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

[flohtingPoint]

Intro: Due to the fact that I'm massively bored during the winter, I've decided to try to make heads or tails of this past season. It's no mystery that the classes are vague and with no overall raw printout each week and no PAX it makes things very muddled in terms of who did what each week, how good certain classes are, who stacks up to who, etc. My goal here is to clear things up and give a more comprehensive season review, week by week, and then a final "end of year" summary. I'll also be handing out EXTREMELY UNOFFICIAL SEASON AWARDS, which do not express the views of the NCCBMWCCA, they express the views of my numbers and I.

BTW, I'm hand jamming most of this data into a database and in order to make a lot of my digital logic work, I have to manipulate the data that contains cones or off courses. With that said, I HATE EVERYONE FOR WEEK 1, TO INCLUDE MYSELF! Week 1 took as long to hand jam as Week 2, 3 and 4 combined. It was a cone and off course fiesta!

Criteria: In order to get a real feel for how the season went, I need to weed out "anomalies". These anomalies are the irregular entrants, folks who were not around for the full season and would screw up the numbers. To accomplish this, I've devised a system I like to call 5X5, which works like this:
-You have to have attended at least 5 NCCBMWCCA events
-You have to have finished in at least the top 5 of your class

With this criteria set, I have my first EXTREMELY UNOFFICIAL SEASON AWARD to hand out.

EXTREMELY UNOFFICIAL 2010 HISPANIA RACING AWARD: JOHN NETZEL

Like Hispania just BARELY squeaked onto the grid in Bahrain for the 2010 F1 season opener, John Netzel just BARELY squeaked onto the full season rankings after he completed only 5 events AND ranked 5th in his class (fulfilling the criteria exactly). I also thought about naming this the AK47 award (after the guy who used to get 5x5's in the NBA rather easily), but figured I'll stick to the racing theme.

Ok, now that we finished with the intro and such, lets move on to week 1!

[flohtingPoint]

WEEK 1

INTRO:
Was there ever a worse day of autocrossing in terms of coning? I think not... Just about everyone collected at least one cone, if not more. Between it being quite cold outside, Bowie's unpredictable surface and everyone shaking off the winter rust, we were ALL OVER THE PLACE! Just about every pic taken of my car had smoke coming out the back from the tires...

FACTS:
FTD - Hougham, Ron (T2) - 46.199
STD - Steele, Jeff (S2) - 55.969
Best Avg - Chelikowsky, Adam (T3) - 48.255
Most In Top 10 - T2 - 4 entrants
Most in Bottom 10 - S3, X3, S2 - 2 each
Got Their Money's Worth - Steele, Jeff (S2) - 228.192 seconds on course
Coney Island - Riechers, Mike (T1) - 8 cones






ANALYSIS:
Mike, you collected a TON of cones and still finished in the top 10, not bad, hell you did better than me =P

BMW took a big win from this event and represented well. FTD was a bimmer and 6 of the top 10 cars were from the BMW classes. Also a good representation of trophy winners in the top, as you have to get to 17th place before you see the first non-season trophy winner in the rankings of Week 1.

I think a growing trend is going to be seeing T2 in the top 10, I'll definitely keep an eye on this in future reports. Between Ron and Joe Brannon, they have two of the most talented drivers of the field (I think the best rival to those two would be X4's combination of AJ and James Dunham, who are outstanding).

One of the things I'm going to be keeping an eye on greatly is averages. Averages mean how comfortable you are in your car and on course. Great drivers can get a good run in two passes (I'll bring up AJ's name again, as he's someone who can do this rather easily). You'll notice I even included the average run time on the graph for this event, expect to see that each event.

Anyway, that's it from week 1, enjoy and stay tuned for week 2.

[hepcatz]

Huzzah, I'm a cool winner, the Slowe Azz strikes! I'll give you that $20 Jim for setting up the criteria just right later... lol!

[woodym3]

Great analysis. I look foward to the rest of your reports.

[SamB325es]

I think the fact that Adam's average was so close to his fastest time says a lot about his driving, too bad about his personality...

[flohtingPoint]

WEEK 2

INTRO:

This was my first time ever to the Waldorf lot and instantly I was fan. Outside of Fed Ex, this is my favorite lot in DC regional events. It features minor altitude changes, EXCELLENT lateral adhesion, INDOOR BATHROOMS (which is much better than wizzing in what can best be described as a septic greenhouse) and great paddock location. Where Waldorf falls short though is grid (unless you get very creative, AI does a very good job of this and has fairly good Waldorf grids) and the drive (unless you're Alan & Kate, in which case it's right down the road and they dont have the suffer the long/bumpy drive down the very boring 5).

