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Re: How to make a kid's day
Park ? at 60 ?
You must tell us how that happened and then WTF happened then Walt.
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I thought I had shared this before, but I guess not. Anyway, one night out at the strip, a kid and his parents brought out their old 5.0 lx hatch. (Right lane)
They were clicking of 10.5s, but the 15 yo who owned the car was not old enough to take it down the track alone. As the lightest driver at the track, I was asked to ride jump seat for him. So, I did, and as he was making passes starting in 1 and clicking the floorshifter up to 2. The car had really long gears, and didn't need to come out of first until about 60. After several passes they asked if I would like to make a pass or two in it. Now, I had been racing the Escort all night, which is a serious effort with the pretty long throws and the fact that I don't really lift or use much of the clutch. I staged, and launched. I redlit just a little bit, but since it was my first time launching an automatic, I wasn't worried. I eyed the tach as I approached time to shift, reached down, put hand on the shift knob, and let instinct take over. Instinct decide that my best 2-3 powershift technique was required, which was about a zillion times for effort and about 4" farther than I needed to go to click the car into second. Thankfully, I pushed in the button on the side of the shifter and ended up in park instead of reverse. I immediately realized my mistake, popped it in neutral and coasted through the lights. After putting the car back in gear, nothing was wrong, so I drove it back to the pits, explained what had happened. The guy laughed and told me to go do it right. Which I did, knocking off a good r/t and clicking of the second best time for the evening in the car, IIRC.
Originally posted by 70chevyC-10
You must tell us how that happened and then WTF happened then Walt.
[/quote]
I thought I had shared this before, but I guess not. Anyway, one night out at the strip, a kid and his parents brought out their old 5.0 lx hatch. (Right lane)
They were clicking of 10.5s, but the 15 yo who owned the car was not old enough to take it down the track alone. As the lightest driver at the track, I was asked to ride jump seat for him. So, I did, and as he was making passes starting in 1 and clicking the floorshifter up to 2. The car had really long gears, and didn't need to come out of first until about 60. After several passes they asked if I would like to make a pass or two in it. Now, I had been racing the Escort all night, which is a serious effort with the pretty long throws and the fact that I don't really lift or use much of the clutch. I staged, and launched. I redlit just a little bit, but since it was my first time launching an automatic, I wasn't worried. I eyed the tach as I approached time to shift, reached down, put hand on the shift knob, and let instinct take over. Instinct decide that my best 2-3 powershift technique was required, which was about a zillion times for effort and about 4" farther than I needed to go to click the car into second. Thankfully, I pushed in the button on the side of the shifter and ended up in park instead of reverse. I immediately realized my mistake, popped it in neutral and coasted through the lights. After putting the car back in gear, nothing was wrong, so I drove it back to the pits, explained what had happened. The guy laughed and told me to go do it right. Which I did, knocking off a good r/t and clicking of the second best time for the evening in the car, IIRC.
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