Racing 2002

Ok. Let's see the schedule this year. At Hungaroring the distance is still 1/8th mile, but this is the first year they are using an official christmas tree. They are open at the following Tuesday nights.

Hungaroring

• 04/09
I was there. My first race night ever. Well. I could beat every car till the final, where I lost to an EVO VI. In the best eight there were one Lancia Delta HF Int EVO III, Ford Sierra Coswort with a built engine (he was sporting 2.2 bar of boost!), a new M5, an LS1 camaro, a Polski Fiat with an modified 1.9 tdi on the back seat, the EVO VI and me. That's seven. One guy didn't show up. I won against the Lancia in the first round with quite a margin. His start was horrible that time. Won against the polski in the second run by 0.002. It's around 3" if I'm right. Got him at the start, but he came back. It was really close. Finally lost against the EVO. He got me at the start with ~1.5 lengths and managed to put an other one to me till the finish. Hmmm€


* I was quite sad at the end. Not because I lost in the final, but because my best time. She felt kinda fast, boost was stable, I could manage to do some nice starts, but my best time still was only 9.018. I should be at least .5 faster than this. I went with 17 psi. Which I didn't know at the race, but I've already known now, that they had no photocell at the starting line, so they started the clock with the green light. This means that my reaction time counts into my ET. I always waited the green before left the line, so hopefully this could mean an other .3-.4 for me. If they will work in this manner I gonna start right after the last amber next time. We will see.
• 04/30
I won't be able to be there. I had to choose between CA and the race. You guess what? ;-) Awfully lot of people were there. The same EVO won in my category, beated a turbo Carrera in the final. An other EVO VI took the 3rd place. Best time was ~8.6.
• 05/21
I couldn't make it. My new exhaust is under construction. The two EVO VI's dominated in my category. The better -which handed my ass to me- was near to 8.0. I really don't know what to think about the times on HR.
• 06/11
Missed it. I was exhaust less that time. Biro Geza won my category with ~8.5 beating the red Evo VI. There were a red C4 running 8.8's too. No more car under 9.
• 08/27
Was there and could win my category. It was a great night, I really enjoyed it. Thanks for the support a lot of people. It was great. I went two times during the qualification and had to go two times during the eliminations. Let's see.
• First run was against a Wartburg. Well he picked me, not me. Anyway I don't really care with my opponents during the qualification the only thing that matters is the race against the clock. Well, I had to go from the crappie launch pad at the first time. I got a good start but the back of the truck started to play on the pad, so it was far from my best launch. The engine compartment was also very hot, because of the lot of waiting and idling. It it was 9.028.
• Before the second pass I let the truck cool down and tried to pick a better opponent too. I could find a mid 90's Audi S2. It's a 2.2 turbo, 230 HP, AWD.
  
  
  The guy talked about some 350 HP, but couldn't back up it with any mods, beside a chip, so I let him that way. He went 10.6 against my 8.884. Couple of bus lengths...
• I went to the final with the two best times in my category. Only four guys showed up at the finals. I was missing the silver Mitcu Evo VI. He went 9.2 in the qual and I wanted to race with him again badly. There were a large Audi, maybe V8, who went a single 9.3 in the qual, but can't be seen afterwards. Anyway my first run in the finals were again a very nice Honda Integra spraying 50 shot of N2O. He went flat tens before, so we both knew that the outcome is straight forward. That was my worst launch that night, went 9.052.
• In the final I lined up against a white 4th gen Camaro, with an LT1, with slicks. He had some mods, but I don't know them. He had a 150 shot installed, bat was not spraying that night. He went 9.6 in the final against my 8.652. I tried to watch him all the way. I pulled on him till the end of my 2nd, when the distance between us stopped increasing. At the end actually he pulled back a bit. The 1/4th would be much closer...
  
  
  
So to sum it up, it was a long but really funny night.
• 09/24
One of my worst Sy related night so far. It was raining whole night, I managed to scratch the front of her, lock the key into her and finally almost lost the final. Ok. Since I wanna forget that night as fast as possible, I don't want to talk to much about it. The only real races this night was against a very fast Audi S3. The car has been modified by MTM, and said to be put 331 HP at the wheels. If you don't know what an S3 is, it's a 4WD, with a 1.8 liter turbo 4 banger. This is around the max which you can get from this engine. It's a 13.4 sec car on the 1/4th. Really fast. I was lined up against him two times during qualification. I could beat him twice, but he had a bad start first time and the second race was really close. Went 8.7's against his 9.0. Later he could manage to do a 8.8. During elimination's I won against an Alfa 164 Q4 first, than walked directly into the final to line up against the S3 again. The weird stuff started here. First he red lighted, and on the Hring this means a rematch. BTW I went after him but couldn't catch up. Lost with a fender. Second time we both sucked or start but I could beat him by a car length or so. But, my photocells went bad, so the track's computer showed him as the winner. Ok. Third try. Bad starts again, maybe the worst of the whole night on his side, so I won with ~3 car lengths. Well. I don't want a final like this any more. One more note to this night. There was a silver Audi S2, which went a 8.8 one time. He was pretty fast, but the S3 eliminated him in the semifinal.
• 10/22
It was the last race of the season. Crapu weather again. It was raining the afternoon and the air was so wet it couldn't dry up the whole night. The next day was national holiday so it was more cars and people than ever. I could manage to get there around 8 in the evening a could do two passes quite soon. First was against a rooky Subaru Impreza GT. Pretty cool guy, but not competition for me. Could win by a couple of car lengths. I run 8.843, it was an avarage launch with an avarage run. Second I run against GombVTI's Honda Civic Vti. Both of us were shooting for better times, so it was not realy about competing each others. BTW, congrat Gomb for your third place! :-D I copied the first run it was 8.889. And that was my last qual run this evening. That was the two best time's of the evening in my category and there were a lot of cars so I decided to let the Sy rest till the finals. There were no other cars in the 8's this evening. There were five cars showing up to the finals, in order of their qual times, my Sy, an old Audi 90's, an Audi S2, an Alfa 155 Q4 and a Subaru Impreza GT. All of their times were between 9.1 and 9.5 and neither of them were stock, all of them were 4WD/AWD. So five cars in the final which means that they were battling to give me an opponent in the final. The two Audis run the semifinal and finally I was run against the old 90 in the final. It was close. He went 8.956 against nt 8.912. Wow. I had a bad start, but still managed to get an one car lead out from the hole, which he almost cover up till the 1/8th mile mark. Pretty amazing car, a real 16 years old sleeper. Will tell you more about this car soon enough...


