The Dodge Road Runner is a classic muscle car from Dodge. It’s known for being a performance-focused car with a strong enthusiast following. In the podcast, it’s mentioned as part of a story, not as a detailed technical topic.
The pit wall is the wall next to the pit lane that separates cars in the pits from the track. Drivers use it as a reference point for where to brake and how close they can get while staying on track.
Rumble strips are the bumpy strips near the edge of the track. If you hit them at the wrong time, the car can feel unsettled and you lose time, so drivers try not to rely on them.
“Marbles” are loose junk on the track surface that builds up off the main racing line. If your tires hit it, grip can suddenly drop and the car may feel looser or harder to control.
A driving simulator is a video-game-style setup that lets you practice driving a track. It’s useful for learning lines and braking points, and for testing mistakes safely before doing it for real.
Horsepower is a measure of how much power the engine makes. Less horsepower usually means the car accelerates more slowly, which matters a lot in races.
A tune is the car’s computer settings for how the engine runs. If you don’t have the right tune ready, you may have to drive with safer settings until it’s updated.
Qualifying time is the lap time you set before the race. It often decides where you start, and faster qualifying usually gives you a better chance to score well.
Term
reclassifying to 215
“Reclassifying to 215” means moving the car into a different rules category, usually tied to tire size. That can change what the car is allowed to run (like weight), which affects how fast it can be.
Three tenths of a second is a small time gap, but in racing it can be huge. Tiny improvements can move you several spots on the grid or in the results.
Place
Watkins Leonard
This sounds like “Watkins Glen,” a well-known race track in New York. It’s a twisty course where drivers have to be smooth and consistent to do well.
Lime Rock Park is a race track in Connecticut. It’s known for being short and twisty, so driving mistakes and car setup differences can really matter.
Topic
grid life drifters
“Grid Life” is a motorsports event that sometimes includes drifting. Here, they’re describing a drift setup happening alongside the main racing weekend.
“Initiate the drift” means starting a controlled slide. The driver intentionally gets the rear tires to lose grip so the car can rotate while still being steered.
They’re saying the weekend schedule combined two racing groups into one shared session. That changes how drivers plan their laps because it’s not separated into practice and qualifying.
A “banker time” is an early lap that’s already fast enough to put you in a good position. It’s like saving a good score before you try to improve even more later.
A “purple lap” is a lap that’s your best time in that session. It’s a color on the timing display telling you you’re doing great compared to your previous laps.
A transponder is a small electronic tag on the race car that the track uses to automatically time your laps. If it doesn’t get read, your lap times may not count properly.
Instead of using one best lap, race officials used an average of several of his recent laps. That can change where you start the race, even if you had one really strong lap.
An out lap is the lap you do when you leave the pits and are still getting up to speed. It can be slower or less consistent than a lap where everything is fully warmed up.
The Plymouth P15 is an older classic car made by Plymouth. The podcast mentions it while talking about how it does on straight sections of road, which relates to how fast it can go and how it accelerates. It’s being used as an example of performance in a simple, practical way.
GLTC is the racing series he’s talking about. He’s saying that in this kind of racing, getting around other cars is hard, so starting a few spots back can really hurt your chances.
Clean air means you’re not being affected by another car’s airflow. If you’re stuck behind someone, the air around your car gets messy, and it can reduce grip and make passing much harder.
Being balked means you get stuck behind slower cars and can’t get around them right away. That can ruin your chances because you lose the right moment to pass.
The Ford Mustang is a performance car made by Ford. People talk about it a lot in racing because it’s built to go fast and there are lots of parts and tuning options for it. In the podcast, it’s mentioned because someone works as a mechanic for a Mustang racing team.
The BMW E36 is an older BMW 3 Series (from the 1990s). People often modify it for track driving, and here they’re testing one with a different engine to make it faster.
A “B48 swap” means putting a BMW B48 engine into a car that didn’t originally have it. It’s a way to get a newer, often turbocharged engine into an older chassis for better track performance.
“Box” here is shorthand for the gearbox/transmission. Matching a swapped engine to a multi-speed transmission is important because gear ratios affect acceleration, top speed, and how well the engine stays in its power band during laps.
A front splitter is a piece that sticks out low in front to help the car “stick” to the road by using airflow. Here they’re testing how much faster the car is with the Zebulon splitter on.
Term
air dammit devices
He’s talking about aerodynamic add-ons that change how air flows around the car. Even if the engine stays the same, these can make the car grip better and go faster through corners.
Term
high speed left over crest
“Over crest” means the track goes up and then down through the corner. That can change how the tires grip, so it’s a spot where aero and suspension setup really matter.
A high-speed corner is a turn you take quickly, without slowing down a lot. At those speeds, the car’s aerodynamics and tire grip matter more than in slower turns. That’s why setup changes can noticeably affect lap time.
Pace delta just means the time difference—how much faster one car is than another. The host is saying the splitter might create a big enough time gap to matter over the whole lap. Small speed changes can add up.
Here, “arrow” sounds like the car’s aerodynamic grip—how much the aero parts help the tires stay planted. The host is comparing two similar cars to see how much that extra “push down” helps in a corner. It’s about how aero affects cornering speed.
A “setup” is how a race car is adjusted for a specific track. Here, the host is saying Wingfield fine-tuned his car for Road Atlanta instead of just using the same settings everywhere.
Car
BMW S52
The S52 is a BMW engine (an inline-six) that shows up in some M3s. In this story, they’re saying their car uses the stock S52, but with small changes to help the valve-train last longer on track.
The valve train is the mechanism inside the engine that controls when the intake and exhaust valves open and close. If you’re driving hard on a track, people often upgrade it so it lasts longer under stress.
A mechanical throttle body means the gas pedal is connected to the throttle plate with a physical linkage. That can make throttle response feel more direct compared to newer “electronic” throttle systems.
Engine management is the computer that controls how the engine runs. “Stock engine management” means they’re using the factory settings rather than a custom tune.
A ZF gearbox is the transmission made by ZF. On track, the transmission matters because it helps you keep the engine in the right rev range while you accelerate and slow down for corners.
The BMW E46 M3 is a track-capable BMW from the early 2000s. Here, they’re talking about Eric Magnuson’s E46 M3 and how its engine setup changes how much power it makes and when it makes it.
Term
275
“275” here is almost certainly the tire width in millimeters. Wider tires can provide more grip, which matters a lot for cornering and acceleration on track.
Race weight is how heavy the car is when it’s actually being driven in the race, not just empty. A lighter race weight usually helps the car accelerate and handle better.
Wheel width affects how the tire sits and how it contacts the road. Matching an 11-inch wheel with a wide tire can help the tire work better when you’re driving aggressively.
RPM is the engine speed—how fast it’s spinning. They’re saying their power is strongest at certain engine speeds, then it drops as the revs get higher toward the redline.
Torque is the engine’s pulling force. More torque generally means the car can get up to speed faster, especially when you’re accelerating out of a turn.
A V8 is an engine with eight cylinders. It usually makes strong pulling power, which helps the car accelerate—especially when you’re coming out of a turn.
Concept
hybrid racing
Hybrid racing means the car uses both a gas engine and an electric system. The electric part can help the car accelerate and manage energy during the race.
The ECM is the engine’s control computer. They’re saying the car’s computer may be set up to change engine settings—like power output—when the driver presses a button.
Coefficient of drag is a number that describes how “slippery” a car is through the air. Lower drag helps the car lose less speed on straights and usually makes it faster.
The Chevrolet Corvette is a sports car designed to be fast and handle well. The podcast talks about how its shape affects how easily it moves through the air. That’s important because air resistance can strongly affect speed.
A 6-speed gearbox is the transmission with six gears. More gears (and the right gear spacing) help the engine stay in the “sweet spot” so the car accelerates strongly.
Custom ratios means the gear spacing was chosen specifically for the racing situation. It’s done so the car’s acceleration and speed match what the track and rules require.
Term
6B
“6B” here is the name of the specific 6-speed gearbox setup the host wants. It’s not just any 6-speed—it’s a particular configuration aimed at better acceleration and shifting.
A “close ratio” transmission means the gears are closer together. That helps the engine stay in the useful power range so you don’t fall out of power between shifts.
ZF is a company that makes transmissions. In this conversation, it’s the transmission brand currently in the car, and they’re considering building a custom version of it.
“Usable gears” means the gears that actually help you at the track. If the gearing doesn’t match the speeds you reach, some gears won’t be useful for accelerating.
Your engine has an RPM range where it feels strongest. “Natural power band” means that sweet spot, and the setup aims to keep the engine working there as you drive.
