Greetings everyone,

SCCA (Sports car club of America) is holding an autocross (Solo event) at Aloha Stadium lower parking lot on 10/15/06.

Gates open at 7am but if you wish to drive your FIT you need to be there a bit earlier to get one of the 30 open registrations left for the day. Over 100 drivers have preregistered. Sometimes one will cancel and that slot will be added to the 30 on site drivers.

Most novice or first time drivers will be driving in the afternoon during heats 3 and 4 so that they can get an instructor to help. You will need to be a volunteer course worker for one heat in order to drive in another heat. At the end of the day there can be fun runs for $1 each.

Cost for drivers is $28 for non members and $20 per event for SCCA members. You walk the course after it has been certified in the morning or at lunchtime and you drive 4 runs during your heat taking turns with other drivers.

So far we have not seen ANY Fits out there so please consider coming by to join us. If not as a driver then stop by (50 cents to part via the swap meet event next door in the stadium parking lot) and watch a bit. We will be there all day from before 7am to 6pm and driving from about 930am to 5pm. Or you can bring a camera and take pictures.

For rules/information about the 10/15 event download
http://sccahawaii.org/Event_info_for_10-15-06.pdf

For complete information on SCCA Hawaii see
http://sccahawaii.org/

and for SCCA solo events see
http://scca.com/Solo/Solo2.asp?IdS=004F41-3E88BA0&x=050|030&~=

Hope to see you there!

1971 Datsun 240Z autocrossing with the same driver since 1977!
Watch for him, he's the man to beat.

Bring your FIT!!!!!!!

 

Here is a Summary of Race 2 this season with pictures and commentary
http://sccahawaii.org/S2_Race2_2006.html

E Prepared Integra


D Street Prepared Prelude


D Modified Sonic CRX

 

I'll see if I can check it out! if not to race, then at least to watch!

 

Sounds good. kkim is planning to visit from Kauai as well.

Event Schedule (subject to change):
0600 – 0830 Track set-up
0700 Gate opens
0700 – 0830 Morning registration & tech inspection
0845 – 0900 Heat 1 & 2 driver’s meeting...MANDATORY
Turn in registration cards at the trailer
0900 – 0945 Heat 1 & 2 drivers grid cars (2 different grids)
Track open for walking
0945 – 1000 Heat 1 & 2 drivers report to trailer for work assignment 1000 – 1300 Heat 1 & 2 (first car out no later than 10am)

1130 – 1230 Late registration & tech inspection
1245 – 1300 Heat 3 & 4 driver’s meeting... MANDATORY
Turn in registration cards at the trailer
1300 – 1345 Heat 3 & 4 drivers grid cars (2 different grids)
Track open for walking
1345 – 1400 Heat 3 & 4 drivers report to trailer for work assignment 1400 – 1700 Heat 3 & 4 (first car no later than at 2pm)
Fun runs if possible
1700 – 1730 Clean-up

So for spectators
Drivers on the course about 10am to 1230 and 2pm to 430pm.
You can't bring in food unless you are a driver.

 

hey is that colin's integra? perhaps i should stop by and watch too

**edit** have any tsx's come out to race?

 

Yes, It is Colin. He's usually out there each event.

At last count, there were four Integras last event. NO tsx. How about you?

Most drivers can do a run in about 45 to 50 seconds. Fastest time of the day under 38 seconds by comparison. Sometimes the difference between first and second in the classes is thousandths of a second or a few inches which is a photo finish but our timers are electronic and catch the difference.

The course vary each event. They are put together the morning of the event by a crew and adjusted before being approved. You can't do anything but walk and study the course before you get your four runs. Hit a cone and it is a two second penalty. We take turns driving in different heats.

That's Gary K. in the "PSU" Prelude
And Robert I. in the Sonic CRX!

 

i might come out just to watch!

 

We will be there all day. Two heats drive in the morning and two in the afternoon.

It will seem like it's easy to drive but the faster you go the less time there is to think about the next turn, slalom or obstacle and you can get off track in a hurry. Each small error costs time, even a half second lost is too much to make up.

Looking forward to seeing you.

 

Rain predicted 80% chance.

Autocross still going on.

Events chairman and I are watching the weather and will decide.

He likes driving in the wet- good to hone his skills with less than perfect conditions I guess.

Bring your umbrella.

 

RAIN RAIN and more RAIN. In abundance.

I guess that is the definition of flash floods.

OK they have arrived tonight.

It was raining so hard at times the car alarms were going off. No lightning and thunder just the many thuds from the drops of water falling hard.

OK, I'm going to Aloha Stadium a little after 5am to dry off the course.
I'll bring my blow dryer just in case.

 

Just when I thought things were going bad enough with all the Flash Flood warnings until Monday...

We go to autocross at the stadium and it's pouring. Sometimes it lightens up to just raining.

Then it clears to a drizzle and as we are setting up and under the tents we notice the ground isn't so solid. The earth is shaking and for quite a long time then we loose power the lights go out.

SCCA runs on a generator anyway so we are OK but everyone else around us is blacked out and will remain so all day.

I met with some visitors from Kauai- pretty brave to travel this weekend- whom I instructed at the autocross.

I looked for any FITs but did not see any. Just two Matrix a Honda Civic SI-R and some 80 odd cars. 50 less than we had capacity for.

Someday we have got to get some FITs to come out and play. Let your friends know and I'll be posting the future dates once we confirm them with Aloha Stadium officials in the next 2 weeks at their October board meeting.

