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  • Just Let Me Rent the Track

    Land Speed is a mortal blast, a different kind of thrill, especially when the line is moving like it was in Arkansas in June. That was just untold fun, that really was. Worth every minute of it and every mile it took to get there.

    But Red is built to the hilt for road courses, and he's not the fastest pig in the barn, and it's time to just forget trying that anymore. But I LOVE that. Just give me the track, leave me alone. We can sell the house and rent Kenny the Cat out to prostitution and maybe just rent Road Atlanta for a day with the money.

    Just let me drive, give me about ten laps when I'm not being pestered by guys in Corvettes and getting passed by a Volkswagen sedan, just give me the track. Enough time to get focused and concentrate, get into a rhythm, just to see how fast of a lap time I can turn. And it won't be "fast," but I'd just like to know. But that will never happen.
    Charter member of the Turd Nuggets

  • #2
    Pdub, at our local track, Cordova dragway, there are Ford weekends....I don't know, but, are there similar weekends at the road tracks, or tracks that offer testing days where drivers can get one on one time on the track?
    Patrick & Tammy
    - Long Haulin' 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2014...Addicting isn't it...??

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    • #3
      When I was a kid I could take my stock SS-350 Camaro to the street races and experience hours of chasing around, watching for the police, endless sh*t-talking by participants which is not my "bag", and tiny little portions of time where there was actual racing...or take my stock Vega GT to the Angeles Nat'l Forest only a short distance from home and instead have hours of solitude away from the a*holes and:
      Originally posted by pdub View Post
      time to get focused and concentrate, get into a rhythm, just to see how fast of a lap time I can turn.
      Very late at night I'd literally have a hundred miles of curvy roadway to myself if I wanted to either push it as hard as I could (don't crash!) or just work on smoothness and technique and because of growing up around there every curve was a known factor to me. Like renting the track and having it all to myself, except free. So when money for speed parts came along, it went for swaybars etc. for the Vega not Camaro parts and eventually if there were other guys I'd happen across up there (and of-course the much-busier Mullholland Drive and Malibu Canyon areas) I'd have as fast a car as anyone which was fun too. But the best was, just having time to kill, a full tank of gas, and those hills that went on and on.

      Things have changed I'm sure but Angeles Crest and Angeles Forest Highways seem to come up in car test photos and videos all the time, or motorcycles or even racing road bicycles, and of course law enforcement up there has the unenviable job of pulling bodies out when people miscalculate. We live in hills with lots of curvy roads now too but it's rare that I get out on them late enough at night, and I don't know the roads as well anyhow. Maybe twice I've had really epic drives that went for a couple hours or so in the time between midnight and 3am, both with the El Camino which did have the suspension and brakes worked up a bit. My current (ironically) Camaro project (the actual car goes back to the late-'70s when a friend owned it and was built as a canyon racer) keeps getting tossed on the back burner, and I'm a little more out of practice (not to mention law-abiding) all the time. But maybe that's what it should be called when you can have a whole mountain to yourself, you go out at 2 a.m. and "rent the track".

      ...

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      • #4
        Originally posted by silver_bullet View Post
        Pdub, at our local track, Cordova dragway, there are Ford weekends....I don't know, but, are there similar weekends at the road tracks, or tracks that offer testing days where drivers can get one on one time on the track?
        The drag strip in Ringgold has test and tune days but I've never heard of such a thing at a road course. Jimmie Johnson tested at Road Atlanta one day because A) they could afford it, and B) that didn't count against their test days because Road Atlanta is not on the NASCAR circuit.

         
        Charter member of the Turd Nuggets

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        • #5
          the funniest thing - if you do rent the track, run it in reverse rotation. This may only be me, so ignore it if it doesn't work for you, but I've found that running a track in reverse makes me faster going the 'right' direction. I know what it is - I get tunnel vision at the end of the corner, so I don't see how much run out room I have; running a couple laps in reverse helps you see that - and your brain then gets it.

          alternatively, follow their lines or run it in the rain.... all of those things help me get faster (700 hp should help too)
          Doing it all wrong since 1966

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          • #6
            Check the calendars for the local tracks! There may be clubs that rent the track on weekends that you might be able to join the club and get some run time of your own
            Patrick & Tammy
            - Long Haulin' 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2014...Addicting isn't it...??

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            • #7
              Originally posted by SuperBuickGuy View Post
              run it in reverse rotation.
              WOW. The odd thing is that I can actually "see" what you're talking about. That WOULD be cool, I would have never thought of doing that.

              But that backward thing caused a fatality at Walt Disney World Speedway that one time. And they weren't just touring backward, they were running the track hot-lap backward.

