you back
and so you guys fix that
and then
you could go have fun
right but had the gearing
been the same as it was last year
I don't think you would have had as much fun
no
because we were getting frustrated
by the end of last year and last year's game
was Sonya and I soloed so many rounds
it was a personal thing
last year it had nothing to do with the bike
it was about what we had accomplished
as individuals
on the bike
and this year you're right it did become
more about the bike because we were trying to do
a different thing
and as soon as we tried to do a different thing
we wanted to do that different thing
better
and then
that leads you down that rabbit hole
and so we ended up
winning our class for the year
so we went
the F7 Expert
so it's the slowest class
but the
it's the only class in endurance racing
they divide into
amateur and expert
or whatever the other
thing is beginner and expert
just to allow people who are like totally
new to it to not be super intimidated
by it
because we're the two bikes
that ran an F7 Expert this year
are
we're two of the faster bikes on the track
when they had the right riders on them
and so if you show up and you're like okay I'm gonna race
in the slowest class
and it's got these A-holes who are just like
crushing it it's super demoralizing
just out there trying her
yeah so
but the other team that we're racing against
is a family that runs
super nice people
had a great time running against them all year
we were still happy to beat them
they would have been happy to beat us
yep
and had a good time
I think we finished
we finished 6th
or 7th overall
for the year
out of like 30
total teams that raced
of the teams that were seriously showing up
all the time there was
12 or so teams that were consistently
there all the time that we were really racing against
so we raced well this year
I actually think we raced
slightly better last year
as far as the
quality of racing we did
but we had zero problems last year when we raced
like we literally from the time
like flag to flag
we were just on the bike
zero problems
like no drama nothing happened
this year we had a little bit more drama
crashed a little bit more
you know I ran into
like first race of the year I had somebody
I sent you the video I had somebody crash in front of me
and he immediately
got up and stepped in
front of me like
you know because when you crash a bike
same thing as in your car like it slides to the outside
so you see somebody crash
and you're like okay I'm gonna go inside them and he
he and the bike slid to the outside
and he stood up and walked to the inside of the track
and I didn't
bonk him hard but enough that
he and I both fell over
and we lost that race by like one lap
I was like god damn it
we just had little things like that
happen all year that we didn't have happened last year
so I think we raced better
last year than we did this year
and then of course
we started to try real hard
at the end
and you start to try real hard and
things happen
yeah but it sounds like
if you guys
get the brake situation
sorted and maybe
different gearing like
we have so we got a half
second in gearing I'm sure there's a half second
lap in gearing right now
um
and how much time do we have in braking
I don't know but we definitely have time in
braking well and
you know just finishing the race
with brakes would be nice
right right but as far as just
like if you're just chasing a lap time
we
probably have the ability
and certainly to get within a second
of the fastest lap
which is you know two race classes
ahead of us people who are
like we don't have any business
running as fast as they do but we are running
that fast and we love that so
what's the fastest you've gone
around that particular track
um on this bike
no not on this bike I
um I ran
it was cold
yesterday too cold for us it was
around Saturday it was
mid 70s
and that track surface
isn't grippy in mid 70s
um you really want
the surface temperature of the asphalt
to be above 90 before the
it's really grippy um
which is a nature of the tires that we run
plus just that surface in general
so we didn't have good times yesterday
the team um
the boys that I used to race with
ran the fastest lap
and they ran a mid 49
um
but they've run
like high
47s out there on the same bike
and
when the track is good
I've gotten into the low
I don't think I've run a 49
but I know I've run in the low 50s
on different bikes out there
um and I
I know I could run that
fast on this bike
given some changes and given a good day
and being in the right headspace
um it's quick
it's a quick bike
um
we might die
so you're going to do it again next year?
