Time Attack Round 2 - Scottish Imprezas

[TrackScotland]

As above.....

I've entered as a OHW and was wondering if there were anymore doing the same?

I dont have a crazy spec car (370-380bhp) so have my own personal targets rather than going for the top step Thats not saying I wont be trying though

I know there are a few scottish evo's entered (Matty, Mike, Russ, Eric & Barbour) along with Fee in the R32.

[WUZ]

Sadly, I won't be home to enter this year (plus I am still reeling at the costs involved in a OHW entry) so I've decided to take a little longer to prep the car and do Snetterton later on.

[TrackScotland]

The costs are 'as bad' if the car is up to spec already and you have all the safety gear.

BUT yes - if it was a pure one-off and you needed racing boots, gloves, suit, MSA helmet, fire ext, rain light on top of the control tyres and entry fee's it can be a bit scary.

I estimate my costs for this one off to be £800. I have a race suit, gloves, helmet, boots etc and the car is up to MSA Blue Book regs (can run in TA pro classes). If it wasnt this price would soar!!! Prob about £1700

Also - once you have done the OHW you have the control tyre to either use again or sell - making a potential second OHW MUCH cheaper than the initial one.

My Impreza runs 17x9's so I can pass on my 1 event old tyres to Fee to use as another spare set.

Pro entry for the season costs £2500'ish, for 7 rounds....

[WUZ]

The costs are 'as bad' if the car is up to spec already and you have all the safety gear.

BUT yes - if it was a pure one-off and you needed racing boots, gloves, suit, MSA helmet, fire ext, rain light on top of the control tyres and entry fee's it can be a bit scary.

I estimate my costs for this one off to be £800. I have a race suit, gloves, helmet, boots etc and the car is up to MSA Blue Book regs (can run in TA pro classes). If it wasnt this price would soar!!! Prob about £1700

Also - once you have done the OHW you have the control tyre to either use again or sell - making a potential second OHW MUCH cheaper than the initial one.

My Impreza runs 17x9's so I can pass on my 1 event old tyres to Fee to use as another spare set.

Pro entry for the season costs £2500'ish, for 7 rounds....

Adam - what I mean is that, assuming you have all the safety gear in the first place (which I do), your still paying a fortune to do an event you might get through the first round of. Potentially spending a lot of money for what could be in essence a 1 - maybe 2 - hour trackday

I'd understand doing it somewhere you haven't been before (you admit you know your down on power, etc so won't be as competitive as you'd like to be....... why do it as opposed to one of your ususal TrackScotland days?) but as Knockhill is your usual "hunting ground", why not save your money for somewhere else?

Or is it just the fact that you can't handle the fact your missus is a MUCH BETTER DRIVER

Best of luck anyways, hope you enjoy it and it gives you a thrilling day.

Edited May 2, 2011 by WUZ

[TrackScotland]

Fee is a good driver - Much better, maybe. Much smoother, yes. I'm not scared to say that LOL but we've never been timed in the same car, same track etc.

She now has an easy 600+ to my 380bhp LOL. And comparable weights I'd think.

Why KH?

1- I know the track so have (hopefully) an advantage that should make up for some of the power deficite.

2- Travel costs for two cars (towed) are a lot. We did Snet with 2 cars in 2009 and it was expensive to say the least.

3- Timing - I 'should' be home for KH, but dont know my schedule for the rest of the year. Take it when you can.

Having done TA before I can safely say its at a completly different leval to a trackday. Even with a paltry 380bhp i cannot push 100% on a trackday... you cannot time (officially) and you have no one to beat. They simply cannot or maybe shouldnt be compared.... If they could be, why would anyone bother competing? To see how you fair against others.... to test yourself... to test your car. Many reasons for doing it!

Not entering because it may be a challange or hard is a daft reason.

Not doing TA (1 round) because your car 'may' break is a bit lame.... If everyone thought like that, the human race would still be hiding in the back of a cave somewhere in the dark ages. Your car may break on any trackday, on the road - in the garage. If its going to break its going to break.

Competing at a track you've never been to before....... this puts you at a big disadvantage from the word go. You'll spend most of the time learning the track/lines. At Snet in 2009 where I spent the sat on an MLR trackday I was still making up over 1 seconds between each session. If I knew the track well I could have been near the peak rather than still trying to find it

[WUZ]

Fair play. Agree on the testing yourself and your car, that's the reason we (as in track addicts) do what we do with our cars, etc.

I don't remember mentioning anything about "Not entering because it may be a challange or hard" because I agree with you on that one. If you don't break your car trying, your not trying hard enough!!!!!! and your need that excuse to buy more "gucci" replacements

Some might say you have pushed 100% in your car........... or did you plan to go off road at Knockhill in Febraury

As I said b4, good luck at the event and I hope you get what you want out of the day.