Instead of a cable connecting your gas pedal to the engine, an electronic throttle body uses a motor to control the airflow valve. That makes it easier for the car’s computer to control how the engine responds.
Mid-range is the middle part of the RPM range. Making more power there usually improves how the car feels in real driving, not just at the very top RPM.
Drive-by-wire means the gas pedal doesn’t directly move the throttle by cable. Instead, sensors tell the computer what you want, and the computer controls the throttle electronically.
“Drops a valve” means a valve inside the engine fails and can’t move/seat correctly anymore. That can quickly turn into serious engine damage, which is why it’s a big deal for someone trying to race on a tight schedule.
“Drop shipped” means the engine was sent straight from the seller to the person building the car. It’s a way to get parts faster without handling them through extra steps.
“OEM plus” means using mostly factory-style parts, but upgrading a few things to make the car better than stock. It’s not a full-on race build, more like “better than stock” while staying practical.
An aluminum block engine is an engine where the main engine structure is made from aluminum instead of heavier iron. It’s lighter, which can help the car feel more balanced and easier to handle.
“Best of the rest” means you might not be the absolute fastest, but you’re the best among the other cars. It’s a way of describing being near the front even if you can’t win outright.
They’re talking about a Honda S2000 that gets a different engine—specifically a Honda K24 engine. It’s a common “swap” idea because it can help the car make more power and be more track-friendly.
K24 is Honda’s 2.4-liter engine. When people mention it in a swap, they mean they’re putting that engine into a different Honda car to get better performance potential.
The air box is part of the system that brings air into the engine. If it’s changed to let the engine breathe better, the car can feel stronger and run faster. That’s why it can affect race pace.
Battle pace means how fast the car is when you’re actually racing and dealing with other cars. It’s not just about one perfect lap—it’s about staying quick while defending or trying to pass. That’s why it can be harder to measure than pure lap time.
“Sim work” means practicing in a racing video game simulator. People use it to learn the track and try different driving lines and setups. It helps you show up to the real race weekend more prepared.
Place
Royal Atlanta
“Royal Atlanta” sounds like the track layout they’re talking about at Road Atlanta. Knowing the track helps you understand where the car will be strong or struggle in corners and braking. That’s a big part of race strategy.
“Power band” is the engine’s sweet spot where it pulls hardest. A “flat power band” means it feels strong and steady over a bigger range of engine speeds, which makes the car easier to drive fast.
“Carrying 5%” here means the car has extra weight added for racing balance. Extra weight usually makes the car slower, so it affects lap times and strategy.
They’re talking about how much extra weight the car has—100 pounds. In racing, that kind of weight increase can cost time, but the exact penalty depends on the track and how the weight is added.
Gingerman Raceway is a race track in Michigan. The speaker mentions it because results there can change how much extra weight a car has for the next races.
Term
weight range
They’re saying the “extra weight costs X time” estimate depends on the car’s overall weight category. Where you put the weight and what the track is like can change how much it slows you down.
Fuel starving means the engine isn’t getting enough gas when it needs it. Even if the tank isn’t empty, the fuel can move around in the tank during hard cornering, so the pickup doesn’t pull fuel reliably. The car then loses power until the fuel system “catches up” again.
A dual pump kit is an upgrade to the fuel system that uses two fuel pumps instead of one. The goal is to keep the engine supplied with enough gas during demanding driving. Here, the surprising part is that even with two pumps, the car still had fuel-starvation at certain conditions.
A cambered corner means the road is slanted in the turn. That slope changes how the tires press into the pavement, which can make the car feel more stable or grippy through the corner.
Dual pickups are two places in the fuel tank where fuel can be drawn from. In hard cornering, fuel can slosh away from one pickup, so having two helps keep the engine supplied.
A starvation kit helps stop the engine from running out of fuel during aggressive driving. When you corner hard, fuel can move away from the fuel pickup, so these kits add extra pickup/pump arrangements to keep fuel flowing.
The fuel light is the warning that the car has low fuel. Here it’s being used as a real-world check that the fuel system can still supply the engine even when the tank is almost empty.
“Dual pumps” just means there are two fuel pumps instead of one. The goal is usually to make sure the engine gets enough fuel, especially when the car is modified or running harder.
“Baffles” are little internal parts inside the fuel system that help keep fuel flowing smoothly to the pump. If they’re not there or not working right, the pump can pull in air and fuel delivery can get worse.
Term
fuel pump rings
“Fuel pump rings” are sealing parts around the fuel pump. If they’re worn out, they can cause leaks or fuel delivery problems, so checking and replacing them can help the system work correctly.
Topic
ST4
“ST4” sounds like a specific competition class/category. The important part is that different classes allow different modifications, so what you can do to the car depends on the rules for ST4.
LIVE
From the great halls of their house, there are assembled three who hope to one day be
the world's greatest driving heroes.
Created from the cosmic legends of the universe, comes our team captain, The Vision Bill Fisher.
And there soon to be Wonder Woman, Vicky Fisher.
And our captain, Marvel and head flight trainee, Jennifer Scriptjunk.
Their mission to fight injustice, share what is right and wrong to get you out of your house
and come out racing with them and serve all mankind.
They are the Garage Heroes in Training Team.
Welcome to the Garage Heroes in Training Podcast.
We're back with another post-race episode,
which means we have somebody who raced this weekend and then there's Vicky.
That's Vicky.
Actually, you raced this weekend, too.
I did a little bit racing.
What did training this weekend?
It's fine. We might get there, too.
But reporting live, since he can't talk when he's dead, Nick Barbada.
Nick Barbada, you went to Rhode Island a little bit ago with our buddies at Gridlife.
I did. I did.
There was a lot of struggles, but still a fantastic experience.
My first time there.
I love driving it and lots to talk about for sure.
It should be a good one.
Did I undersell the entry to Rhode Atlanta when you pulled through that gate?
Bill, you did not undersell it at all.
Man, I'm not going to lie.
I have never been.
I'll just admit it.
It was a little intimidating.
That's the first time I've ever been like legitimately a little bit intimidated.
Intimidated to toe.
It's like, wow, this and then I race the other way.
This is lunacy. Why am I?
I will. Bill, I was like, that's the racetrack.
That's that's a hill and holy smokes.
Yeah. Yeah.
I had this picture because I had driven.
I think I drove it straight, like from near Scranton down to Rhode Island.
I think I did it in a straight shot.
So I was kind of loopy at the end.
So all I could think about going down the hill was like wildly coyote.
You know, after he holds up the sign because the road runner just knocked him
off the cliff and I'm just going through, you know, this is ridiculous.
How are you here?
You're just a free fall, man.
I was thinking, man, that hill would be like hard to walk down.
Yeah. You know, do you want to do a track walk?
Yeah. You want to do it backwards? Hell, no.
I think going up that hill.
Yeah. Wow. Yeah.
All right. I mean, that has to be over a hundred feet or close to it.
Right. I mean, I was over that which is this going to the track or is this
well, the track itself?
I think they said it was 12 stories.
So a story is like 15 feet.
So I'm like that. Yeah.
So that's a hundred and eighty feet or so.
It is a massive hill.
I do not believe it looking at it.
I was like, OK, I need to recalibrate here and then.
And then like the first time you drive it, right?
I mean, thank goodness I did to Simlabs for anyone listening.
My goodness, do not drive this track without doing at least a couple of Simlabs.
Even just to get your car pointed in the right direction.
Yeah, because there's a couple of times.
Yeah. Well, it's like, you know, what makes it worse is there's a little hill
going up before the crest you go down.
So it's like you don't even really have any bearings other than this bridge.
And there's a couple of markers on the bridge.
So it's like if your car isn't like pointing in the right direction
and you go over this crest, it's like you you need to take a base of action.
Surprise. Yeah. Wow.
Can you imagine doing that hill when they used to not have 10 any 10.
Be it was just straight.
Get out of here. Oh my God.
So it's a breaking zone.
If you miss your breaking point, you're just flying off a cliff.
Wow. Old school tracks.
Got to love them.
That, of course. Yeah.
Are we talking about that last that last term before you hit the straightaway?
Yeah. The whole blind. Yeah.
You got to figure that out. Oh, that's crazy.
Yeah. It's like when you're going skiing that first time and you're on a new trail
and you're like, I could bomb down this trail or I could be smart.
Now, there were days in Bill's life where it wasn't that smart.
But it's like with age comes the cage kind of thing, you know?
Yeah. Yeah.
Road Atlanta's no joke. No joke.
So before we get to your results, we prepped you a couple of times about road Atlanta.
I said 12 is intimidating, but one's actually worse to me.
What did you think?
One, I'll be honest with you.
