NASA Midwest - Putnam Park May 16-17

#2 event for the NASA Midwest chapter, #1 for me. This was actually a crossover with the larger 'Great Lakes' region as well so a ton of cars. TT had nearly 40 for the 1.8 mile track!My previous best from a last month there was a 1:22.5
Changes included new AMSoil 10w40, a heatwrapped downpipe, a new Sparco seat and running 245/40-17 Hoosier R6's.
Saturday: Some light mist in S1/S2, S3 totally wet (everyone skipped), and S4 the best. Around 65 most of the day. Ended up with a 1:22.2 and placed 2/6. Contingency $$ from Hoosier and Hawk! I missed first by about 1 second to a much higher hp car.
Sunday: Good weather all day. Improved to a 1:21.5 Ended up 3/6.

Overall, the car felt good, a little down on power in the straights and needs a longer 4th gear for the track for sure. I don't think the gearing is well suited for this track, but that's how it goes sometimes. I've got a few ideas for small tweaks before the next event to help things out!

Click HERE for Video!

Truck & Trailer time!

I made the jump to a truck and trailer! This would really help relax the weekends. The Evo wasn't the nicest to drive to long events with the exhaust, race suspension, race alignment (ie camber), rollbar, etc. Plus it's fancy scheme seems to catch a lot of eyes (coppers too).

The truck is a Nissan Titan 4x4 KC and it pulls very nicely. The trailer is an 18' ATC trailer.

High Oil Temps - Solution - AMSOil!

Using my new set of STRi gauges, I noticed what I thought was high oil temps throughout my April 16th trackday. Outside temps were no higher than 72, so it's going to get a lot hotter here in the midwest! To this point, I have been using the Mitsubishi recommended Mobil 1 5w30. The oil temps I noted were:

190 - cruising at ~75mph on the interstate

210-220 - Tracking in a light rain with ambient temp 55

235+ - Tracking with ambient temp 70

So, I hooked up with Andy from AMSOil for some fancy 10w40 oil to help control temps and better protect the Evo's very hard working engine. I'll report back on engine temps after my My 16-17 track weekend!