24 Hours of development...

[WJM]

Central Carolina's Region SCCA hosts a 24 hour autocross...basically, you work for 4 hours (2-2 hour shifts each 12 hours) and the other 20 hours you are runnin, sleeping, eating, etc....

 

Results!

http://www.ccrscca.com/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=112

 

The RX made it from Atlanta to Winston Salem NC (7 hour drive iirc) and made it all 24 hours (3 drivers taking it for runs over the 24) w/out incident.

 

The course favored power cars and cars with power that could carry momentum...as an STi was the car to have...it set an unofficial FTD of 42.0....the best I could get out of the RX was 44.198...I was SEVERLY gear limited. The first section was pretty high speed, 7k for most it, NOT worth it to shift into 3rd...back stretch was flat to the floor in ANY car, and I topped out 3rd easily. I was running in HI range all day/night. I hit 4th on a really fast run (not the 44.1 tho)

 

Since I am driving the Continental/boxer4racing 2.5 RS at Nationals, I took all of my official runs in it...which is why there are no runs posted in the RX. However, JWX was there and proved that TWO RX's can show up and run w/out problems.

 

The RX is CERTINLY dialed in suspesnion wise...definatly lacks power and gearing is VERY short....the RX is more of a monster on the tighter courses with more technicals...this course was pretty wide open, but the finnish was VERY critical and tight. the STi i drove to 42.6 was hitting the rev limiter in 3rd on the 'back stretch'....FAST.

 

With the RX stuck in too short of gearing and loosing too much time shifting...the Conti/boxer4 RS on Conti Porsche compund street tires is 1 second faster than the RX...on a tigher course the two cars would be even...if intercooler equipped the RX would be fast. Mainly the lack of power and proper gearing for the course is that 1 second lost. RX puts down ~100 at the wheels where as the RS puts down ~150 at the wheels.

 

The RS is prepped for STX (tho swap of the cats and the 225's on it, and its an STS car!)

The RX is prepped for FSP, but due to the BOV its in SM. (plus i have existing points and its more competitive overall)

 

However, I drove the RS to a SM class win, beating out ALL of the top contenders who were on FULL RACE TIRES in an RS on STREET TIRES. That and us 3 were only separated by 0.007....Jon K. and Steven R (racerjon1 and pleiades respectively) are FAST FAST national level drivers...and I am right there with them.

 

Time to kick some STS Civic butt in Topeka 9 days from now!

 

Either way, the RX is definatly there suspesnsion wise, it just needs proper dampers, wheels (13x9) and PROPER EMS/AWIC....then, it'll be FSP kick-butt ready.

[subyrally]

way to go will!! theres no stopping youo. congrats and keep up the good work.

[Warp3]

Nice spin you put on there to cover the fact that you had to switch to an EJ-powered car to beat me! :-p

 

Seriously, though, WJM's car is very quick. I took a couple runs in it and if I hadn't completely hosed the finish section by entering it too late, I seriously think I'd have been in the 44s on that run (I did a 46.0 on that run as it was) and that only my 2nd run in the car. Honestly, it surprised me how quick that car is. The fact that it was pretty nimble didn't surprise me due to the lighter weight, but it gripped quite well to have old R-compounds on it, handled very well (though the setup was slightly twitchy for my tastes), and was very quick.

 

The lack of torque (vs. my 2.5RS with cams) and the sheer cornering grip (vs. my 225/50-15 V710s) was notable, but the car was far quicker than I expected it to be. It almost makes me which I'd gone through with autocrossing my RX when I had it.

 

A bit more cornering grip and some more grunt and that could be a very good local SM competitor (though Will seems intent on FSP now). How he'll fare against Geoff Zimmer's FSP Rabbit remains to be seen (especially considering that FSP Rabbit has frequently outrun the entire SM class at events in the past), but Will's crazy enough to go for it anyway, so go for it!