<VV> California Dreamin' - Part Four - Autocross and home

[Sethracer at aol.com]

Part Four – Autocross and final day events. 
Friday was the only day I was unable to enjoy the  breakfast at our Bed & 
Breakfast Inn. That is because I was out at the  Autocross course early. This is 
the first time I have attended the Autocross as  the Corvair Society’s 
Autocross Chairman. I was hoping things would go all right  at the event. Some things 
had been properly planned and some had not. But a  relatively small turnout, 
around 40 drivers, meant that small delays couldn’t  hurt too much. Only a few 
cones had been disturbed in the overnight stint from  Thursday’s course 
set-up and they were easily reset. Pre-Grid had been laid out  the night before as 
well. Enough of the regulars were present that Technical  Inspection, carried 
out on the grid, went smoothly. Since the timing equipment  was taking longer 
to configure that anticipated, there was plenty of time for  Tech inspection. 
At about 9:15, a little later than the scheduled start time,  Tim Chew, the 
local autocross chair and I made the decision to go with Plan B  for timing. The 
electronic timer which had functioned flawlessly at an autocross  a few weeks 
before and had tested fine just two days before, refused to reliably  trigger 
at this event. We had several digital stop watches in reserve and with  two 
eager volunteers, runs in the stock classes began. Full credit to the  drivers 
in the stock classes – nobody hit a single cone, and there were no DNFs.  
Everybody got 4 runs, and timing was to the hundredth of a second. Next up were  
the Modified, Prepared and Specialty cars. By this time a crowd had gathered to 
 watch – and they got a show. Warren and Mark dueled it out for FTD, and V8  
Corvairs and Comp class cars made it interesting. My car was still running the 
 same loud noises from the engine, but no worse than at Willow Springs. Since 
I  had not adjusted tire pressures, my first run had resulted in a dirty 
corner  forcing me to make a tight loop to retain the run as legal. After that 
run, I  dropped the front pressures down a bit, with much better results. (Since 
I don’t  have any written record of the times in hand, and I won’t guess at 
them, you  will have to look elsewhere for the final times.) I am sure Warren 
Leveque and  Mark Wright won their classes, and Mark took home the Don Yenko 
award for  Fastest time of the day. Just as the fastest cars were finishing up, 
a pair of  Fairgrounds folks came to us and told us that these cars were too 
fast and we  would have to stop the runs. The story changed to not enough 
insurance, then  crowds too close, etc. As the last run of the group completed, Tim 
Chew exited  the trailer and we addressed their concerns and the issue of 
insurance, which  was provided in plenty of time and at their requested amount. 
To allow the event  to continue, we had to move the crowd back from the front 
row of pylons and move  a couple of spectators from the area near the finish 
line. The Fairgrounds folks  left and, at least for the remainder of the time I 
was there, didn’t bother us  again.  Whew – that was a close one.  As the 
Improved Stock cars began their runs, I joined my wife back at the vendor  area 
to begin the teardown of our display. Since the banquet was in the same  
general area, the vendors were to close down early to allow room for the  banquet. 
As it turned out, the banquet was at the other end of the building, but  we 
salute and carry on. After most of the teardown was done, I drove back to the  
Autocross to find the event finishing right on time, allowing for a half-hour of 
 fun runs. When I returned to the vendor area, partly with the thoughts of 
Steve  Poe in mind, I decided to buy one of the EZ Car Lifts to bring home with 
me. To  try it out, I used the vendors demonstrator lift to raise the car up 
and change  back to my rain tires (aka my tow tires) Since I had the truck, it 
wasn’t too  hard to carry the boxed car lift items home so, with Barbs help, I 
loaded the  Avalanche and added a few more items into the race car, then we 
drove the truck  back to the hotel to clean up for the banquet. Why sure, a 
glass of free wine at  the hotel beat the $4.50 a glass wine at the banquet, too. 
We were a little late  returning to the banquet, missing the role call of 
chapters for the first time  in many years. I trust nobody set off any fireworks? 
 The banquet went according to schedule.  The car display trophies were “
trophy-like” in their appearance. All the other  events received wall plaques – I 
guess. Since the banquet was on the same day as  the Autocross – the first 
time since 1999, I believe, autocrossers will be  receiving their trophies in 
the mail. As far as the performance of my car goes,  I think it ended up the 
third fastest. Being beaten by Mark Wrights and Warren  Leveques cars was 
understandable, especially for me because I have driven both  of their cars before 
and both cars are killers. On top of that, Mark is a great  driver and Warren is 
still great for an old guy (He is  even older than I am!)  The only  
complaint I heard about the autocross course was that the second half was a bit  slow –
 and those complaining were drivers of fast cars, so it was probably just  
right, overall. Thank you to Tim Chew for his perseverance on the course and  
with the Fairgrounds staff, Jonnie Berkman for her work on the timing watch and  
a ton of others, including Jeff Ballard, Larry Claypool, Dave Palmer and the  
folks who worked the course for us all day.   
The banquet finished up with an auction of a freshly  painted 1965 Monza 
4-speed. It was probably worth the money it made for the  club. Since it had no 
visible rust it would have been a bargain for someone back  East, but that is a 
long way from California. I was impressed with the way that  the local Los  
Angeles area clubs shared the workload for the  convention. They have a bunch of 
practice at it, since they rotate  responsibility and share the Fan Belt Toss 
every fall. Thank you to all the  clubs for their effort and see you in 
Jacksonville, Florida next summer!   
If you are interested in the information on the Bed & Breakfast where  we 
stayed in Ventura, drop me a note and I will forward you  the info. On Saturday 
morning we ate our final (great) breakfast at the B&B,  hitched up the “Stinger”
 and towed leisurely up highway 101 to San Jose toward home. Just  before 
noon, the Leveques passed us heading North and just pulled away.  (Once a 
leadfoot . . . . . !) We were  home, unloaded and relaxing by dinnertime.  
Seth Emerson – (Native Californian!) 
Coming soon. – Technical information on my racecar. 




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