Shed Racing's Tom Aiken crossed over to
race with the Sports Car Club of America's
San Francisco region for the
inaugural "Grand Prix of Willows" at
Thunderhill Raceway Park.
Modifications to the car to fit the NASA
GTI Cup class are
against the rules for SCCA Improved Touring "B" class, where the car
would be normally run, forcing Tom to run in the catch-all "ITE" class,
against modern Porsches, BMWs, and Turbocharged Mitsubishi
Evolutions. Tom was on his own for most of Friday practice and
qualifying, with Bryan and
Angie from the
Miller Motorsports
entourage showing up Friday afternoon, followed by Marcus and Robert
Saturday morning, and Scott Miller and Scott Lipton Sunday
morning.
Things got off to a shaky start Thursday evening, when Tom was swapping
around tires and reinstalling the front sway bar from the last race
weekend, he discovered the muffler hanger bracket weld had broken from
the frame rail. By the time the discovery was made, it was too
late to fix it that evening. First thing in the morning, Tom
scrounged a proper size bolt, and drilled and rehung the muffler, then
had to rush to get the car to tech. His lack of familiarity with
how SCCA ran things caused a delay of 15 minutes at tech, before he
learned he first had to go to Registration and get signed in, and pick
up a tech sheet. Once this was done, Tom rushed back to impound,
as his race group was forming for the first session of the day.
He got through tech, and rushed back to the paddock to get into his
driving gear and made it out on track 5 minutes into the morning
session. Unfortunately in the rush, Tom missed a few
things, like checking the tire pressures and fueling the car, and
starting the video camera. The incorrect tire pressures made for
handling best described as "interesting".
The two qualifying sessions were much better after air was added to the
tires, and fuel was added to the car, with times improving, and a best
lap in the 2:23 range in the first session, and 2:21.x in the second,
putting Tom last in class (as expected), but 24th out of 30
overall. The race was clean and generally uneventful, with Tom
finishing 21st overall, and 11th of 12 in class. Best lap of the
weekend was 2:20.7.
Marcus showed up with the ITA RX-7 Saturday morning, and the crew
started changing the front suspension and prepping the car for the 4
hour enduro Sunday afternoon. Comparison of how loud the car was
to others cars in the paddock, led the team to believe that it was much
too loud, and there was no way to run the car on track without getting
black-flagged for noise. Miller Motorsports team photographer
Geoff Crall came through by retrieving a new muffler from Marcus's
house in San Jose, and delivered it to Scott Miller's house in
Fairfield Saturday night, so Scott could bring it to the track
Sunday. Robert installed the muffler first thing Sunday
morning. The new muffler solved the sound problem, and saved what
could have been a short weekend for the Miller team.
Marcus, Tom and Scott all took turns in the morning enduro practice
while everyone else prepared the assigned pit stall for the afternoon
race. Morning practice times were used to set the starting grid,
where the team qualified 41st of 48. Marcus drove the first 30
minute stint, followed by the first of the two mandatory 5 minute pit
stops. After fueling, Tom got in the car and drove the next 40
minutes, before being called in for the next fuel stop, where he passed
the car to Scott Miller. Scott ran a 40 minute stint, when he was
called into the pits while the pace car went out for a full course
caution. After fueling, Marcus again took over the car, and ran
only 25 minutes when he came in for an unexpected fuel stop. For
some reason, the fuel consumption increased greatly as the race wore
on. The car was fueled, and Marcus went back on track, but
returned after only a few laps with a flat driver's side rear
tire. Unfortunately the only spare tire available was an old well
worn Hoosier, to go with the Toyo RA1s on the other 3 corners.
Tom took over the driving duties after the tire change, and took the
next few laps feeling out how well the car handled with the mismatched
tires. Tom ran for about 35 minutes, when the car started
sputtering as the fuel level ran low yet again. Scott took over
the car for the last stint, with the hope that the car would be able to
reach the end of the race on fuel.
Tom
fuels the car as Marcus stands by with the fire extinguisher
Unfortunately this hope was short lived, as Scott hit the pits for fuel
with about 15 minutes left in the race. A quick splash of gas got
Scott on his way, and he drove the car through the end of the race.
When the checkered flag flew, the Miller Motorsports/Shed Racing team
finished 34th of 44, completing 82 laps, in what was the car's first
time on track. Considering the car has an 8 gallon fuel cell
which would only feed 4 1/2 gallons reliably, this has to be considered
a success.
Scott,
Marcus, and Tom (L-R) in impound after the four hour enduro