(2010) NCCBMWCCA Autocross Season Analysis (By Jim Newman)

[adam]

Chris and I have 193 HP at the crank... and with 130K miles on it I'm betting less so I dunno if that counts as power. B/tw, I seem to recall some of the early events were wet.

[ronh21]

For the 2nd week in a row, someone in the top 2 nailed their best time on the first run.

Not just my first run, but the first of the entire event

Yeah, there's no way that run was completely legit. I don't think I was off course, but something was wrong. The run was an outlier. I told the Jonathon we could scrap it, but it didn't really matter because the class standings wouldn't have changed for the day.

[flohtingPoint]

Not just my first run, but the first of the entire event

Yeah, there's no way that run was completely legit. I don't think I was off course, but something was wrong. The run was an outlier. I told the Jonathon we could scrap it, but it didn't really matter because the class standings wouldn't have changed for the day.

Not a problem. I have the database up and I can re-tabulate week 3 fairly quickly as I'm doing up week 4 right now. I'll post a revised week 3 along with week 4 sheets.

B/tw, I seem to recall some of the early events were wet.

I cant speak for this event (as I wasn't there), but none of the other ones were wet aside from the tail end of the 4th.

[flohtingPoint]

EVENT 3 REVISION

Revision: With Ron saying his first run was a mistiming, I recalculated the results. No re-analysis though, just the sheets.

[SamB325es]

this thread would be more interesting (to me) if my times were included...

[adam]

do you meet the criteria??

[flohtingPoint]

Sam didn't have five events in the same class unfortunately (he had five or more events, but only three in T3 I believe). One of the endgames of compiling the data is for class strength comparison and also season trophy winner comparisons vs non-trophy winners and I need regulars in classes.

[flohtingPoint]

WEEK 4

INTRO:

With the SCCA Northeastern Divisional Championship in the books, my fellow WDCR folks and myself got back to work within our home region with Event 4 of the NCCBMWCCA autocross season.

For the 2nd event in a row, the site was Summit. As I heard from folks the following week, the surface was night and day compared to last year. Things ran smoothly and all was well until about half way through the afternoon runs, when the heavens opened up and I was forced to park the car and forfeit my final two runs while I watched others brave the elements, to include one John Netzel who stuffed his Mazda into an embankment.

FACTS:

FTD - Newman, James (X3) - 52.816
STD - Steele, Jeff (S2) - 61.089
Best Average - Newman, James (X3) - 54.298
Most in Top 10 - X3 - 3 entrants
Most in Bottom 10 - S2, X2 - 2 entrants each
Got Their Money's Worth - Weaver, Dorrian (X2) - 309.794
Coney Island - Weaver, Dorrian (X2) - 10 cones





ANALYSIS:

After getting the Corolla sorted out for the Northeastern Divisionals, it was the start of about three months where the car was functioning it's best, until July when the brake problems started and then mid August when the car gave up the ghost for the rest of the season. This was the cars' second FTD in a month and the only time it would see Summit all year. I'm still curious as to what could have been found if it didn't start raining after my 3rd run.

This event marks the first time a Non-BMW class had the most top 10, and also the first time a non-season trophy winner emerged into the top 10. For the second consecutive event (thanks to new information and reprocessing Week 3), the top spot also had the best average. This week also boasted the longest total time by anyone on course and the highest average run up to this point.

You can see how erratic the average line is. This is due to folks going out in the heavy rain. This was easily the worst rain I've seen at an autocross, as it was literally coming down in buckets at one point.

One of the things I'd like to start tracking next season is AM and PM runs. I think it'd be interesting to see the difference and how much the course speeds up (be it a couple tenths to a second).

[Claff]

I too would like to see a morning/afternoon comparison. It probably wouldn't affect how I approach Summit Point, but if it shows a definite advantage at either Bowie or Waldorf I'd have to take that into consideration.

PS - glad to see I fared significantly better at SP the second time around.

[SamB325es]

do you meet the criteria??

I have no class.

[hepcatz]

Hey I didn't stuff it, I tried rallycross! zoom,zoom. =) That was a crazy run! Rain, slick skidpad. The course only used half of the end sweeper before cutting back up the middle. In my mind I was making the sharp turn and heading up course. Suddenly I notice everything is green and I'm like, uh-oh, this can't be good. lol Amazed I was able to back down off the hill and no damage was done. A nice subtle hint to park it and call it a day due to weather.

[flohtingPoint]

LOL, yea, you were busy stuffing it John and I was down in the Paddock changing tires and getting laughed at by the street tire folk.

[Claff]

P.S. - I'm printing & framing event 3's graph that shows me beating AJ

[hepcatz]

So when is the next episode coming out? This serial is like "As the world turns" for axers. =)

[flohtingPoint]

Later tomorrow perhaps. Was too busy with work recently.