Topic: 2017 Houston, We Have a Problem
I guess we never had an official thread for this race, so I guess I'll start one now.
It was a delicious shitshow.
There was a pretty high proportion of new teams; I'm not sure I've ever seen a Steve McDaniel Friday Night Newbie Lecture as big as that one. This is also the first race I've been to in a long time that actually required a Sunday morning driver's meeting, and it had very little to do with the number of new teams. As Steve reminded everyone in the Come-to-Jesus meeting on Sunday, the vast majority of the numerous black flags on Saturday went to teams that should've known better. Most of them were for PUY. EDIT: we also ended up with a total of three red flags, two roll-overs, and one full-course black to fix a tire wall. (Thanks for the correction, Phil)
Aside from the dodgy driving, it was a great weekend. The weather was fantastic, there was a great mix of cars, the Friday night potluck was a success, and the documentary team from Austin was surprisingly nice and unobtrusive, at least as far as I saw. I guess it helps when the camera crew isn't trying to make "reality television."
My team took a couple black flags, because a couple of our drivers (including me) still haven't figured out how much they suck. We also got flagged for a persistent fuel leak, which we were able to fix with a rubber gasket on the filler cap so thick that it took vice grips to put the cap on. Other than that, the Dart ran great until about halfway through Sunday when the transmission tailshaft housing cracked in half. Luckily we were able to swap in a good spare from the glorious brown judgemobile we brought for the glorious brown judge, and we got Bob back out for the checkered flag.
Here are the awards, as best I recall:
Overall/Class A: #36 Miata. I forget the team name, but this is the same team that won last time. According to Steve, they were the only team in the top 10 with no black flags on Sunday morning.
Class B: Too Soon Junior
Class C: Ratsun Racing
Race-Specific Trophy: Something like "Driving a bad car good," The Resistance (Honda Civic Poo Wagon)
I Got Screwed: Tetanus Racing (Stef Schrader's VW 411, reportedly because TARP left with their Caddy-engined Jaguar before the awards ceremony)
Heroic Fix: Escape Velocity Racing (for finishing a new team's cage on Friday, plus the last-minute transmission repair)
Judges' Choice: Brown #360 AMC Hornet wagon (I forget the team name, but it's the same guys with the blue Gremlin)
Organizer's Choice: Chrysler LeBaron, driven all the way from California by Spank, possibly abandoned at MSR unless someone bought it
IoE: Blue #401 AMC Gremlin
I'd like to note that all 3 teams who brought brown station wagons went home with a trophy (one with 2 trophies). If you want to know the formula for domination in Texas Lemons, there it is.