This is what these cars were made for. The Second Strike/Olthoff Racing spring VIR run was this past weekend.
Raced out the door from work at lunch Friday, too busy to grab some grub, zipped home, where son Chris had the Great Stroker ready, with the Hoosiers and all the track stuff packed into the minivan, and headed up to VIR with another SPF, out of GA, right behind us. Met up with Mike Stenhouse and his Wife, in their SPF and loaded Cherokee, and traveled the 200 miles under the warm SC/NC sun, arriving at Danville late afternoon. Beer, BBQ, and to bed. Chris drove our SPF, looking all cool in his Revo's.
Up at dawn, out to the track, where the misty wet track waited. I think it is about the fifth time or so that we have run VIR in our car. After the driver's meeting, and a warm welcome from the VIR team, who thanked us for bringing some "American Iron" to the track for a change, Chris slipped into the Nomex long underwear, then the quilted Simpson, donned boots, gloves, Voyager, and Nomex hood, and headed out to stage in pit road.
When the VIR director finished his appreciation to us, some one yelled out "not like those Ferrari pricks" and he just smiled and winked at us.
There were 60 SPF's there, from far and near. As soon as Chris blasted down the wet track, spray flying everywhere, i ran over to the camera crew from SpeedVision, who were there to film the event for an upcoming (next year) special on our cars on the track. I muscled and forced my way to the front of the people in front of the camera, and wrangled an on-camera interview, with me standing by my proud, and by then wet and muddy car from Chris's several off track excursions. They put the mike on me, and started shooting.
I had this near irresistable urge to say "hi mom" or hollar "we're Number One" or something equally inane, but i kept on topic, which of course was my car, and SPF's in general.
Then, i suggested they put their track camera on my red/white stripe/yellow Rookie stripe car, so they put their stuff in the truck, and their camera on the rollbar, focused on Chris's hands on the wheel, and out he went, in the rain. Chris told me later he did lots of unnecessary shifting, and even managed a slow spin into the grass, just for fun.
Then they put the camera on the fender, and out he went again, passing car after car, spray and such all the time. It should look pretty good on TV.
It misted and left a wet/damp track virtually the whole time, so we never mounted the slicks. Sat night, about 20 of us headed out to a steak house, by report not far away, in a small town. An hour later, hopelessly lost, the leader finally stopped for directions, and were about there. We were famished, and our table ate at least two cows worth of steak.
Up sunday, the same weather, and chris again was out most of the time, once doing a really classy 360 out of the Oak Tree, staying on track, and just kept going, to the approval of the pit lane watchers. I shot about a dozen rolls of film with my new Pro Nikon, just great action. I went out, all tippy-toe, just two times, just to practice my line over and over, so the next time, i don't spend all my time looking for marking cones to guide me. I waved everybody by, whereas Chris was passed only by the Olthoff's and one other car the entire time.
Late Sunday afternoon, we closed down the track, and the deluge came. The kind where male mammels look for a mate. Drove home, me in the Snake, under drenching rain, with my new upgraded SPF cloth top keeping me dry and warm, only my lower left leg getting wet.
I am proud of my left wet leg, when folks ask me about it, i just comment that at my age, many men get a little drip, but don't bother to see the urologist.
The Porsche group on the North Course quite running in the rain, and went home, while we just went and went, generally top's off. What Wimps, those drivers of the German Machines. Chris wished he could have brought his Boxster.
No one hit anything other than grass, one car developed a bit of valve train clatter, so was put on a trailer. I used no
oil, two tanks of 112 octane, and got 23 mpg on the way home. We did bleed the brakes once. While i may leak a bit, the Great Sroker didn't.
It was great to see old friends, make new ones, and as is now my custom, i dumped a bag of Cheetos on my lap, while trying to merge, shift, wipe the mist off the windscreen, and eat at the same time.
We now have about 700+ race laps on our SPF. It runs like a new car. Even the original brake rotors, the motor pumps 175 psi on all 8 cylinders, and has no rattles or squeaks. The best way to keep your replica running and looking well, is to drive it, as we have for nearly 60K miles now.
All the best,
173 miles "at full chat"
Linear Mode