I thought was a lot of fun.
I didn't find one to.
Yeah, I didn't find one to be intimidating.
Why? Because it just seemed like a little bit more aggressive version of the uphill
of Lime Rock. So, yeah.
So, so for me, although if I didn't have Lime Rock experience,
though, I could see how turn one would be intimidating for the the turn one entry
for me was a little bit challenging, which is probably the most thing for everybody.
Because like you can break a lot later than you realize.
So then once I started breaking basically way past the end of the pit wall,
right, way past it, then it's like a question of just make sure you get to the
apex because you can kind of use that room at exit, but not really all.
Like it's like, so it's like, if you end up out at the rumbles at exit,
that might be almost a waste of time.
It depends on the car and everything.
But the problem is, is most guys weren't driving out there.
So actually, if you kind of got out there, it was a little bit looser.
That's what kind of the offline marbles were.
So it was, you know, it was almost like you would get get penalized a little bit
by maybe carrying an appropriate amount of speed to use the whole track with.
So I had to adapt to that.
But yeah, yeah, turn one was also a bit of bugger.
You had to have some courage there to really take one going.
If you get this wrong, yeah, it's not going to be pretty.
It's not going to be pretty.
And I explored the space in the driving simulator
just to see what would happen there.
And even in the sim, it was not good.
So yeah, make all the mistakes in the virtual world.
Yeah, the pixels are a whole lot easier to fix than the.
Yes, sir.
Panels. Yeah.
Yeah, I just, man, we saw a couple of things there.
And it was just like, oh, that is not a soft wall.
It is not.
And and then, you know, the the usage of curbs,
like the required usage of curbs and the mastery entering,
taking just amount of the right curb at the at the top of the yeses,
which I'll be honest with you.
I probably only got that right 50 percent of the time.
Yeah, turn five, the big triangular curb.
Right. Yeah, yeah, that that that.
So basically, I well, actually not that one,
I guess it would be turn turn 23 or whatever.
Oh, okay, before the yeses, yeah.
Yeah. So take turn one up the hill.
You get to maybe like mid track.
You start to make your blind left over crest.
And it's a little braking zone to take that right hand curb setting up there.
You know, it was kind of like take a lot of it, but not all of it four wheels.
And so to get that right and not over slow, and then I under slowed,
you kind of jump over it and, you know, that just, you know, it's it's challenging.
You know, just awesome track, really awesome track.
Very technical.
Because a lot of time learning there.
Yes. Yeah.
I remember I, I, as you said, I explored the space on the the triangular curb.
Turn five, there, there was a point that's too far.
I'm not going to say that wall is just like right there.
Yeah, right there.
Yeah, right there.
We did not have a up close and personal event, but but parts of my body were clenched
for a second there and it's like, that's a little too far.
Yeah, that's a cold brown.
Yeah, okay. Yeah, we did.
We did. All right.
So great life.
Um, great life hasn't been to run Atlanta much.
They had a they had a break in the middle.
I think this is a second straight year, if I remember right now.
Yeah, yeah.
And you were coming off a CMP where where things kind of went your way,
even though it's KMP and in the GLTC level.
So it seems to be KMP and I think our preview for this was
you weren't looking forward to between turn seven and turn 10
with your particular car and setup.
So, uh, overall, was it what you expected worse, better?
Yeah.
So, uh, overall, if what you're asking is pace of the car, yeah, it was actually
very good, um, you know, without the, the long, uh, let's say the long
format explanation, I had tried to take a little bit of power out of the car
to get it into the 215 horsepower bracket.
So I could take.
So basically, if I could just reliably take one horsepower off it,
I could take 85 pounds off the car.
I wasn't able to get a new tune in time.
So I decided to run a little bit more conservative and still basically run
the car overweight like that, like I did at CMP, which was good enough for CMP.
But I knew that at Atlanta, the acceleration in particular was going to be important.
So my rock qualifying time actually would have been P seven overall.
Um, and then later in the weekend, I ended up, uh, basically taping up my
air box and, and taking some more risk reclassifying to 215.
It took, you know, I wasn't able to get all the way down, but it took
about 60 pounds off the car.
And that was worth at least just on the data, a good three tenths of a second.
And so if you'd sort of back calculate that out into qualifying, that would
have been like, like a P four and qualifying and actually not that far off
of, um, the guy who was really comparing against, which was Eric Magnuson.
And so, uh, you know, I went into the weekend thinking P four or five would
be a great result and a possible result.
And it actually turned out to be, that was the case.
If I had simply gotten my real qualifying time, maybe ran the car a little bit
more aggressively with the taped up air box.
I, you know, I think it would have been another strong weekend.
It would not have been like, you know, race win capable like CMP, but I think
it would have been a nice overall points haul.
But this, this was not going to be the, uh, the highlight track of the season
for you as far as grid life goes.
No, it was not.
This was just to have a try nice, clean, solid weekend, get some good
points, regroup, have a strong weekend at Watkins Leonard and then go out with a
banging lime rock.
Your favorite.
My favorite.
We're going to get there.
All right.
So, so grid life wrote Atlanta, I think they had the drifters there.
I did not have a chance to see it.
And so that, that always makes 10, 10 and 11, 10, 10, a can be a big.
So they had, they had the grid life drifters, but also we were sharing the
weekend, the track with the formula drift squad.
So they were doing their whole cool little live broadcast.
They set up a little mini, um, you know, drip track that was basically you would
initiate the drift coming down the back stretch into 10 a, and then you do a
little left drift through 10 a, and then a hard right past 10 B under like a
little infield track and then loop back around.
So, so, yeah, so, so that was cool.
I didn't really get to catch most of it, but yeah, you're, you're in other things
to do.
All right.
So, uh, after the intimidating entry tooth track with the trailer, you, uh, got
out there, you had a little bit of practice and then, uh, qualifying.
How did qualifying go?
Qualifying, uh, from a raw pace standpoint went great.
Um, I went out, um, uh, early in this session.
So this was a unique weekend where, uh, due to the sharing of the track with
the formula drift and some other, uh, challenges, they had to do a combined
single session, GT and TC, one hour combined practice and qualifying.
So there was actually no practice.
It was just, you know, based on a big, yeah, it's like, yeah, I was like,
not intimidating track and no consequences, no problem.
Hi, no, it was crazy.
So yeah, so one hour block of time, um, and I went out early, ran for 15, 20
minutes, uh, put in a solid banker time.
I think it was like P five or six at the time, solid, okay.
And then of course, uh, I came back in, went over scales, everything was good.
And then the track started to ramp up as expected.
And I fell back, you know, to around, you know, P 13 or 14, but I knew with a
fresh set of tires and a good track, um, ramping up, I could have a good shot.
So I went out with about 15 minutes left, um, did four laps.
And then in the, uh, basically each lap got quicker by a few tents.
And then I ended up doing a purple, purple lap for a 37, eight, I think.
Um, and again, all was good.
I think that was eight raw time.
Um, one or two guys got disqualified.
So it would have retroactively been P seven.
Uh, but then I realized that the session ended, uh, that my transponder was
not actually connected.
No.
And I lost my qualifying times.
Um, I ended up begging the tower to accept my data.
I don't run aim data typically, so they didn't accept my data saying it wasn't
accurate enough, uh, because it wasn't aimed data.
I, uh, very strongly disagree with that statement, but that's what they did.
So they ended up just averaging my last five laps, which included an
out lap and passing somebody.
So it was just stupid.
So yeah, I think I started P 15 or 16 and unfortunately just given, you know,
again, my, my car turns good, but, um, as on the straights, uh, you know,
it's, it's, it's quiet.
It's not like terrible, but, um, I was sort of doomed, uh, you know, stuck, um, you
know, for the rest of the weekend.
Yeah.
You, uh, passing in GLTC is at a premium and that, you know, five, 10, 10 positions.
That's a lot of work.
It's, that's a lot of work.
It's so tight, so much talent, a lot of fast cars.
And, you know, the way my car is set up, it's, it may be, maybe, maybe, maybe
some of the cornering potential is a little better than maybe most of the cars.
But, but if you're not in clean air and you're getting balked and you're behind
a slower cornering car, it's almost impossible to pass.
So, yeah, so.
Yeah, so, so, uh, I'm an engineer, you're an engineer.
How do we troubleshoot this, uh, this transponder issue?
Do we have a light?
Do we have something?
Yeah.
So, well, the, the, the primary corrective action is just to have a crew
in there to make sure that you're getting times during practice and qualifying.
Normally, right on a normal weekend, you run your first session in the morning
and one of the checks is, are you getting times, right?
