My lengthy Joliet writeup

I drove two cars a combined total of nine hours and forty five minutes in the nearly-freezing rain at Joliet and all I got were these crappy overall, Class A and Class B victories.

I started Saturday’s session in the eventual race winner, Team Sheen #181 Acura Integra. We’ve driven that car to two prior hard-fought wins at Autobahn: Lemons’s last true 24 hour race in 2015, and last year’s Joliet race in July. The 24 saw us winning by just over 30 seconds over the hard-charging Flying Pigs Mustang, after the nearly-certain-race-winning Porsche 924 blew its clutch just a couple laps after passing us for the lead with half-an-hour to go.  In July 2017, we held out to win on Sunday after the astonishingly fast V6-swapped, first-gen Toyota MR2 of the Rod Throwing Fools broke their right front coil spring while up a lap. The resultant edge from the broken spring gouged out the tire can opener style, and the replacement tire installed in the pits met the same fate before the root cause was discovered.  Their in-car video from the event showed them leaving it in 4th gear for the entirety of the course, all while clicking off laps five seconds faster than what we could muster in the Integra.

Last July’s race took place during some of the most oppressive heat and humidity the Midwest can possibly serve up: temps in the mid-to-upper 90s, with the hygrometer pegged at 99 percent. It was nothing short of torturous. Like being cloaked in a soaking wet electric blanket cranked to HIGH all weekend. The dry heats of Buttonwillow and Thunderhill just don’t even get close: at least you can rely on evaporative cooling for relief in those conditions. In the Midwest summer swelter, sweat-soaked clothing has about as much chance of drying out as your uncle.

The Joliet-in-July weather doubtlessly weighed on the organizers’ minds when they set this year’s race for mid-April. That’s a good time for the opening race for the Midwest, right? In the sweet spot, no doubt. Springtime. Not cold, not hot. Parasols and mint juleps, practically. Leftover Easter candy and a cool-but-not-cold Old Style right out of the can. Cartoon birds a-la Disney movies left to administer penalty box talkin’-tos while the judges drink freshly prepared Arnold Palmers and pick flowers. A glorious springtime racing event!

Hopes were high for the weather at Joliet to at least cooperate somewhat. The Midwest closed out its 2017 season in what could only be described as utter shit-nasty conditions in October at Gingerman Raceway. That weekend saw a near-ceaseless deluge from a low pressure center seemingly hinged directly above the track in South Haven, Michigan. The system never moved away; it just pivoted around itself and relentlessly soaked the entire area -- so much so that the highway out to the track itself became flooded and nearly impassable. It’s a race no one wants to remember, but one which the attendees won’t ever forget. To have survived the weekend became a badge of honor to those who were there. With what was doubtlessly the worst race weather ever out of the way in October, those returning for 2018’s kick-off event at Autobahn knew one thing: the weather couldn’t possibly be as bad as the Gingerman race. Right?

(Leans into the mic) Wrong! After teasing us with a partly sunny Friday test-and-tech day with temperatures in the low 70s, on Friday night the weather turned nasty and stayed nasty. Throughout the weekend was a steady soaking rain, always just this side of an out-and-out downpour, with gusting winds to match. Temperatures never once got out of the mid-40’s, and rain changed to sleet right as the race came to a close on Sunday.

There were 110 entries for this race, and most of the Midwest’s top teams came out to play. Save the Ta-Tas showed up with their brutally fast 3rd-Gen Camaro, which is now rebodied into the the only two-door bustleback Cadillac ever produced. This car will walk everyone on the straights. It’s a contender wherever it appears, but has been known to be penalty prone and mechanically…sensitive. I guess there’s only so much one can shave the heads on an LS motor before bad things happen. The aforementioned Rod Throwing Fools came out with their MR2, which was somewhat demoralizing because you know they’re the only ones who can beat themselves (via mechanicals or penalties or what-have-you). On the Class B side, Placebo Racing came out to play with their V8 swapped Merkur. And yes, being passed by that is as emasculating as it sounds. Suffice it to say that the field was stacked and there was going to be plenty of traffic to negotiate. My kind of race!

Not my kind of race: the relentless rain and very cold temperatures. Like most tracks, the racing line at Autobahn has been polished smooth by the sheer amount of traffic passing over it. As a result, one either drove completely off-line looking for any rougher surface grip, or drove on-line and waited to encounter rougher patch material to add traction. Such was the technique at turn 4, a constant radius left-hander with a blind-on-entry-apex. But about halfway through the turn on the racing line, just past the apex, were two parallel pavement patches about 10 feet long. I’d set the car up, get it gently down to the racing-line apex and then mash the throttle. Both cars being front wheel drive, the wheelspin would make the car understeer out – at least until it reached these patches. Then the tires would dramatically find grip and boost me up to the exit, where another strip of patch material would catch me and keep me from the curb. The sensation was like a real world version of hitting a boost strip in Mario Cart. It’s not a technique that rear wheel drive cars could use as effectively, which is probably why I say Ta-Tas staying wide and squaring off that corner – which seemed to work very well for them.