[TrackScotland]

that wasnt 100%... that was being a fanny in the wet

[arch]

Why not try the hills and sprints up here?

[supremeweb]

Why not try the hills and sprints up here?

:stupid: Thats my plan + MUCH cheaper IMHO

[TrackScotland]

how many sub 60secs do you get though?

I'm willing to try everything and anything - just finding time and funds to do it all is the thing LOL

Hope to have the Impreza out in Scottish Saloons this year too.

[RA Dunk]

:stupid: Thats my plan + MUCH cheaper IMHO

Isn't it 1K to enter the championship and 80 quid per round after that?

Not too cheap if thats the case TBH.

[TrackScotland]

it may be interesting to calculate value for money based on track time?

i.e how many runs on average can you get per hill climb?

TA - say entry fee of £339 for one round (CLUB, not PRO) = 20min warmup + 20min practice + 15min qualifying + 15mins final = 70mins

£339/70mins = £4.84 a minute (on track)

For £80 entry to a Hillclimb you would need to get 16minutes 30sec on track, so say 21 runs up a hill on average if time is 50secs or so.

[arch]

Value for money doesnt really come into motorsports does it?

Your saying T/A is becoming to expensive for a two car entry which is understandable yet you have a cheapish form of motorsport on your doorstep that will cost you £75 per day. If its purely value for money that you are after then track days will give you the most seat time per pound or tarmac stage rallies.

[arch]

Isn't it 1K to enter the championship and 80 quid per round after that?

Not too cheap if thats the case TBH.

No the Scottish Championship Entry fee is £20 and the Lowlands is £10. You then pay the entry fee which is £75 ish per day. The only other admin cost is your MSA licence fee.

[TrackScotland]

Arch - Its not TA entry thats 'expensive' for two cars.... its the logistics and running of the two cars thats expensive.

We'd be about 1k in fuel alone for 2 cars to Snetterton for example. (towing both cars, running both cars)

We do lots of trackdays with both cars - thats no cheaper!

No motorsport is cheap - but I was just trying to compare the time you got for the money you spend on entry.

[arch]

The logistics i.e hotels and fuel is what I was getting at when I said I understood the expense of two cars in T/A the extra costs of wear and tear and consumables is also considerable in T/A. The expense for Scottish events would be less as some venues could be done without the need for hotels and the others the distances are less so petrol costs would be significantly less. That said the seat time issue for hills and sprints does put a lot of people off and I would say that Fee's car is definately not suited to those events but yours prob is. I would estimate that a full season of hills and sprints (29 events) would see around 155 mins of seat time as opposed to 7 time attack events giving around 490 mins so approx 1/3 of the seat time.

[TrackScotland]

yup - I hear what your saying, and I'm not adverse to trying it Just never got round to it.

Fee's car is a feckin boat LOL

[arch]

Give Boyndie a go its fairly close to you and a good wee circuit. You might be surprised how much fun 90 odd secs can be.

[sti pretender]

I had looked at T/A OHW as I thought about Knockhill just for something a bit different from trackdays but the initial expense put me off. May consider it in the future but would like the car to have bigger brakes and more power.

Will probably enter a few rounds of sprints once I get a brake upgrade as have notice when running Kames that my brakes are the weak point of the car.

[TrackScotland]

I think these are the Imprezas involved

Pro:

Duncan Grahams 600+ bhp newage

Club:

Pro-R Hatch with GT35R

Dave Coe - 550+ bhp + Newage

Chris Bennet - dunno spec, newage

Me - classic with 20G

[stuarted]

Im sure you'll do the classics proud Adam

[andrew_forrest]

Having done TA before I can safely say its at a completly different leval to a trackday. Even with a paltry 380bhp i cannot push 100% on a trackday...

Having done both, there's not much difference from a driving point of view. You can push as hard as you like on either, subject to traffic (which is less of an issue on T/A this year due to the drop in popularity/entry)

The big difference comes with how pampered you are, with pit garages, live timing, press coverage etc. Thats very important to some

If you want a step up, go circuit racing with a competitive car and actually 'race' someone!!

[gambler]

I'll not be competing this year. I am taking a year out of Time Attack.

Best of luck Adam. I agree 100% that Time Attack is a massive step up from a track day. It sounds like it should be very similar but its really worlds apart. There is no hiding or excuse making when there is a timing beacon in the car.

Andy Napier from RA Motorsport has kindly agreed to support me and is working on the car and the engine right now. With a bit of AndyF magic on the mapping they should be able to come up with a very competitive package.

I am hoping to do a couple of sprints/hillclimbs and the odd round of Scottish Saloons to try out some proper racing. And i may try and drive round some cones as well.... Think i may find that very hard on the brain cell though!! I like a big grey stip of tarmac to let me know where im going.