we're going to do it again next year
we're going to
um yeah
we're going to develop the bike and we talked about it
and you know Seth said
as long as we have a backup bike
as long as we have the ability
we have something that allows us
to do the wrong thing
but still race
um
then he's 100% wants to do it
so
um we
we think we figured out
a front end solution we need to buy some parts
and assemble them and then do testing
because it's a combination
of weird Chinese pit bike parts
and some good parts
and a wheel from somewhere
else and doing all these things
like we know what we need to do to put it together
but there's going to be something that we're not expecting
um and
you know we have to
the forks that we're going to get are not going to be sprung for our weight
and the grip we're putting in we're going to have to respring the forks
and do all of these other things
so we're going to have to test it
um but we're pretty excited
we got done racing
we were still excited to go racing
that's
pretty good
that's a pretty good place to be
um
and and as an aside
um the
the three my three friends that I call the boys
Derek
and uh the flowers flowers brothers
that I raced with for years and then had to stop racing with
because I still wanted to be their friends
um
they won
overall
they won the whole thing this year
good for them
um they they got their shit together
they started the year with a bike that was giving them some trouble
and they said this is not fun
they bought
they ponied up they they spent the money on a new bike
they did some development on it
through the year but all the way through
they they raced well
um by the end of the year the bike is just
better than any other bike out there
um all three of them are good riders
the bike is just good it's really good
and they raced
they raced well all year
um and they earned it
like they finally put all the
pieces together after all the years that
that we spent trying to do it
um
you know Derek and I and the other teammates
spent from going that we have
no idea what we're doing to
we're actually okay at this to
wanting to win our class
to
strategically trying to figure out if we could win
overall
um and they finally did it
and I'm very proud of them
for finally putting all the
pieces together
and winning an overall championship
so that was good to see
I was really happy for them
that's pretty good stuff
yeah and this is again
this is like the most obscure
weird little corner of racing
anywhere
this racing matters the least
of any racing that happens
anywhere we're racing literal children's motorcycles
on go kart tracks
and it is the best
like for the people
involved for the community that we have
um
absolutely the best thing so much fun
well congratulations
and you got uh the trophy
is a t-shirt is that right
yes so that's that's been the trophies
for the last like 27 years
or something that this
no longer than that almost 40 years of this organization
has been going on they give trophies
and if you're a champion it just says champion
on the side of it
so the only way to get a champion shirt is
to earn the champion shirt by
winning um if you get
second or third if you're on the podium for that
you get a top finisher shirt
um and then
um if you want
you can just like buy one it's lame
because you know then it's just
a shirt which is still cool
very cool shirts different shirt design every year
um
so um
it's good it feels good to have a champion
shirt or you know I have a drawer
full of champion shirts now from from the
different classes I won over different years and somehow
somehow
I got third place in a sprint
class
like inexplicably you personally
yeah me personally I
in uh F7 lightweight
okay I accumulated
enough points in F7 lightweight to get
third place so I got a
got a shirt for that because I was
I literally just
raced sprints this year
as a grid filler
um the bike's not competitive in sprints
but I have fun racing
mid-pack with people
um and I talked to I think I talked
about that earlier this year
um just racing with people and
um in the last
the last second to last sprints we
did I ran over Sean
because he crashed in front of me
um
had a great year had to just
sprints were literally just fun
um I
just went out there to have a good time
fill the grid um
to somewhat give
people a person to beat
um
because you didn't have to be real fast to beat me when I was lapping
on a 70
but you had to be okay and so
people who couldn't beat me at the beginning of the year
could beat me at the end of the year
they had a good time um
felt like I was doing a service to the community
in some respects um
but had a super super fun
time and miraculously
ended up with a third place in
F7 lightweight so that was cool
pretty dope it's a good year
it was a great year um
I
last year I finished having
having had fun but I was
really tired um all the
soloing the races last year
made me really tired I couldn't
sprint race when I was soloing races because it was
physically too much um
so I was happy last year but also