              EDIT: One time at AMP, we got there and got signed up the day before because Superman was towing and he left the Corvette and the trailer locked inside the paddock area overnight. we were all signed in and he said, "Let's walk the track."

              Are you CRAZY?!?! I can't even WALK that far no matter what. But he did and he swears he found something on that ridiculous mile-long left sweeper that ought to be a back straightaway. He said that whole thing that feels off camber is actually banked correctly in the innermost lane. He used that but I couldn't. Soooo many laps on that track. And I somehow found a little more speed in the center lane, following a guy who had just passed me.
              Last edited by pdub; July 16, 2018, 01:31 PM.
              Charter member of the Turd Nuggets

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              • #8
                Originally posted by silver_bullet View Post
                Check the calendars for the local tracks! There may be clubs that rent the track on weekends that you might be able to join the club and get some run time of your own
                AMP is a private country club with a road course instead of a golf course. If you want to afford it, and after about a dozen tries we decided to hate that track.

                Whenever there is a "track day" at a road course, somebody (some outfit) has already rented the track from the owners and then they turn around sell opportunities enough for amateurs to get out there and thrash. The track is "open," but the track owners are usually not even there. The sanctioning body has to pay insurance, have an ambulance and fire truck and rollback on hand, lots of staff to work the corners and flagstands, etc..... It's a big orchestra. I can see why it costs so much to play and it's not cheap.
                Charter member of the Turd Nuggets

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                • #9
                  Originally posted by pdub View Post

                  WOW. The odd thing is that I can actually "see" what you're talking about. That WOULD be cool, I would have never thought of doing that.
                  As an alternative, I'm pretty sure AMP is available for Xbox - now I'm curious if I can run it backwards on my Xbox... will check back soon on this
                  Doing it all wrong since 1966

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                  • #10
                    Originally posted by SuperBuickGuy View Post

                    As an alternative, I'm pretty sure AMP is available for Xbox - now I'm curious if I can run it backwards on my Xbox... will check back soon on this
                    I've got an old racing game on X-Box, Need for Speed SHIFT, and you only go the wrong way for maybe 15 seconds and then it DXes you for being so dumb.
                    Charter member of the Turd Nuggets

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                    • #11
                      Originally posted by pdub View Post

                      I've got an old racing game on X-Box, Need for Speed SHIFT, and you only go the wrong way for maybe 15 seconds and then it DXes you for being so dumb.
                      maybe it's big computer trying to keep you from seeing the secret to racing success? they really are all out to get you - especially after the computer fiasco with Bluebell
                      Doing it all wrong since 1966

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                      • #12
                        Originally posted by SuperBuickGuy View Post

                        maybe it's big computer trying to keep you from seeing the secret to racing success? they really are all out to get you - especially after the computer fiasco with Bluebell
                        ****sigh*******
                        Charter member of the Turd Nuggets

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                        • #13
                          I got that SBG was talking video games from the first post. Many games rely heavily on it for variety. You need to try them all, but of course that would almost REQUIRE piracy. A lot of that is because of FADS in track design IRL.

                          I grew up in hills. HATED 'EM. Caused accidents. Cars slide off them in inclement weather. Makes corners BLINDER. I started driving after my family moved to flat land. Drove like a MANIAC without incident.

                          So what is the big new FAD in track design? ELEVATION CHANGE. REALLY sucks in gaming because it throws most physics engines into FITS. Either you go BWAAAA and the car becomes a turtle going up and an uncontrollable rocket coming down or the effect is understated and every hill is a jump ramp and you are on skates at the crest. Good luck with THAT with karts at Road Atlanta with 4 1/2 stories of elevation change. GOTTA feel like mowing a lawn going up.

                          The PREVIOUS big fad was radius change and camber. THAT is why I feel reverse laps get interesting.
                          My hobby is needing a hobby.

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                          • #14
                            Quick plug for a fave game series..... TEST DRIVE UNLIMITED. ALL of OAHU to DESECRATE with SPEED. 3.000+ miles!
                            My hobby is needing a hobby.

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                            • #15
                              Originally posted by RockJustRock View Post
                              Road Atlanta with 4 1/2 stories of elevation change.
                              With variations all over the track, that 4 1/2 stories would ALL be at one time, going under the bridge down into Turn 12. And you can only go to that track for the first time once, but that's the first thing you see when you drive through the gate, that plummet. Gyadalmighty......

                              AMP has 98 feet of elevation change and sort a similar deal at one point but you're going UP that hill, and all you can see is sky at the top. You just have to know and believe where the track is after that. Turn. Turn NOW.
                              Charter member of the Turd Nuggets

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