Saturday I'm going to run a Time Trial day with the Maverick Region (Dallas) Porsche Club.

I'm still a member, even though I traded in my 993 for the C32, and they are still pretty nice to me, despite my treason!

I did autocross many years ago, but this will be my first time on the track with a front-engine, rear wheel drive car. Should be interesting. I've asked for an instructor - hopefully I'll learn a few good things. Everything is stock, so I expect it to understeer at the limit. Acceleration will be my stong suit, not cornering, I imagine.

This'll be a medium speed course (or so the tell me) - maybe 95-100 down the back straight. Sounds pretty fast to me!

I expect my tires will be trashed afterwards - I'm almost out of tread on the rears anyways.

They really shouldn't have told me about the new WRX that flipped and rolled a few months ago! He was doing "several things wrong" - maybe my wondeful electronics will keep me from getting out of shape.

I'll update everyone after its all over.

 

Let us know how everything went. Try to take some nice pictures with the C32 in action. Suggestions: burnouts or power slides.

 

How did it go? Pictures and detail descriptions please.

 

It went well. Unfortunately I had no time to take any pictures - they run you through pretty quickly!

I ran in class OG - Other German (this is a Porsche club, after all!). There were two other cars in my class (if you can call it that) - a Corrado that was brought in on a trailer (I'm thinking it was NOT stock!) and a Golf that was not on a trailer but was similarly prepared.

These people are pretty serious. Most everyone (except me) brought a set of race tires and either swapped them in before coming or put them on out there.

One older gentleman brought his car (a 934) on an enclosed trailer behind his motorhome. What a retirement hobby!

I'm pretty pleased with my effort, considering everything. The C32 had plenty of power but not enough cornering stick, in my opinion. It certainly felt tall and heavy compared to the 911 I used to autocross.

The course was 1.6 miles long, and was laid out using cones on an old helicopter airfield. Plenty of runoff room. I only hit one cone and did not slide or spin the whole time - indicative of possibly being too meek!

I came in with a lot of humility, and rightly so - Boxsters were even or slightly faster than me, with over 100 less horsepower!

I drove several times with an instructor (a Miata driver who also trailered his car in) and he helped quite a bit with familiarization and some tips.

The Boxster and Miata boys were jealous of my horsepower - they said it wasn't "fair"

I drove with ESP off, downshifting it into first before I started and then letting it shift by itself. It did a pretty good job of shifting, but occasionally it would not know to downshift before the turn - I would come out of the turn and it would shift down and I would have POWER - rear end wagging, etc. Not smooth. Next time I will try to manually shift a little more.

I'm sure a set of Hoosiers and some lowered springs would help immensely.

 

Tires make a HUGE difference. You'd be surprised at how much more stick you can get by going with a set of R compound tires.

At the local 2-mile roadcourse, I'm able to shave 5 seconds off going from Kumho street tires to Yokohama A032R's. This is a track with 2 long straights (1 mile worth of straights).

 

rage2, what size tires are you using? The stock 17s? And what wheels?

 

I'm currently riding on OZ Crono Evolution 17x8 all around. 235's up front, 255's out back, A032R's. This is on an SLK 32.