It was a wet but fun day. Much better than staying home with no power.

 

Wow! Great to hear the event went on despite the ruckus! Kudos to you and the others to power forward! I was fully expecting to hear the event was canceled, but man you proved me wrong! Props to the Kauai crew that showed up, too. Man, those guys are hardcore!!

Sorry to have missed the fun... hope to attend upcoming events when they are scheduled.

 

sorry but the weather yesterday was just too much to come out!!!

 

Weather was bad but only in some pockets. Some us got sunburns! No joke.
And we were covered up due to the heavy rains. But it did clear.

Short breakdown of the day-

6am- setup crews working in moderate rain to clear parking lot and do early setup.
630am track course crews working to lay down cones for course in mild rain to drizzling mixed with moderate rain
707am All hell breaks loose- Actually we were fine- we felt the quake and saw the light posts shaking and then all the lights went out and the Stadium generators kicked on - the lights went on but then went out a short time later and remained off all day. We run our own generator and were not affected by any power outage except some of us were low on gasoline!
8am track ready to check for safety- drizzling rain
830am drivers meeting then walk the course in light rain.
930am Heat 1 ready to run in some rain to light rain. No standing water.
1030am Heat 2 ready to run in some light rain. Times improving a little
1130am starting to dry off and clear a little- mostly overcast with light rain at times.
1230- I switch my wheels from street "Rain" tires to R compound competition tires and cross my fingers for more clearing.
Lunch then drivers meeting
130pm Heat 3 ready to run under dry but cloudy conditions
230pm Heat 4 ready to run mostly dry with a little light drizzles.
320pm Fun runs begin - Fastest times all day done unofficially.
Basically as the day wore on the times were getting lower and lower.
350pm heavy downpours- so much for my tan.
4-430pm clean up and tear down.
97 total drivers (16 novice drivers) and a clean event- only a few spectators but we have a covered area for them in any case.

It was great to see our new friends from Kauai and two got to drive and the other two I took along with me on the fun runs. Mahalo to Keoni, Joshua, Douglas, and Justin for attending the Safety Steward training class. We need each to attend one more event before we can sign off on their applications.

Our course was designed for a wet day. Rain by itself is not a problem for driving. Poor visibility, active lightning in close proximity, or standing deep water leading to loss of traction would be reasons to HOLD competition long enough to stop the problem or if it cannot be resolved then cancel the event.

However I talked to those who have been autocrossing in Hawaii for over 25 years and we do not cancel autocross in our region much if at all. We do maintain a safe event and monitor for good conditions but we will allow the event to happen with a few adjustments.

Anyway the course itself was shorter and slower by design with some tight switchback turns heading out to a loop turnaround at the far end then tight evenly spaced 5 cone directional slalom then two long hard turns and a tight left to the finish. In the wet the slower speeds were fine.

We did have a few new drivers in the morning heats. Many did cancel and not as many registered as walk ups.

All in all a good day that was safer and much more fun than staying at home with no power. Hey power was not restored to Oahu until about 155am this morning and there are still about 8 isolated pockets that are out.

 

Some pictures from the wet earthquake event on 10/15


Our Kauai visitors in the morning trying to stay a little drier going over the Safety Steward training material


It was wet in the morning but managed to dry by lunchtime. Here I am in my swimsuit and reefwalker shoes.


Josh in ESP class (it's no Forrester we know)


Troy in his FSP Accord


Taro in his "New" FX-16 (his old one rusted to smitherines) in Street Mod class (he's the Pylon Assassin)


The "old" FX-16 in D Street Prepared class earlier in 2006. RIP

 

The latest word on the autocross is we have no dates yet.

Seems the Aloha Stadium Board of Directors has concerns about safety at the autocross events. No extention was given for SCCA Hawaii.

SCCA Hawaii will be given another chance to convince the Board at the next meeting on Nov 30th to be allowed to have autocross in the stadium's lower parking lot.

Stay tuned

 

not good news...

...but they allow the other guys to drift around the parking lot... SCCA is more dangerous???

 

In Drifting you are supposed to loose control. So crashing is a given.

I don't think they are giving us enough driving skill credit. Heck, I don't even hit the little cones on an average day.

When we get the official word we will let you know about future dates. For now it's back to the wait and see approach we had all summer.

This weekend at Aloha Tower Marketplace, MINI of Hawaii is sponsoring an All MINI car show (first time in Hawaii) with about 30 MINIs and a few other special cars. All open to the public from 9am to 1pm.

 

Brad,

Maybe the Oahu SCCA should invite the stadium board directors have a go at driving autocross track? If they don't get hooked, they might at least gain some respect for the skills involved for those who participate?

Is your MINI on display this weekend?

 

I think the Stadium board knows we are serious at what we do and hopefully things will work out.

The newspapers have been running lots of ads about tomorrow's MINI to the Max event at Aloha tower marketplace. My MINI will be on display.

There's a Rockford Fosgate MINI with 1000 Watts of power and something like 6 LCD video screens. It's a basic MC not MCS but it has some custom front door speakers that look great. The rear seat is taken up with large subwoofers and large LCD screen out the back. I spoke to the owner and he said it isn't street legal due to the loss of the rear seat and limited view out the back.

The MINI club is collecting food for the Food Bank of Hawaii and Toys to benefit homeless children on the Waianae Coast with the help of Waianae Coast Comprehensive Health Clinic.