So if we even just had a practice session, I would have known that my
transponder wasn't plugged in.
I also, you know, prepped what's worth stating, not that there's any excuses,
but I basically drove 17 hours towed by myself, including a four hour rainstorm,
like to rental downpour.
I got in at two o'clock in the morning and then woke up at like six.
So basically it was like four hours of sleep and I even had the transponder
right there.
I brought it from my hotel.
I charged it up and I was right there.
I, I, I did all my other checks in the morning and I just literally, it was,
it was like right there on my little easy up table.
Just, just should have put it in.
So the corrective action is crew member, but really, really long-term
corrective action is, I just need to hard wire it.
So it's going to be hard wire.
And it is, cause there's always the things that you can't do ahead of time.
You have to do them morning of, we have a laminated card with like a little
checklist and then a few empty lines where you can write in with Sharpie.
Just, you know, the, the weirdness of the weekend, whatever.
And that's worked out well with us.
Cause we put it underneath the windshield wiper so you can't drive away.
You're going to see it.
So I don't know if that would help, but you know, that it's tough
when you're sleep deprived.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's just one of those things.
And so yeah, I actually already have a great guy.
Maybe the viewers know a guy named Max Dredger work for Thai speed.
Actually got a cool gig this year in IMSA.
He's working for one of the factory for Mustang teams as a mechanic.
So, and he's also my good friend.
So he'll be with me as my crewman at Watkins Glen.
And yeah, have another candidate identified for Lime Rock Park.
So yeah, it's just, you know, you need, you need help, you know.
Tough, tough coming solo, especially after that long of a drive.
That's right.
That's right.
Santa Jeremy's arrived.
Is it working?
It is.
Yes.
Very nice.
Hey, buddy.
Santa beer just getting quite prolific there, sir.
Yep.
Wow.
The chicks dig it.
Just say hell, yeah.
So we met some people who did extreme experience and I was trying to say, you
know, who did you do it with?
And they couldn't remember.
I'm like, did you do it with some bald guy with a big old Santa beer?
I know that guy.
Yeah, he sticks out a little bit.
Yeah, I've met him once or twice.
Yeah, once or twice.
Yeah, baby.
All right.
So a bit of a good news, bad news on the qualifying.
Good news was Pace was there.
Bad news was you have no data to support that the pace was there.
So no data that they would accept.
I had high resolution data.
Just it wasn't aim and they did not accept it.
So yeah, unfortunately, which I've like compared multiple times against
aim, which is within 0.01 of aim.
So yeah, it was unfortunate, but I figured I'm not going to fight that
battle right now with everything going on.
So yeah, it is what it is.
It is the rest of the weekend began a.
He says back, right?
Well, some battle.
Oh, well, yes, but.
Battle practice and a science experiment to test and observe things.
And that was probably the biggest value of the weekend.
Did you think about, I think it's race three race to and I know what you're
going to ask, just try to set a lap time to just set a lap time and get a
try to try to could not get a clean lap.
Did it did was going to be.
I would have had to literally start from the pit lane, which I'm actually
going to probably just do that next time.
I'm not even sure if it's legal, but I'll just do it.
And then if they want to disqualify me fine, but in retrospect, the very
best thing I could have done was just start from the pit lane, let the whole,
you know, field go, you know, one quarter, one half a lap in front of me.
And then just do a few qualifying laps and set a fast time.
That's actually what I should have done.
Well, instead of getting DQ'd on that point, you could have just let everybody
go by you right at the very beginning and then got a cleaning lap.
Let them just leave, you know, 45.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, yeah.
Let in 25 race cars by it would have been.
I mean, I just, you know.
Yeah.
You would have tried to race.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, they, I could see them getting angry over me doing something
because that would have been dangerous.
So I don't know.
Yeah.
But yeah, no, I, that was what I was, that was what my thought was.
I actually put on a fresh of the tires for race two, just, just trying to do that.
Just to try to get the fast lap.
Brought it back.
Yeah.
But yeah, I just was not able to do it.
So actually, and I actually went backwards.
I was like 16th fastest in broad time on race two, because I never got a clean lap.
I had, I had two laps that basically got bought into 10A.
That would have put me, I think five or six.
Yeah.
Yeah, it was seven and you can't mess up 10A, 10B.
No, no, you can't because well, what happened is I would, despite the time
I would give backing up into traffic behind me and putting myself at risk
for being overtaken, which I don't care really getting overtaken,
but it would just mess up my lap each time because they were cars slower
battling in front, they were like battling into 10A.
And I would just catch them and get bought by half a second a second
through, through 10A and B, but of course, not able to actually pass them.
Right.
So yeah, it was, it was tough.
All right.
So your weekend was pretty much sealed with qualifying to put up at the
buckle. So let's, let's do race one.
Race one.
What happened to race one?
I think I got by a couple of cars right off the bat and had some good battles.
You know what?
I didn't even watch the races or really any of the in car video so I could
tell you about all the battles that I had, but I just don't know actually
which race they occurred in.
Oh, well, your weekend kind of was kind of flat line from, from the start.
So we could do, we could do a summary of race 1234
Sure. Sure. Yeah.
Okay. So that, that would be easier to discuss.
So one of the highlights of the weekend was observing pace differential
against the garagistic BMW.
That's Matt Ibrahim.
He had another, he also has a E 36 that they'd been developing and testing.
It has a B 48 swap, which, you know, for those who don't know, it's a really,
really cool little, I think it's a two liter maybe turbo charged engine.
And they made it to a six or seven speed box.
I'm not sure.
Super cool car, you know, well developed.
And he was running a full till Zebulon front splitter and I don't run a splitter.
And we were able to compare times when he wasn't running a splitter.
And I was a little bit quicker in particular, like in qualifying raw speed.
But he put that real nice Zeb splitter on for race two or three, wherever
we tangled with each other.
And boy, his cornering speed in the high speed corners was phenomenal.
Yeah.
And, you know, of course, I'm no stranger to running these types of air
dammit devices over the past 10, 15 years, but I was not expecting actually
how much of a difference it would really make on track just based on the prior
testing I've done.
But for example, at the bottom of, or I guess at the end of the S's,
let's say, right, right, you know, so you make that little, it's like a little
breaking zone, high speed left over crest, the wall is to the right.
We were just talking about that corner.
He went from like a little bit of a deficit on me to like a four plus mile
an hour apex speed, min speed advantage.
I mean, it was like I was tied to a stump compared to how fast he could take
that corner.
And I saw I was like, wow, okay, you know, because at CMP, right, just as an
example, I think I had the perfect setup, maybe not perfect, you know, but my
natural power band, my no splitter, lightweight, I have a really good
tire to weight ratio.
There was only one corner I was lacking in that high speed corner in the back
before the kink.
But here there was like three solid high speed corners where that front
error was working and it kind of got me thinking, I really need to run a
splitter at Watkins Glen.
Of course, I'll be running a splitter at Lime Rock, but, you know, I thought, man,
if this is going to make this much of a pace Delta, I need to make that happen.
So yeah, lesson learned on the front splitter.
Yeah, so, you know, if you're, you know, even if it's like one mile an
hour difference coming out of seven, it's got to be like six, maybe more at the
end.
Yeah, I mean, it was, it was like I was holding them up like I like an out of
class car.
I would gap them through like a couple of corners, but right there in the back,
man, it was like he was, he was coming like a train.
So yeah, it was just very interesting from a scientific perspective to see
literally the same chassis on almost the same tire, similar configuration,
and he was running a bit heavier than me just to see how much the arrow was
working in that corner.
Just yeah, cool.
Cool experiment to observe.
Yeah, and you didn't have to buy one to try.
Didn't have to buy one to try it.
I had another great battle with Justin Wingfield.
So he is a local guy and really good driver.
Atlanta.
What's that?
Yes, exactly.
Yeah, but he had run at CMP and his setup very similar to my E36.
I think he might run a different engine and has a little bit flat tune.
So he runs a bit heavier, but he has the power and so, you know, CMP and he
actually runs a front splitter at CMP.
He was off the base, you know, 22 and a half, you know, plus seconds,
but here he was quite strong.
I mean, he has, you know, however many hundreds, if not a thousand laps around
Rhode Atlanta and a setup tweaked around there.
And he, you know, you know, I was like, I was like a little bit faster than him,
but he was driving awesome.
And, you know, we kind of ran into each other in a race and he was doing great.
I was really not able to really pull much of a gap.
I would pull gaps in certain sections.
He would come back.
So really great job by Mr. Wingfield.
So how was your, uh, your similarly configured nemesis?
How was you versus Eric Magnuson?
Yeah. Oh, I don't know about similarly, you know, LS power, uh, front splitter.
