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It's a freezing Saturday morning as my mate CT & I drive our heater less Volkswagens towards Oran Park for round 2 of the Porsche Club of NSW Supersprint series. (try saying that 3 times fast) There are already quite a few Porsches there already, so we immediately go to scrutineering to get the cars passed. One Porsche regular says to me 'U bringing reinforcements now Jak?, it's bad enough I get beat every time by 1 Volkswagen, but I won't be able to handle 2 of u guys!' At least these guys have a sense of humour about us being amongst them. Upon getting my car checked I'm told by the scrutineer that when he was 21 that he had a VW with a 2180cc with IDA's that could lift the front wheels, which is fine , but he forgets that he tells me this at every event!
CT & I cruise through scrutineering without any hiccups & after attending the drivers briefing we line up for our first run on the track. We begin the day with 10 minute driver training / familiarisation sessions which gives us a good chance to get ourselves sorted out before the timed runs after lunch. Our first run out together was trouble free & it was good to find that with the new cam I was able to stay with a 1974 911 on the straights. So much so that after 2 more laps of filling his mirrors he politely moved over to let me through. The second run is just as smooth & un-eventful & the smile on CT's face shows that he's having a good time. He is more than happy with the amount of track time that we are getting, with a similarly costing hill climb event giving only 3 to 4 40 or so second runs for the day, it's quite easy to see why the super sprints have so much bang for your buck. Already by lunch time we have lost count of how many laps we have done. The cars have been running flawlessly & we are humoured by the fact that there are a few big dollar Porsches that have already started showing the strain by marking the ground with oil leaks, but our little souped up lawn mowers are drip free.
Upon checking the cars over after our last run, we notice that whilst CT's tyres are very warm, especially the rears, mine are stone cold! CT's tyres are sticky rubber which is popular with the hillclimb guys, whereas, embarrassingly my tyres are 4 years old & were $50 second hand ones! Doh! I think that it's about time to step up a notch in the tyre department & my first timed run was going to be evidence of that. We are informed that we will be having 5 timed lap sessions, which is excellent as it gives you plenty of time to get settled & put down a good time. I'm first in my group to go out, with CT a few hundred metres behind me, second lap around, very fast left hander just before straightening up for the dog leg, doing around 6500rpm in third, I start to feel the back of the car let go, I thought that I had it but it just went that little bit too far for me to bring back & so I spun a full 180d & onto the other side of the road, keeping it off the grass whilst just pedaling the brakes on & off so as not to lock up the wheels. I see my Autometer oil light come on but it just because the car had stalled. Re-started & waited for CT to pass who seemed to have just as surprised look in face as myself as he came around the corner only to find me facing him. There are no dramas & my next lap turned out to be a 58 second lap so the spin didn't seem to rattle my nerves that much. We come in after our run & by this time my very good friend John (Lado) has arrived at the circuit to have a look & straight away asks, 'So where did u come off?' I tell him what happened & he immediately asks what tyres I'm using. Upon checking tyre temps again it's clear that this is where my weak link on the car is. CT's tyres once again were very hot & sticky whereas mine were still stone cold after 5 hot laps & a spin! CT & I contemplate putting his wheels on my car for me to try the sticky rubber but unfortunately I have the Porsche stud pattern.
We end up having about 4 or 5 more timed runs consisting of 5 laps & then decide to call it a day. CT in his beautiful Oval ended up with a scorching 55.9 second lap whilst I had to settle for a 57.1, a far cry from my best of 56.2, which I think can only be beat with decent tyres. Apparently decent rubber can be good for anything up to 3 seconds a lap! Can't wait.
Hopefully CT & I will be making the trek down to Wakefield park at the end of July for round 3, ( well I hope he comes with me as I don't know the way!) which I will be looking forward to as I've never run there before & have been told is a great track suited to the Volkswagen.
Until then, Jak Rizzo