not all the way um
years previous I had been slightly frustrated
with the team um
this year is just good
like like I finally
I think I'm figuring out how to race
in a way that makes me happy
only took me like six seasons of racing to
sort of figure out how to do that but um
yeah but yeah it was
it was it was good
nice
well we have been
lacks
remiss
uh answering
some of these questions that we have
we have listeners who send us questions
and we're like we'll answer those
questions on the show and then we don't
because we will
because it haven't
but we are listening
to you um we are getting your
questions we're just
crappy at actually saving enough time at the
end of the show to answer them yeah um
I want to get your
your take on this first because I'm kind of
interested from your experience
with tiny bikes so
question is how can I
learn to make objective
observations about the
condition and pace of my tires
I'm usually switching
between takeoffs of varying
vintages but I always blame myself
when I have a slow session
a few healthy racers
excuses might be good for my
mental health thoughts on how to
analyze and adapt instead of
wallowing
I like this question
there's a lot going on
there's a few things going on yeah
definitely born out of personal experience this one
yeah
so I would always answer
that question with a question
jerk
I am a jerk but I would
always ask that person
are they doing things like
tire temperatures like are they trying
to optimize those used tires
or are they just putting on a
set of tires setting pressure
whatever 26 or
whatever their pressures are and going out and seeing
how it goes
because if you're treating used
tires like used tires
they're always going to drive
like used tires
say more
you have to
look at any given tire
as this is the best tire I have
today and I have to
get the maximum performance out of it
people who habitually
drive on used tires very
frequently go out whatever it's just a used tire
and they set their pressures
by fuel and they go drive on it
and they don't work to optimize the tire
because they don't think of the tire as
special
when you've got a set of stickers
man you
think real hard about what's going on with them
because you have expectations
for them
and I think we drive to our
expectations a lot
we
if we don't think the tires are good
we don't treat them like they're good
and we don't drive well on them
I've seen it happen a lot
in autocross I've seen it happen
I watched a bunch of wheel to wheel
racers in NASA do that and they're like
well I can never do good I'm only on takeoffs
they weren't trying to do good
they weren't trying to do good in the same way
they would when they
got that one set of stickers
for the year
so
yeah I would answer
their question with a question I'm like
are you trying to maximize your takeoff tires
or are you just driving them like takeoffs
what's your
what's your take on it
yeah I would definitely want to know
what data is being collected
you know tire
temps for sure
even
lateral longitudinal
G's
because you can see that
it would be subtle for sure
and a lot of driver input
would potentially cloud it
but that's certainly
something that you can see
especially when you're dealing
with like long duration corners
where you're not just like
coming off the brake and straight onto the throttle
big time but that you're
kind of holding it for a minute
that can be a great place to take a look
at your lateral G's
to see just mechanically
what are these tires capable of
right
another thing could be
the
my brain is missing this
the
derometer
if you're taking derometer readings on your
tires when they're new versus
you know a couple of heat cycles old
and tracking the temperature
when you take them and stuff like that
that can be a good sign
of when they're getting heat
cycled out if they're just
harder
and
generally what we see
with tire temps
is that when a
tire
continually wants
or continually build
builds heat in the tire itself
and you keep chasing
it with pressures trying
to get the tire to grip up
because the tire
and this could be a whole thing
in and of itself but the tire
builds
heat from different sources
a major source
is scrubbing on
basically being abraded
across the track surface
just like sandpaper
or rubbing two sticks together
is going to create a lot of heat
and so one of the major
sources of heat for a tire
is that
and so if a tire
is heat cycled out
it just simply doesn't
have the grip
that it once did the chemical
compound of the rubber
and silica itself
just cannot conform
to the surface of the track as well
so it just slides across it
builds up a bunch of temperature
and kind of no matter what you do
to try to chase it with
tire pressures it just keeps
building heat
that is like the
one super clear
indicator that
tire has been heat cycled out
so
do you have a
difference enough in
grip that it would affect
your ideal alignment settings
does grip fall off enough that you're like
actually I don't need to run this
much camber on a tire that has
less grip than a new set of