The win for the Team Sheen Acura came as it always does: the hard way. Clean (well, mostly) driving and long stints to make up for the speed it lacks versus many of the top Class A teams. It’s a fact that the Team Sheen fastest lap is usually merely mid-pack in the field for any given race. One thing that played into our necessary strategy at Joliet: the weather conditions and reduced fuel consumption as a result. We were able to “one stop” Saturday’s eight-hour session, which we wouldn’t be able to do under normal race conditions. I drove for the first four hours, and didn’t waste much time trying to throw away the win from the get-go with an early race spin at the “kink” – the outside rear wheel unloaded in rebound from a slight bump and that’s all it took to go around on the very slick track. Later while inside of a Ford Focus at turn three, the Focus got sideways and as I added steering angle to avoid it, the car came around. I found myself back at the penalty box for a second time.

For Sunday, Team Sheen put on some special non-200tw rain tires. Boy, did they ever make a difference. Perhaps 10 seconds a lap difference over similar cars operating on non-rain tires. Car owner and team captain Bruce “Big Smoove” VerMeulen (he’s 6’7”) took Sunday’s opening stint and put on a nearly flawless clinic, moving the car into first place. He did occasion into the penalty box once for suspected contact in a three-wide corner fiasco that left another car spinning. Bruce denied having any contact – and the car’s paint seemed to concur – but did agree that he probably should’ve not pushed that corner as aggressively. By the time the second Sunday stint rolled around, all driver Tim Robinson had to do was run in “cruise control,” considering the lead we held. And he did, flawlessly, for the next three-and-a-half hours. Tim was so focused on staying on track that he errantly did an additional victory lap, missing the pits the first time around after the checkered flag.

The class B win for the Knights Templar Neon took a substantially similar path, with a few caveats. Most notable is the “You break my car, I break YOUR car” penalty meted out during Saturday’s session. At some point that afternoon, as I was driving the Neon, the flagger at start/finish began pointing a black flag at me. This was quite confusing, as I’d taken no action requiring a penalty: no contact, offs, spins, passing under yellow – nothing. No other flag stations were displaying a black flag. No number board was being held up along with the black flag. Unfortunately, corner workers can sometimes get the wrong car/wrong number when there is a penalty to be issued, and I figured I might’ve drawn a bad card that way. But I was still going to wait for the number board to be displayed at any station before reporting to black flag. Finally after about four laps, the station at turn 11 displayed my number – 108 – and I headed to the penalty box.

Judge Eric met me at the turn-in to the penalty box, waving his arms. I pulled up and received the good and bad news. I had done nothing wrong – can’t say I’ve ever had a judge agree with me on that. However, the car was being penalized because the car owner – Owen – “is a dumbass.” It was explained to me that this type of penalty is usually reserved for on-track parents of children who are running rampant in the paddock, but that this was a special case. Owen, it seems, had hurt the collective Lemons baby: the 1961 AMC Rambler.

The current purveyor of the Rambler, Albert, offered Owen a chance to drive it Saturday afternoon while I was out in the Neon. Owen, naturally, accepted. Unfortunately, a confluence of nasty conditions, unpredictable handling, and driver error led to the meeting of the Rambler with the wall. Light contact, but still contact nonetheless. Penalizing the Rambler made no sense: it’s now in Class B with no chance at winning until the rumored V8 swap happens.

For those who don’t know, the Rambler is a collective Lemons project, moving from team to team around the country and participating in races along the way. Before Joliet, it’d most recently won Class C at Road Atlanta under the APE-X moniker, a name near and dear to my heart. Causing damage to the Rambler doesn’t merely just damage the Rambler. It damages all of us. So Judge Eric meted out the only penalty that made sense.

It was also sort of a catch-up penalty, as the Neon – a previous overall winner some years ago with its original team – is a marginal B Class car. It is fast, but not Ta-Tas (Camaro) or Lemonaid (E30) or Rod Throwin’ Fools (MR2) fast. With its original 12 gallon fuel tank, it can’t compete on distance unless there is some other intervening factor (in this case, the slowed pace from the wet track). In any event, I was held at penalty for a minute at most, and resumed thereafter with a still-healthy lead in class.

Before the start of Sunday’s session, it was decided by the team that even though we were in Class B, we should shoot for the overall win, as we were within potential striking distance. This meant one-stopping the six-and-a-half hour session, no small feat considering that 12 gallon tank. Only because of the rain-slowed pace – and a couple lengthy full course cautions – were we able to do that. I drove the first half of Sunday, dreadfully concerned I’d not make fuel. Perhaps I’m traumatized from running out while on track a time or two. Nevertheless, by shifting at 4500 RPM, generally staying in a higher gear and rolling on the throttle with as much reserve as I could muster, I made it to the halfway point without so much as a sputter. While out for Sunday morning’s session, the Team Sheen car -- now on rain tires and being wielded by Big Smoove himself -- must’ve lapped me at least five times. Without the benefit of rain tires, the Knights Templar Neon had to settle for a mere Class B victory, the first for its new owner and nefarious Rambler wrecker, Owen.