The sun shines out of Eyesore's butts

F'ed Up was in great shape on Sunday, with super-smooth driving and near-invisibility on the track... until one mental error ruined everything for them. The driver came into the Penalty Box with the team's first black flag of the weekend. By mid-Sunday, teams with one or zero black flags generally get the quick wave-through treatment, and that's what happened with the F'ed Up E30. Then things went downhill fast; the driver was a bit over-conscious of his dwindling lead and gunned it out of the Penalty Box, horn a-honkin' and right foot a-mashin'... and nearly ran over Jay and Jay's mom. Whoops! By the time the dust settled, they'd lost about 15 laps.

The Krider Racing/Big Sausage team normally does the sane-and-invisible thing, but their drivers saw their chance to catch Eyesore when POS got knocked out and they started pushing a lot harder. They'd been clean all weekend, so we gave them the "we see you again we're going to skin you alive" speech when the car showed up in the Penalty Box after what was described as "contact resulting from a really dumb thread-the-needle move" and let them return to the track. In the end, it wasn't enough; the relentless Eyesores ended the session with a comfortable 5-lap cushion.

Once again, I recommend that teams pay attention to how the Eyesores go about their business. I believe they've had about ten black flags— total— during their entire Lemons career, which spans eight races going back to Altamont '07. Other than a single running-out-of-gas incident at the Arizona race (in which they had about a 30-lap lead), I can't think of a single bonehead mistake they've made. Yet unlike so many of the super-competitive teams we see, the Eyesores don't become raging automatons at the track; they socialize with other teams, lounge around on lawn furniture, wear silly costumes all weekend, and so on. I'm still going to keep twisting their arms into pretzels as part of my ongoing campaign to make them build an IOE contender, but I'll do it with respect.

You guys definitely get it done and are a fine example of how it should be done. Can't wait for thunderhill hopefully we will give you a little competition. Great win AGAIN.

While we may growl about the Eyesore guys, they really do set the bar and I've got nothing but respect for their team.  And, for us, they're our rabbit to chase.

Initially, we thought there's no way we could compete with them - similar weight, 1.6L turbo versus 1.5L NA, a team with tuner-connections versus a dentist, some managers, and a marketing guy.  But we've kept at it, learning and improving, pulling favors and advice from here and there, paying back where needed - and I'm pretty sure that if we stop breaking, and stay out of penalty, we've got a shot at it.

Personally, I'd be bummed if we didn't have our rabbit to chase - so I look *forward* to seeing the Franken-miata again!

Anyway, this was some of the best driving/racing we've seen in our 4 races now.  A bejezus amount of fun was had by all.

As someone who saw a lot of the butt-end of that frankeniata, I can attest to the presence of sunshine...  It always made me smile a little to see that thing pass me.

You are the class of the Lemons (that is meant as a compliment).   I was at your first race (Thunderhill) and marveled at the work your team had done putting that car together.  It is inspiring.

To see you win, just shows that you can do it the right way and have success.  As Jay said, you do it the right way.  I do not believe that you win because of a rally driver, tuners, etc.  I believe you win because you spend the time preparing and execute (while still having fun).

Someday we will sell our other race rigs and focus on the Lemons series and try and give you a run for your money.

With that said, we are looking at making a couple of changes to our little Paseo to try and get it closer to the standard you have set.    We will be gunning for you at the 2nd T-Hill event.

Rick

We've got an open-diff as well, and it hurt us also, esp on 2 and 11.  Nothing a little quality-time with a welder wouldn't fix.

You guys are like the Jimmy Johnson Team of Lemons.   Big thumbs up from the
Turbo Blowing Sharks!!!

Krider guys,  I was in the Shark at the end of the race and I was making sure I was WAY out of the way for you. 

Thank you for the Pizza Pie!!!!