Real 24hour races (Page 2 of 3)

You really have to know the track to be effective at night.  I had a bunch of SCCA races at VIR and was pretty comfortable with the track.  As we had a couple of drivers who didn't have good night vision (one of them was our fastest driver but age isn't kind to night vision) I was volunteered to do both my stints at night.  Nothing quite like lapping a V8 Mustang with an n/a 4 cylinder Mustang in a stint, and I'm not a fast driver.
Generally teams are looking for a&d because they normally run with 4 drivers and a 24 pretty much requires 6.  We typically would join up with another team and would have 8 people to draw on.  As has been mentioned keeping a car running for 24 is significantly harder than a normal weekend for us.  It's not just the hours, it's also that no one is at their best troubleshooting or repairing things at 2 am.

My first 24 was at VIR and was miserable. I said I'd never do another, but time has a way of softening the memories, so I took the Supra to Homestead 2 years later. Not so miserable but definitely more difficult than usual because we raced from Midnight (Dec 31st) to Midnight (Jan 1st). No sleep for more than 36 hours. The car had a few issues but took the checkered flag and it felt great, but I told myself "never again".

Riiiiiight. 2 years later Lemons scheduled Joliet and I HAD to do it! After a long tow from Atlanta we had a great time with only 4 drivers and no crew - by this time we knew what to expect during a 24. It's a mental test more than a physical one, and you learn more about your car than any race less than 15 hours.

As others have mentioned it's hell on a car. My engine was on it's way out anyway due to water loss, but my transmission got crunchy after 20 hours and I blew up the diff at 2am. We replaced the diff and soldiered on to 6th place. THAT was a great feeling. You will find weak spots in your car in these races that result in better reliability in any future race. DO NOT take an unproven or unreliable car to a 24.

The one thing missing from Autobahn was the socializing, but we knew there would be compromises and enjoy the 24-hour format.

We do one most years. It's fun, but brutal, especially with 4 people. Right after the race, we're wondering what possessed us to volunteer for that kind of hell, but after a year we forget the bad parts and think that it sounds like a neat idea again. We're stupid that way.

Anyone considered doing true shifts with some dedicated Crew? That way everyone can get a reasonable amount of sleep. a 24 split into 3 alternating "Shifts" wouldn't be THAT much of a nightmare.

It's hardest on the den mother.  I didn't sleep at all my first one.  Everyone else did.  I had to wake the next guy up after my 2am stint to get into his gear and drive.  The second one we had more people who could work on the car.  I told them I would try to sleep and wake me up 15 minutes before my 4am stint.  I flopped around for a while thinking I wasn't going to get to sleep.  This time I was the one being woken up by the previous driver.  The 3rd one I sat down in a beach chair next to the hot pit while it was dark and next thing I know I woke up in sunlight with another driver next to me asleep.  He was the guy who we had sent out before I sat down and a pit stop/driver change/refuel had happened 10 feet from me and I slept through the whole thing.  I think that learning to sleep comes with experience.

It's also a lot easier with mandatory pit stop times. We did our 24's with another series, and with a 5-minute mandatory pit stop, we could easily get everything done with two drivers, the guy getting out of the car and the guy getting in to the car. That way we could put each driver on shifts; 2 hours on standby in case the current driver needs an early relief, 2 hours in the car, then 4 hours off to eat/sleep/poop/etc. With Lemons we need our pit stops to be half that in order to be competitive, so we suit all 4 drivers for each stop. I really like mandatory 5 min pit stops. I also really like 2 hour max driving stints.

I like the 5 min stop but dislike the 2hr max stint length.  The 2hr max removes all strategy.  Let's say I have a car that is 10 seconds a lap slower than you but we both have to stop every 2hrs.  If neither of us has a problem I will never catch you.  However, if my 10 seconds slower a lap translates into me being able to go 3hrs to your 2hrs, at the end of an 8 hr day, I'm pretty close to even with you.  If we all have to stop at the same time, it's a pure speed contest.  Granted all that goes out the window if you spend $$$$ to put a big fuel cell in your car so you too can go 3hrs but if you want to race checkbooks you probably will beat me anyway.

That is what makes Lemons great or terrible depending on your view.

Take our Plymouth...flathead 6 burns less than 4 gallons per hour and we pass less than 4 cars a race.  Once the suspension is better sorted, our only hope is 3+ hour stints to win Class C.  So should we be disallowed from realistically even competing in the only way we can?

The unlimited stint length has allowed our class B car to compete in A. I drove for 4hrs 10 minutes Saturday at Gingerman and Andrew did the same. I'm not young or fit but we have a comfortable seat, hydration and fresh air into the helmet. It helped that the temp was around 60 outside and we had a couple of full course cautions but at the end of my time I felt like I could have easily done another 30 minutes.

We finished Saturday 3rd overall with the slowest time in the top 10. To do this we needed to run 4th gear a lot and not push as hard as we would have liked but our large fuel cell ($250 from Jegs) allowed us to compete in A class without adding HP ($$$).

it's not always possible to take advantage of these 4+hr stints but it's nice to have as an option and helps take the sting away when a Camero or BMW blasts past us on the straights

I thought the same thing but figured I'd give it a go and come in if I felt like i was losing concentration. I think that the cooler temperature and busy track helped a lot. I doubt I could repeat in summer.
But it is endurance racing so those that can should be able to. In my view my 21 races make me I was less dangerous than most of the yahoos out there!

I think this is the real problem, but I've probably beaten that dead horse more then enough. Or maybe just a few more whacks. I mean, it's dead, so who am I hurting?

Limited stint times limit what cars can be successful in exactly the same manner that unlimited stint times do, just toward different cars. There are some contests that I think are good for the sport, and some, like who can buy the biggest fuel cell, that aren't.

I respectfully disagree, short stints favor heavy fast cars, just look at chump with the 2 hour limits. Having cars out of sync on lap times and able to run some fuel strategy makes the race interesting and exciting to me.

My fear is if we had say 2 hour stints that we would end up with a day of 2 hour sprint races with the carnage that would come with it. The current 24 gallon rule seems to work ok, the Cameros/BMWs are running 2.5-3 hrs and NA 4 cylinders up to 4 hours with a 5-10 second per lap speed difference (based on my recent experience). If anything limit fuel capacity to something like 18-20 gallons so the smaller cars still get to compete but the overall stint length is shorter all round.

Looking forward to sampling some of your fine brews at Barber!