It looks the same from the outside.
Yeah. They're both BMWs.
Yeah. It's the same.
They're both BMWs.
There's more to it.
So neither one of you use turn signals on the track.
So yeah, that's true.
That V8 power was, uh, was quite something on that track being a big track like that.
Well, so yeah, so here's some interesting observations.
So just for those listening, right?
So, uh, my car is a 108,000 mile stock S52 engine has some mild upgrades
for durability on the valve train side.
That's it.
Five speed ZF gearbox, mechanical throttle body, stock engine management.
Eric Magnuson's car.
So I run that car in roughly 215 horsepower, 2,800 pounds.
Eric Magnuson has an E46 M3 LS3 flat tune VA.
The thing makes 230 horsepower for like 4,500 RPM.
And so, but he runs it.
He has to run it much heavier and runs it on a 275.
So I think his race weight is 30, 32 or 33.
That's a big difference.
Wow.
Yes, it is.
Yeah, because he has to take a full flat tune modifier in the 230 horsepower bracket.
So the flat tune penalty is much more severe running between 215 and 230 horsepower
and compared to running under 215, which is why I was trying to get to under 215
so I could take a lot of weight off the car.
See what I'm saying?
Yeah, yeah.
But he gets to run a big 275 wide tire on an 11 inch wheel.
So he has a real 230 horsepower all the time.
I make 215 horsepower for about 200 RPM and it falls down to maybe like 203 by red line.
And it's like under 195 and another 1,000 RPM in the other direction.
So my average horsepower is probably 206, 207.
So you're talking about a real almost 25 horsepower difference, right?
So anyway.
Plus all that torque of that V8.
Plus all that torque, yeah.
So he has monster runs off the corner and he was one of the fastest cars on the straight.
But guess who was the fastest car accelerating everywhere on the straight?
Huh.
Huh.
I think that car needs to be looked at because none of that made sense.
whatsoever.
Well, it's over those.
I don't know.
It looks like you.
It was the hybrid racing Civic with a K24 swap.
6B was had the fastest trap and was accelerating faster than Eric Bang to
send that at any speed, including any speed, any part of the corner.
Yep.
Everywhere.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think, I think there's something modified in that ECM where you touch a little button
and it goes, oh, no, now we're back to the correct horsepower.
To be honest with you, that's just my observation.
Who knows?
I mean, you know, so there's some things that do matter, right?
Which is that car cuts a very small hole through the air, right?
So let's just assume it's all good, right?
Then, you know, it's probably half of the frontal area of the 46, right?
Oh, yeah.
You know, so it's probably not quite Corvette coefficient of drag, but probably close, right?
And a 6-speed gearbox that would keep good, you know, because he doesn't take a full flat
modifier, does Eric, to my understanding, it's only like 208 horsepower.
But with the 6B transmission, close ratio, he's probably operating at 204 to 208 all the time,
you know?
And he has a gearbox, I think it's custom ratios where, you know, it's built just for GLDC.
So I think coefficient of drag, 6-speed.
I'm sure they're doing some fancy things with that engine in terms of tuning and stuff.
You know, hey, but yeah, that hybrid Civic was moving out on the straights.
Any thought on you changing to a 6B?
That actually is something I wanted to do before the end of the season.
So I have some goals and things I'd like to do this year versus next year.
And if I stick around next year, one of the non-negotiables is to go to a custom build,
close ratio, 6B.
I actually looked into it this year and I kind of ran out of time and budget because this is
going to cost some money.
You can, basically, you can build a custom 6-speed out of the E46 6-speed boxes, but those
like 150 pound, you know, almost, they're like 80 pounds heavier than my ZF transmission.
Probably the more preferred option would be a custom build ZF transmission to turn my gear box
into having four usable gears instead of just three.
So right now it's third, fourth, and fifth.
So I basically, I just run the stock ZF tranny, you know, all OEM.
But if I got a custom build box and basically turn second gear into like a third gear,
but that have, you know, 34 and five scaled up appropriately.
So I have shorter accelerating gears up through fifth and then six is sort of like,
you know, 127 mile an hour and above gear.
That would be a big deal.
That would definitely buy me significant pace, depending on the track, etc.
Especially road Atlanta.
Especially road Atlanta running a natural power band.
The next thing on that point, which is what I intend to do to the best of my ability.
So really it's two things.
The short-term corrective action for road Atlanta, sorry, for Watkins Glen is
do everything I can to get the car as flat tuned as possible.
I don't have an electronic throttle body right now, so I can't really flat tune it like the
rest of these guys, but I'm going to go to the dyno with my tuner.
And our number one goal is just to make that power curve.
I want to try to have that thing just make 213 horsepower to redline
and then add as much power back as I can in the mid-range.
And that will only charge me 1% on the way.
So like I could basically add 10 plus average, real average horsepower for 25 pounds.
That will definitely be worth it.
So that's a huge that that will be at Watkins Glen.
That will be huge.
That that will be like I'll probably be fighting on
legit pace with Magnuson and Cateal for an overall podium,
podium giving how much rewards weight they're going to be carrying now.
Yeah, right.
And so and then for next year, I am already looking into custom engine management.
So there's like MS3 Pro, there's Link ECU, and I'm going to retrofit an electronic
throttle body onto my S52, which has not been done many times before.
There's not a lot of literature on it.
So I'll kind of be a trailblazer because most guys just upgrade to more modern
engines that come with drive by wire.
But I'm going to keep the old S52 and basically retrofit any 46 electronic
pedal to a drive by wire throttle body and do a real flat tuned S52 next year.
I probably have all the stuff for you to use to do that.
All right.
Well, I guess you and I will be in touch.
You might be Santa then.
Nick, do you build all your own cars?
I do 90% of the work.
The only things that I outsource are like, okay, if my engine explodes because it
drops a valve and I have to race in a month, I'm going to contact my buddy here with high
speed motor sports to love you.
Yeah, he's a great dude.
So yeah, that's what I did a couple of years ago.
And I blew a motor walk in Glen.
Actually, I did the legwork, found an engine online from carpart.com,
motor out in Texas, drop shipped the motor to you.
I did the whole build.
I ordered like, you know, 70 parts for the car, you know, upgraded, you know, just basically
OEM, OEM plus component shifted to you.
I said, hey, you build it and he did it.
So, but yeah, but, but, but yeah, the vast majority of the stuff, it's just me, myself
and I in the garage.
So why, why stay with the S52 for next year?
That would just be a convenience and budget thing.
It's not a performance.
It's not for a performance.
No, ideally, I'm 54 B 30.
Absolutely.
That's that would probably be the ideal engine.
Some aluminum block engine where I could get 80 pounds off the nose.
Yeah, that would be where it's at.
Even like an S54 would be a game changer.
Yeah, if not, if not, I think we may have one of those
kicking around too that might need to be rebuilt too.
Oh my gosh.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, we'll, we'll, we'll be in touch.
I'll be honest with you.
I actually think that if I just had a close ratio, six feet and a flat tuned car,
the setup is so good right now that I could probably compete for wins most, most anywhere.
I mean, it's not going to be as fast as the hybrid racing Civic, but it could probably
be like best of the rest at this point, I think in terms of what's possible.
Oh yeah.
I mean, what happened at CMP just shows that, you know, it's different tracks, different,
you know, you got a big boy track with big straightaways.
You got to have that power.
You got to have, you know, the ability to use that power.
Yes, sir.
Yes, sir.
And so yeah, that and that's another thing too.
It's like, you know, again, it, you know, I, I definitely use road Atlanta as a lot of learning
there because I definitely learned a lot I can take for next year.
Like so next year, I know it's like, if I can have a flat tuned setup, run the arrow, man,
I'll be, I'll be flying there.
So I look forward to that.
Of course, the ultimate nuclear option is, you know, K24 swapped S2000.
That would really be, be amazing.
But we don't need to drop, we don't need to drop that new just yet.
None of the other S2000s is doing well.
So Matt, Matt Walbaum had issues.
He was doing phenomenal laps in the early part of, of, of quality and practice.
But he basically did like a half a lap every session.
He was going to be real fast.
He actually could win gingerman, keep an eye out for him.
He's, I think he's going to do some awesome stuff.
Yeah. Yep.
Yeah, but you said that wrong word though, Honda.
Oh man.
Hey, look, I got BMW.
Hold on, hold on, Jeremy.
What, what car are you trying to drive in at NJMP in a few weeks, Jeremy?
You're slumming with us.
Listen, I'll drive anything.
I'm just saying I wouldn't own one.
He's slumming, he's just got a spice.
He just spice it up.