Since I won this race and the previous two plus a second place from the summer I managed to win the point race of this season in my category with 18 points. If somebody told me this at the beginning of the year I'd laugh. But now it's a pretty good feeling. On the other hand it'll be pretty hard to make a better season next year. ;-)

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Rabaring

The Rabaring improved a lot this year. They're also using a christmas tree (I'm wondering, is this the same!?), but now it's 1/4th mile with all the stuff on you timing slip. Nice. The schedule is the following:

• 04/07
I wasn't there. You can check the times here. There were fast cars there. The C5 Vette, which I saw at HR last year went 12.0, but he was very inconsistent. An other EVO VI, which beat me at HR went 12.7.
• 05/06
Won't be there. The same reason like above. It was rainy, so I loosed nothing.
• 05/19
Wasn't there. There were two cars in the 11's. An old turbocharged Jeep and a C5 vette, both from Austria. A few cars, including a Dodge Charger in the 13's.
• 06/23
Biro Geza was back with his C5, went ~12.5. An other Vette and a LS1 Camaro went high 12's. I was following the stuff on the Net again. This time because the weather, which could do for the Sahara as well. It was near to 100F. There were a Honda Integra Turbo from Austria as well doing high 13's.
• 07/14
Missed it again. ;-) My friend Zolika wondered what will I use as an excuse this time. Well. I had no mood to go. Good enough? The results. Nothing exeptional. The Jeep was there again, running mid 11's.
• 08/25
It was really hot out there. You know the rest... Were not really good results, a Vette went mide 12's.
• 09/08
It was hot again so I missed it. That move left me one chance to get an official time slip this year.
• 09/22
After a week of rain this Sunday brought a really nice weather. Temperature in the high 60's, low 70's, not a single cloud around. Rabaring is 1.5 hours of driving from us, mostly on highway. It was pretty boring but we were there around 11. You can't find that kinda crowd there, which is usual at Hring. The average car there is much faster than at Hring with a lot of racers from Austria and with lot of modified cars. This day there were more than ten car in the 13 sec range. Also one very fast Ford Sierra Cossi in the 12's with a best of 12.1. The categories are a bit different here as well. I'm in A5 which started from 2.5l, and there is an A4 for cars with engines from 2.0l to 2.5l. Aspiration puts the car into one category higher. Nitro puts you in A5 automatically regardless of your displacement. Also this is a real race track so they give you full details on every passes. Reaction time, 60ft time, 1/8th mile ET and trap speed and 1/4th mile ET and trap speed. Nice. My dream was to hit 12's. Since I went with my family I didn't want to wait for the finals - which start at 4 PM -, just get my time slip and say goodbye. Also I was only interested in racing against the clock and didn't want to deal with other cars. First pass. It was against BKori's C4 Vette. The start procedure was quite strange for me. It's much harder to do a recent launch with good reaction times here than at Hring. So at the first try I sucked my launch, but I still managed to pull an 1.81 short times, 8.36@79 at 1/8th mile and 13.46@93 at the end.


Second pass and best pass of the day. Went against the yellow MTM S3 again. I promised a rematch and there were voices that he could catch me at the end. It was an 5 psi launch with my best reaction time of the day (0.77 :-). Pulled and 1.77 short time, 8.12@82.6 at 1/8th mile and 13.02@99 at the end. It's so close, but there is that .02. BTW, I could beat the S3 with a decent length, he went 13.45@103 (new best for him).


Third pass against the S3 again. I produced a 2.2 sec reaction time, so I was really racing against the clock only. It was a 8 psi launch. Pulled 1.76 short time, 8.19@82.4 and 13.07@97.5. I was happy and bit disappointed at the same time. Hopefully 12 sec wont be a problem next year. :-) I was the third fastest car that day, second in my category after a C4 Vette, who went 12.7. Also I could only record my first pass with DM, but it's pretty interesting to compare DM's "Quarter Mile Time Estimator" to real life data. For the first pass a recorded an 1.84 short time, 8.25@83 and 13.11@99. Pretty close. Now I have a base to count on.

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