tires or is that too subtle
we've seen that
happen on occasion
it um
when you're not
yeah it's a good question
we've seen it
a bit on both sides and I'm
not sure I can
generally tell
you one or the other
I've seen it happen where you just don't have
enough grip so it looks like you just
have way too much camber
because
the car is just simply not able to
roll over
on to the outside of the tire as well
as it typically would be
right
other times
if you're kind of right around
good camber anyway
that the sliding around
mixed with like additional
steering input
all of a sudden it makes
it look like
your fronts are
all sorts of weird
because you're adding more steering
than you typically do
depending on your caster and bump
steer and stuff like that that can
look very very strange
or you know
since you know
maybe the car wants to rotate more
and so you can get back to throttle
a lot quicker
but you light up the inside rear
and so it can do
sorts of weird things but I think
the like
the real like straight talk truth
is that if you're not on
sticker
or like certainly within
four heat cycles
your tires are losing grip
your tires are not as fast as they could be
right so you're going slower
than somebody who's on
that's not true
you're going slower than you would
be going
you're on tires that were
fresher
but you still should be
doing everything the same
and that's why I like
what you started off with
alright we all know this
not many of us
can afford
sticker tires
for every single race
every single weekend
and so they're
learning how to
get ahead of
the tire wear in terms of
maybe you soften
the car up a little bit more
so that you have more load
transfer
so you don't have to rely on
the lateral grip of the tires
you have to play with the load
transfer of the car
more instead
stuff like that so there's always something that you can do
um
it's always a great
racer excuse
old tires
tail is old as time
but yeah I think
just learning
about
what that does for you in your car
you know
if you can learn
about date codes
learn about how many
heat cycles in the front
versus the rear because
depending on front and rear wheel drive
that will change it
as well so just
track things make notes and
um
you know even if you're
you know don't know a whole lot about it
you can
just kind of
keep mental
notes of the whole thing and eventually
I think if you
do that you will start to
find some
common threads
and some things of
you know well once a tire gets to
about
8 to 16 heat cycles
it really
starts to kind of want this
one X or it behaves
more like that
sort of thing and so you can
just kind of start to get ahead of it
you know if
you know again if you don't
want to buy new tires or you can't
afford to buy new tires or whatever it may be
you just know
ok my tires are this old so
next weekend I'm still
going to have these tires
likely here's where they're going to be
and here's where I should be prepared
to go with the pressures
or setup or
driving kind of whatever it is
so take take an active
role you know
change what you can change control what
you can control
sort of thing
legitimately do the best with what you have
which is what we should all be doing every time anyway
to
your best
yes
ok do we have time for another question
or not just that one
we got to keep it going
we can't be too good
at this thing
I'm not worried about being too good at anything
that's fair
yeah thank you for the note that's
I like that question
that was a good question
it's thick
and also telling of
the personal
story of the person who wrote that for sure
yeah and also
I mean we bring our own
real quick we bring our own thing into it
the reason I was immediately like I bet
if you're using used tires you're not trying as hard
because when I was using
used tires I 100%
didn't try as hard
when I was autocrossing
you could tell when a set of tires went away
and as soon as it set of tires went away
I didn't
I was not trying to win
because I knew I couldn't
and so I immediately wasn't doing all the things
that I knew I should be doing
to maximize those tires
and I definitely
saw the same behavior in people around me
so whenever I see
something consistent like that
I'm suspicious
of others that are in that same situation
adapt and overcome
be better than me
well that'll do it for us this week
do better than Seth
I think that's gonna be the name of the episode
but
yeah we're at track
walking podcast
the discord link is in the show notes
and that's kind of where we're hanging out
these days come join us
delightful
ask us questions we might answer
we might
actually a couple days ago
we were talking about
favorite
cold weather food
and I love me a grilled cheese
just give me soup
any soup I love all soups
yeah I can't say the same
it's gotta be hearty or thick
like a bisque or chili
yeah but like a good chicken noodle
with a good broth in it
well that's gonna do it for us this week
thanks for listening
I'm Scott and I'm Seth
we'll talk to you next
you
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