And I feel so bad.
Honestly, I feel so bad because I have been so busy lately.
I completely forgot that you were racing at road Atlanta last weekend.
And I realized on Monday and I was like, oh my God, are you kidding me?
I felt so bad and then everything was going on.
It's just been a madhouse for me up here.
Oh, all good.
All good.
You were there in spirit, brother.
Oh, so bad.
I still feel terrible about it.
You didn't miss much as you know, so.
It's cold.
Yeah, it's cold, Jeremy.
But, you know, truthfully though, I mean,
you, you know, when you and I were talking beforehand, you know, wasn't on the podcast,
but you kind of, you were telling me like you kind of said what was going to happen
and it kind of did.
You know what I mean?
Like you were like, I'm going to be in the teams like, you know, mid to low teams.
Like that's, that's what my car is.
It's not one of the fastest cars.
And, you know, it was quite comical because I didn't realize that Brian was Brian.
And then I work with Brian, right?
So we're chatting about, you know, once I realized who he was and we're chatting about it.
And then I was like, yeah, you know, I've been talking to Nick and his good friend of mine,
blah, blah, blah.
And I was like, you know, his car is going to be, you know, 12th to 15th fastest at road Atlanta.
And he's like, there's no way you can know that.
And I'm like, listen, that's what he said it's going to be.
And that if he says that's what it is, that's what it's going to be.
And here you are.
You were right.
I mean, you, you know, you kind of, you know, you kind of called it and knew what was going
to happen before you, before you got there.
I mean, obviously we want a better outcome, but I mean, you kind of knew that
that was kind of the thing, you know?
Yeah.
Well, yeah.
You know, like in the early part of the podcast, so yeah, the car did end up having
pace for, you know, five or six in retrospect after it went a little bit more aggressive
with the air box.
But yeah, you know, just, you know, in terms of like battle pace, yeah, I mean, that's
that's what it was.
So yeah, you know, and so yeah, you know, after a while, I appreciate the kudos.
But yeah, you know, you learn and you study and you just recognize what the car can do,
right?
Different traits of weaknesses, different tracks and, you know, knowing the layout of
Royal Atlanta, all the sim work and even I even spent some time researching results
last year watching the races last year of the in car and I can see which cars did better.
But there were some cars that did not show up this weekend because it was kind of like
a waste of time for him.
You know, Andy Smedgaard actually was one of those guys.
You know, he knew his car was, you know, obviously he was very strong at CNP.
He was like, yeah, you know, I'm going to do a bunch of races.
I don't want to waste my time racing, racing in Royal Atlanta.
It's going to be a man weekend anyway.
So, yeah, but I mean, it's Rhode Atlanta.
If he's been there once, sure.
But, you know, yeah, yeah, you got to kind of pick and choose your battles with the tool
that you have, you know, exactly, exactly.
So future Nick, what's what's coming up for the season?
Watkins Glen.
So Watkins Glen, if I can get a flat power band, like I mentioned,
we're going to put the splitter on.
It's going to be good.
Cateal is going to be carrying 5% at least by then because remember he won all four races
at Rhode Atlanta.
So that's 4%.
That's that's 100 pounds.
Plus, if he wins anything at Gingerman.
So that should slow down a car.
It should, quote unquote, slow down a car at Watkins Glen, a second per lap because
conservatively speaking, 100 pounds is half a second per minute in that weight range
depends on track where you put the weight, million other variables.
So, you know, and I think I could buy myself a half a second, at least at least adding that
kind of power there, plus adding the front splitter, which basically compared to my pace
at Rhode Atlanta, I still had 45 pounds that I couldn't even take off because my car was
fuel starving.
So I'm basically going to be able to add 10 average horsepower and a splitter for free.
Now, quick question about fuel starving.
Do you have the the kit in there?
I have a dual.
Yeah, the dual pump kit and it was still starving.
It's actually that's a great question, Jeremy.
I have never experienced fuel starve at that high of fuel before.
Normally, I can run the car down to under one quarter tank without a problem.
Even at Lime Rock with the two right handers, that's where it will starve.
But you want to know where it started starving big time?
Turn one, that massive sustained high speed arrow loaded up sweeper up the hill.
I would add fuel starve up the hill.
And actually, it wouldn't even hit until I was entering the essence.
Right.
Yeah, because it takes that delay.
It takes that time because you've got the fuel in the lines and everything else.
Right.
Because at Lime Rock, you're in the corner half as long.
They're high speed corners with arrow loads, but it gives some time for the fuel to come back
and get picked back up again.
I also was getting fuel starve.
What's it?
Seven and eight, right?
That like medium speed right hander into the low speed right hander before you begin the hill.
Yeah.
And even that because it's a cambered corner.
So a little bit more load, even though so there was less arrow load,
but more mechanical grip mode.
And that wasn't enough to get me to starve a little bit.
Just so just actually a little over 11 third of a tank.
Wow.
So yeah.
Yep.
Wow.
Yep.
With with dual pickups.
Yeah, that's crazy.
It is crazy.
Never experienced that before in my life.
No, that's that must be something with that track.
And obviously, you know, the things you just described because I like in mind with the dual tank,
you know, the dual pumps, the starvation kit as they call it, right?
Even at pit race, you know, all those high speed, high G corners and, you know,
flying around there and like there was, I had my fuel light on and I still did three laps.
Wow.
Wow.
Awesome.
Well, right.
And that's what that's why I ask because those kits are usually like phenomenal.
So it is definitely that track.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Now, one thing I do need to do, which because I never looked at it, but so the previous,
it's actually those dual pumps were installed by the previous owner long, long time ago.
Actually, the owner before the guy bought the car from and but I'm not sure if it has those
little almost like, like baffles, like the little cups.
Yes.
And I think that will be something I'll need to do.
I think that will make a big difference.
Take a look at that, pull it out, order some new fuel pump rings, pull them out and just
kind of take a look at them and see what's going on in there because that might be it.
The older kits, I don't know if they came with that extra baffle on the bottom.
Yes.
Yeah.
So that yeah, that's that's another note to my list of things to do.
Yeah.
Great observation.
Yeah.
So what else?
Yeah.
And the and the front splitter.
I have a really cool half inch pressure treated wood splitter that I ran in ST4.
Got it.
Got it out of storage really nice.
I'm going to finish resurfacing, prepping, painting that and that's going to go on the
car with some new mounts and stuff.
We're going to go even a little bit more aggressive on the ride height.
Actually, I'm going to actually raise up my ride height a little bit to get the
roll center a little better because I have some really sturdy basically mounts that will drop
the splitter even more aggressively.
Oh, nice.
Yeah.
So that'll be a nice change.
And yeah, I got a couple of titanium skid pucks.
Yeah, we're going to run a really aggressive.
Well, yeah, I got some flares that are going to go on the car.
That's going to look cool.
Carbon fiber hoods going on.
I was just going to ask about that.
Yeah.
Power fiber hood, polycarbonate rear glass.
Yep.
So yeah, we're going to get a whole bunch more weight out of the car.
Hopefully I can add a little bit of ballast in the passenger footwell area.
So yeah, we're going to be the car is going to be to its maximum potential this year before
Watkins Glen.
And it's definitely going to be running in that 215 bracket.
When is the Glen?
When is Watkins Glen?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mid mid July.
Mid July.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So I forget the exact dates, but yeah.
Now, is that the next race or is in between your home track?
That's the next race for me.
There's another race first at Gingerman.
Gingerman for you.
No, Gingerman.
No, a little bit too far needed a break.
Happy to have this break.
Definitely enjoying the break.
I think your car would be good in Gingerman though.
I'm not saying go.
I'm just saying I think your car would be good there.
Eric Madison said Nick, if you do Gingerman, I think you'd win Gingerman.
I think it would.
I said EMAG.
Thank you.
I'd love to go, but not in the car.
I'm not trying to talk you into going.
I'm just saying I've been there.
I think your car would be good there.
It'd be perfect.
I think maximum speed in the GLTC car there is 150 mile an hour.
So it would all be low speed, mechanical grip,
tire to weight ratio, tight twisty braking, traction events.
That's where my car would be killer.
I was murdering almost.
That thing would shine.
What's that?
That thing would shine there.
It would shine here.
It's basically like sector one and sector three at CMP,
which is where my car was murdering people.
You'd have trouble after the big turn going 10 to 11,
but that's not anything like road Atlanta long.
But you could probably carry a good chance through 9 and 10
and get out of there.
Maybe next year.
Yeah, perhaps next year.
Maybe do Gingerman instead of road Atlanta.
In retrospect, you're right.
That's that 100% it's the right call.
