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posted by 2fass240us on May 5

I had a great time at this event. Jimmy, a fraternity brother and close friend, came down for the weekend to hang out and take video. So instead of the usual in-car footage, I have external video of a few of my runs. I’ve found that I enjoy it much more, as in-car autocross footage isn’t nearly as cool as the same from track events. Maybe because it’s easier to see the course in track footage, plus there are people passing and getting passed. In autocross, you have neither of these things. And in watching footage from other people’s autocross runs, I rarely get a good feel for course was layout. At any rate, I hope to have the footage posted soon on Google Video.

I managed to get 12-15 runs in, but wasn’t keeping count so it may have been as few as 10. Either way, it was good experience despite the fact that I couldn’t seem to get past the 55-second mark. I convinced one of the good local guys to ride with me and he said that aside from going a bit wider to take some sharp turns (also called “attacking the back”), I couldn’t do much more on street tires. While this was comforting, I almost felt cheated. I was hoping he would point out a few things I could change, so I would have something to strive for in the remainder of my runs. It also sucked because it made me feel like I have to use r-comps to be more successful. Not that I care about winning any autocrosses mind you, but I don’t like getting pwned on raw time by everyone save the bottom 10%. And while r-comps would be nice for track use too, I have plenty of life in the Hankooks and no spare set of wheels to mount r-comps on. So for now, I’m sticking with what I have.

The car did pretty well, despite oversteering a lot. In most cases, this was good because it allowed me to point the car in the right direction. This was especially helpful considering I deleted PS and how have a smaller wheel that makes tight autocross turns hard on the forearms. This “problem” also makes for a funnerar driving experience when you come out of a turn counter-steering.

All in all I had a great time driving and hanging out with Yims. The event would have been cooler though if anyone from CarolinaNissans actually shown up. Not that I’m surprised, but it continues to frustrate me that I spend so much time and have so many friends on a board where very few people actually care about motorsports other than drifting. A few of the guys, probably my closer friends, have either roadraced, are building cars for it, or want to try it. Everyone else, it seems, is content to never try autocross. I would cite money as the issue, but entry fees aren’t that much. If anything, I think it’s the safety requirements that scare people away, especially since 240 owners are notorious for not securing the battery properly. But any person whose car is safe for street use should be OK for autocross, right?I think the main reason behind poor attendance in general is that there’s usually a drift event happening. While I would likely have lots of fun at said events, they’re not as close as CCR autocrosses. More importantly, they eat the hell outta your tires. And seeing as how my budget isn’t unlimited, I would like to keep as much meat as I can. I’ve considered putting the stock wheels back on, but the tires are mismatched and at least one of them doesn’t hold air, so either option would require an outlay of money that I’m unwilling to make. Speaking of which, that must be why driftkidz are always poor.