This is why I need advisors and crew to help me out with strategies.
We are here to make bad decisions for you, Nick.
You don't have to listen to them.
But I mean, you, you had never been to road Atlanta.
So I see the, you know, hey, I want to go there.
Like that's, you know, I mean, 100%.
I mean, this year, why not try it?
See what happens, you know, and then make your decisions.
You know, look at the game plan for next year, you know,
at the end of this season, take everything into account.
And hey, this is going to be our game plan for next year
because this is where we're going to be strong.
This is what we're going to, you know.
Absolutely right.
Absolutely right.
Um, yeah, actually, I began thinking that I almost viewed it like, um, you know,
like the, it's funny because, you know, for, for how much into road racing
and driving you guys all know, it's like, I still watch NHRA top fuel drag racing.
I love watching that stuff.
And, you know, one of the big differentiators for them, all the success is track knowledge.
And I, you know, this weekend, I began thinking about man, like,
imagine if I had some experience here, how I could have approached things differently
from everything.
And that knowledge is critical, right?
Yeah, it's, it's, you know, it's so competitive at the top
that that kind of stuff really, really does, does matter.
And I, like I said, you know, I said, okay, well,
this, this weekend, you know, it's not like ever gave up.
I never gave up, always tried to get 100% every race, but I said,
hey, look, all right, well, if, if, if we're not going to be battling for
points all this weekend, let's make the most out of it.
So every race was data gathering, testing, experimentation, in case ever come back here.
And I definitely learned a lot in addition to just enjoying the driving, you know, but.
Yeah, yeah.
I forgot that you liked, I forgot that you liked NHRA.
I've got, I got a couple of pistons that connecting rods for you from Antron Brown's car.
Get out of here.
No, I swear to God, they're signed and everything.
Yeah.
When, when did you get them?
Um, so when I was selling tools and you, you had them.
No, no, no, no, I was at the track and they, when they pull them out, they just hand them out.
And I actually, Antron was actually at my house for six hours.
We hung out for barbecue and all kinds of stuff.
Get out of here.
No way.
Oh well.
Yeah, super cool.
Him and his son and the whole crew and.
I love him.
I love his attitude, man.
He's just a hard worker dude, you know, loves, loves what he's doing.
Such an inspiration.
He's a role model, uh, you know, lots of like, you know,
lots of positivity and man, it's just, that's, that, that's a great dude.
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, he's, he's super cool.
So they, they're just being sitting around the house and I'm not going to do anything with them.
And all right.
Now I know where they're going.
Oh my God.
Don't, don't give them all to me, but man, I will cherish that.
It's the piston, like super lightweight.
Is it as like a, an aluminum?
Yeah.
It's, it's lighter than you think it should be.
It's trick.
But she's so weird.
It's like a court bucket going up and down.
Yeah, they're super cool.
Super, super cool.
Oh, badass.
So Vic and I went a long time ago, a couple, I think, I know we went at least once.
I think we went a couple of times, but she wasn't the mechanic that she is now.
I want to take her back and go into the pit and show her what they do in between runs.
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
That would be fun.
Most of the teams will let you go right in there.
You know, if you get into the VIP 10 or something, you can literally stand
three feet from them and watch them tear the motors apart and put them back together.
It's great.
It's a wild to watch what they do.
Amazing.
Yeah.
Each person has a job.
You know, what they can, they can turn around a motor and like less than a half hour.
Like, oh yeah.
Yeah.
Clutch is everything.
Yeah.
It's amazing.
It's so cool what those guys do.
They must have like chef hands, you know, how the chefs can like grab stuff and, you know,
they just, oh, look at this.
This takes out 150 degrees.
Let me carry it in my open hand.
No problem.
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, it's very, very impressive.
I just can't imagine working on an engine, but it's that hot.
Yeah.
And the crazy thing is so many single use components, you know, like I think the
crankshaft bends out of spec, you know, after a pull.
I mean, it's just, you know, everything, it's mostly just one time use.
Have you got how many runs to get out of the clutch pack?
But that's like one of the biggest things.
It's like, I think it's like a seven or eight stage clutch system.
Oh yeah.
It's crazy to watch them.
They pull it all apart.
They check every measurement of every disc and every plate.
But I mean, they reuse them a lot, but it's amazing that how many times they can run that
clutch pack without replacing it.
That's pretty wild.
It's still, its lifetime is measured in seconds.
It's not.
Yes.
No, you're 100% right.
It is literally seconds.
You know, like a four second, five second lap and they run 10 laps.
It's like, oh, my, I got a lot of money out of this one.
We went 10 drop.
That's 40 seconds.
Yeah.
Well, they even, I mean, just to give you an example of how I find it so impressive,
like on the knowledge, right, even of the track.
I mean, so they, to my understanding, correct me if I'm wrong, but so they have a base setup
that they will plug into the car based on track conditions and their knowledge and the tire and,
you know, and the density altitude of the track at the time.
So there's like this base map that they have programmed in, but then they will be ready to
make fine tune adjustments literally up to within 10 seconds of the final run.
And then the final tuner will make any final adjustments in a programmable box right on the car
just before they take the staging beams.
Yeah.
If they need to, yeah.
And that's, it's all knowledge.
You know, they, they develop to my understanding a box.
It almost looks like, you remember the old ghostbusters movies where they would toss a little
contraption.
It almost looks like a jack.
And are you asking this group?
Well, it's so cool because they have this little box.
It looks like a little ghostbuster box.
And it was engine design engineered to very accurately measure the coefficient of friction
of the surface.
And so they're, you know, they're, they're taking these friction measurements multiple times a day.
And all the tuning is based on that.
So they're, they're just doing all that stuff.
It's just so cool.
The temperature changes, you know, temperature five degrees difference here or there.
Like it's, it all makes a difference.
Yep.
Yep.
Exactly.
Even, you know, they're even doing things like a new thing this year.
I apologize for the ramp, but, you know, they have these, like, wind deflectors under.
Yeah.
Well, they have these, like, wind deflectors forward of the rear wheels and in some tracks
you want to run them because it's like a little bit, a little bit more down for us,
but a little more dragon of a track.
So you don't need to down for us.
You pull them off and they have a little more top speed.
Anyway, I just, yeah.
It's, it's pretty impressive, you know, to see the things that have to be done for a three-second run.
That's right.
That's right.
Well, even so, just to bring this back to like GLTC, you know, one thing I did was trim my wing
for Rhode Island.
I took like two and a half degrees angle of attack out of it.
And that, that, that helped even like I was able to basically look at my acceleration
traces and sort of infer a little bit of things.
And that was a nice A bounce improvement in the high speed,
even though I still was getting a little bit of high speed understeer.
So I could actually take some more wing out.
But yeah, having the wing trimmed was definitely a net improvement for a long track like Rhode
Atlanta.
So I'll be carrying forward that setup at the Watkins Glen.
Nice.
Nice.
And then after the Glen, you have Lime Rock Park, baby.
Lime Rock Park.
Lime Brock.
Nick's home track.
I got, I got some test sessions and some things planned for before.
I've seen some videos that you run at Lime Rock Park.
It's, yeah.
I never posted my 57 zero on 200 tread or tires.
That is just absurd.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I had a lot heavier than it is now.
So, and it, and with not as much arrow and a whole bunch of other things.
So, yeah, yeah.
Does extreme do Lime Rick Termin?
No.
No, it's too expensive and too brutal.
Yeah.
I mean, it's, it's not even that it's, it's the fact it's, it's so hard in Connecticut
where you can't do anything on Sundays.
Yeah, sure.
Like that's, that's the thing, you know.
So when we go to Thompson, Thompson's been very good.
And, you know, we still don't run Sunday.
Yeah.
Does Lime Rock run Sunday at all?
No.
I don't think they're allowed.
No, no, it's, I don't know if Lime Rock Park is, but Thompson can run Sunday from
12 to five and that's it.
That's the only thing that Thompson can do on Sundays.
There is no, no racing on, no driving on Sunday at Lime Rock Park.
At Lime Rock.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah, yeah.
Ever.
Yeah.
It's still open.
You can do car shows, right?
So after Lime Rock, there's like a Sunday Concourse, you know, cool little car show thing,
you know, but yeah, there's no, no, no racing on the track.
No.
Well, our plan is to be at Lime Rock.
We're 50-50 on Watkins because it's kind of when is Lime Rock?
August, I think 15th, 16th, 17th, something like that.
I mean, I could double check the dates here.
You're killing me with these dates.
Well, Jeremy, you're busy every weekend.
So what does it matter?
No, I'm not.
Well, I mean, I am, but not really.
I am.
That's my, that's Rory's birthday weekend.
Maybe I can convince him into going down there.
The cars are cool.
Grid life is a whole different scene.
It's way different than lemons.
But lemons are NASA.
Yep.
Yep.
And that's close.
I'm going to look at my calendar.
He looks at his calendar, but he doesn't do anything about it.
It's fine.
You know, because he's not going to do baseball coaching this year
because, you know, he doesn't have to.
Where were you tonight, Jeremy?
Uh-huh.
Yeah.
Where?
Yeah.
We're in Baseball.
We're in?
We're in?
Oh, okay.
I've been umpiring baseball games and coaching.
That's where that beard's come up from.
That's an umpire beard right there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's, I mean, I love it.
You know, and Bill and I have this problem with the word no.
And that problem is we just can't say it to people, right?
So it, uh, yeah.
Yeah.
When I am home, I am just slammed busy.
It's crazy.
Tony Robbins, right?
You just never stop.
He's a just say yes guy, right?
You know, yes to the opportunities.
So, you know, yeah, embrace it.
Yep.
I won't be able to do it forever.
So there you go.
That's right.
Very well.
Well, Nick, if you need anything at Lime Rock,
we will be there.
If you need anything mechanical, Vic, you'll be there.
If you need anything like food or part run, I'll be there.
Okay.
Yeah.
Hope to see you guys in the Barbados Speed Factory.
That's right.
We'll be there.
We'll be there.
Jeremy will be out doing something, but we'll be there.
No, I need to be at both of those because neither one of them are very far away.
Well, Nick, plug in your transponder next time.
I'm going to.
I'm going to, yeah.
You know, and shout out to the guy who helped me.
You know, my buddy Kelby, he was there, you know, but he was even there in the pits,
you know, but just, you know, did not think that you would check timing.
So just, just one of those things, you know, yeah.
We've all done it.
I mean, things came together.
We've started races and didn't have it, you know, missed like four or five laps and they're like,
your car is going around, but you're getting credit for none of this.
Would you like to come in?
Yes.
Yes, we.
Yeah.
Oh, whoops.
Hey, the transponders are right here.
Yeah.
I've got two of them.
Both of them are charged.
None of them are in the car, but that's it.
That's why the Honda is hardwired.
Yeah.
You have one of those Mylapse X2 ones.
So, yeah, I'm sure you get hardwired, no problem.
Yeah, pretty good.
So I have a question.
I've been waiting for this one.
Okay.
Because we all know where my heart is, what I raced for for so many years, right?
Tell me about the Jetta.
The Jetta.
Have you looked at that?
Have you done anything like?
Yeah, I don't know.
I don't know the Jetta I raced in Rotolana, or are you saying the.
The GLTC Jetta.
Yes.
Tell me about that.
That thing is cool.
So that's run by Tom Panzarella.
Really good driver.
I have to say, like, you know, the past couple of years running that car,
he was kind of off the base, but he's got that thing going pretty good now.
It looks pretty good.
I'm not sure what engine is in it.
It's a turbo something.
I don't know if it's a 2.0 T or 1.8 directed.
I'm not even sure.
Yeah, but it's a cool car making good noises,
popping, banging everywhere, you know, lifting the inside rear tire.
He's got a pretty hardcore sort of like boxy aero package on the thing.
Yeah, this white and black paint job, you know, man, that that thing is cool.
It's cool to see one of those things out there running.
Because I mean, it's like, if you want, you know,
if you were building the car to compete in GLDC, that is not the platform you would run.
So to be up there, like in the top 15 in that thing, I mean, I mean, I, you know,
you got to give that man credit for what he's doing with that car.
A hundred percent.
And Mark twos are, they have the aerodynamic
co-efficiency of a toaster.
Exactly.
Exactly.
So he, he, he's hooked that thing up.
Shout out to top answer.
Actually, we had a great battle actually.
And he was not easy to get around.
I have to say, actually, he made a little bobble exiting A out of the main straight.
And I actually was able to only get in his slipstream just barely.
So I was kind of at his bumper right into 10A.
And it was, it was a lunge, you know, not, not high risk lunge, but it was like a boom.
It was like a breaking ballon of getting by him.
Yeah.
I got to do it here and now or, or this is going to go on forever kind of thing.
Exactly.
It had to happen.
I made sure to broadcast the move in advance.
And, you know, I've raced Tom before he sees heads up, you know, so he knew it was coming.
He, he, he didn't make it easy for me.
You know, we, we kind of almost went almost like 22 wide through 10A B.
And I kind of just ended up, you know, I, I, I, I gave him room.
Yeah.
It is, I'm telling you, it's, and you know, like the, you know, with, with racing,
Jonas Volkswagen, the GTI that Mark three, and, you know, I just love those things.
And you raced Tom's for, you know, many years.
And I see that Jetta in there.
And I'm like, Oh my God.
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
And even, and remember, I even go back to the Volkswagen Fox days if you remember.
So right.
Yeah.
Right.
The Fox or a followed rear axle.
No.
Tom's Fox.
Yeah.
A Volkswagen Fox.
Yeah.
No, I know.
I just wasn't sure if it was that one or a Fox.
No, that Fox.
That's, that's sad.
Oh man.
Yeah.
That thing was, yeah, we used to run that thing with an open differential, you know,
inside wheel, just roasted itself up the hill at the Hampshire Motor Speedway.
It was a lot of fun though.
That thing, that thing took down so many cars.
It had no business taken down.
That was, that was cool.
Right.
Yeah.
Well, Tom's got a new, a new helmet design.
So hopefully his cars will perform this year as well as always.
Please.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I don't know.
We'll see.
Maybe his new helmet design will make him faster.
Tom, hopefully that'll make you faster.
There you go.
Here's your podcast guest.
Tom, you're overdue.
All right, Nick, we will bother you again.
Same bat channel.
Different bat time.
Hopefully I will be in the right time zone.
Where are you right now?
Down in Huntsville.
Oh yeah.
Okay.
Huntsville.
Anyway, Nick, always great to have you on.
Thank you for coming on.
Keep us in mind.
Jeremy apparently has all the parts you need.
Yep.
Now you just need time.
That's right.
Yeah.
That's the thing that none of us have.
Nope.
Thank you so much, Rad.
It was an awesome chat.
I have a feeling our next chat's going to be even better.
Our next one will be better.
It'll be fine.
Rhode Atlanta.
It's something you got to do at least once.
Right.
And you know, that's racing, right?
You win some, you lose some.
If you do the best you could, you left it all out there.
You're done.
Yeah.
And the positive thing is you came away with a lot of data.
100%.
A lot of data.
A lot of information, a lot of data.
Probably the most valuable data-gallery exercise I've had
in almost two years of running in the class.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And that's the big takeaway for that.
I mean, it does.
You're a competitive person.
You're an incredible driver.
And, you know, I can tell that, you know,
it kind of hurts where you were.
But you know what?
That's racing, right?
That's racing.
And you win or you learn.
Right.
It was easy.
And I could do it.
Right.
Thank you, Nick.
Thank you.
Thanks, Nick.
Thank you.
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
you
About this episode
Nick Barbato’s GLTC weekend at Road Atlanta with Gridlife turns into a deep dive on track intimidation, sim-first hill confidence, and why braking points and curb discipline matter. They connect qualifying chaos—transponder/timing data issues and averaging laps—to the reality of passing in dirty air. The conversation also shifts into setup experimentation: air-box aggression, splitter/wing tweaks, and even fuel-starvation troubleshooting with dual pumps. The takeaway: racing as data gathering and learning, not just results.
If you would like to help grow our podcast and high-performance driving and racing:
You can subscribe to our podcast on the podcast provider of your choice, including the Apple podcast app, Google music, Amazon, YouTube, etc.
Also, if you could give our podcast a (5-star?) rating, that we would appreciate very much. Even better, a podcast review would help us to grow the passion and sport of high performance driving and we would appreciate it.
Best regards,
Vicki, Jennifer, Ben, Alan, Jeremy, and Bill
Hosts of the Garage Heroes in Training Podcast and Garage Heroes in Training racing team drivers
Money saving tips:
1) Enter the code GHiT 25 for $50 off the Fire Links hardware system with a 1 year membership included and/or a an extra three months if you subscribe now at https://firelaps.com/
2) Enter code "GHIT" for a 10% discount code to all our listeners during the checkout process at https://candelaria-racing.com/ for a Sentinel system to capture and broadcast live video and telemetry.
3) Enter the code "ghitlikesapex!" when you order and Apex Pro system from https://apextrackcoach.com/ and you will receive a free Windshield Suction Cup Mount for the system, a savings of $40.