After a very cold start to the season, between NCCBMWCCA's week 1, CDC's frigid Frederick events and what could probably be described as THE WORST AUTOCROSS OF THE YEAR, SCCA's Event 1 (freezing temps + freshly sealed tarmac = spin hell), things were starting to look up. The day was fairly mild and for the first time since the initial AI event at Fed Ex (which was an uncharacteristically warm day), the season looked to be heating up.

FACTS:
FTD - Dunham, James (X4) - 41.755
STD - Maraya, Mike (S1) - 53.164
Best Avg - Aviles, Alejandro (X4) - 42.044
Most in Top 10 - T2 - 3 entrants
Most in Bottom 10 - S3 - 2 entrants
Got Their Money's Worth - Netzel, John - 199 seconds on course
Coney Island - Riechers, Mike - 3





ANALYSIS:

First thing that sticks out is cone junky Mike Riechers makes his second appearance on Coney Island with 3 cones. Cant get enough of the orange smack. Still pops into the top 10 though, not bad.

David Arthur, your average was VERY close to your best time (no cones either, so these were basically replica runs), which was 3rd from the bottom. This is what I like to call, "going through the motions". On this day you were not taking any risks and you were playing it too safe. When you see yourself doing this, you need to make mental notes, preferably while sitting at start, that you need to push and change things up. Last year this was a massive problem of mine, as I was scared to take risks. Autocross is all about one run glory, and one of the best pieces of advice I got toward the end of last year was, "If you're ever feeling comfortable on course, chances are you're going slow". If I ever feel good about anything while I'm driving (not after I cross the line, that's totally different), I know I'm not pushing it. The season review is no where near done yet, and you may have fixed this later in the year, but if not then I would suggest (should you find yourself in this replica situation again) picking the brains of the folks up front. I constantly talk to folk and trade thoughts about how certain sections of the course should be run.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that X4 dominated this event. If someone put a gun to my head and said I had to choose the best driver of the field all year, I'd have a very hard time choosing between the top two this day. Dunham took top spot and AJ took his best time on his first run. I want to say that AJ fell into the same trap as David Arthur (replica runs), but honestly I think the kid was just driving the car to what it's capable of, as I had the opportunity to ride with him on two runs when all was said and done, and he was spot on (plus there is only so much you can do with 16 horsepower).

I'm horrible with matching names to faces, and I'm sorry to admit that I have no idea who Adam Chelikowsky is (chances are we've talked or even been in grid next to each other, and if I saw you I'd probably go "ooohhhh, he's that guy, I know him"). Through two events, he's been the most successful/consistent driver. BTW, ask Joe about how bad I am with names to faces, as I didn't put that together with him until the Virginia Autocross Championship (which happened mid-season).

Once again, the T2 boys crowded into the top 10, with Joe pulling an impressive 41 out of two 43's (one coned, giving a 45) and a DNF.

During the analysis of event 1, it was easy to see that there was a "happy medium" that folks were satisfied with (51 average time taken widely across the board). This event was a bit different, you can see folks really getting after it (more pronounced line, less flat spots. Perhaps we can chalk this up to getting the off season dust shook off.

That's it for Week 2 folks, week 3's database is completed, I just didn't finish the processing of any information yet, so that may happen this weekend, or I may get drunk and forget. Who knows?

[adam]

He's half-asian, wears pink shoes on occasion, sports various soccer jerseys, and uses yellow driving gloves. Okay awkward, I'm talking about myself in the 3rd person and just realized it....

[flohtingPoint]

He's half-asian, wears pink shoes on occasion, sports various soccer jerseys, and uses yellow driving gloves. Okay awkward, I'm talking about myself in the 3rd person and just realized it....

Half-Asian with an eastern bloc last name that sometimes wears pink and yellow shoes with soccer jerseys? Nope, I think I'm farther from figuring it out now in fact =P

[ronh21]

Half-Asian with an eastern bloc last name that sometimes wears pink and yellow shoes with soccer jerseys? Nope, I think I'm farther from figuring it out now in fact =P

The pink/yellow things aren't great clues. He co-drives his blue M3-looking 328 with Chris Higgins, so if you ever worked their heat, it would seem like they do a dozen runs. Also, his "special lady friend" (Alex?) comes to many events and even works some of them. The usually bring a little one with them. Does that help? If not, you need to mingle more :-)

BTW, this thread is great. I've looked for week three a couple times today, even though you already said it would be over the weekend.

[flohtingPoint]

BTW, this thread is great. I've looked for week three a couple times today, even though you already said it would be over the weekend.

Glad you dig it Ron, I'm also having fun doing it. The inputting is rather tedious, but when I always cannot wait when I sort the results and pull up the charts/graphs, almost as though it's a new event.

I'm going karting today, so maybe tomorrow or this evening if I have time, we'll see the processed results of Event 3.

[civicexracer]

Thanks a lot for doing this Jim! Very interesting information for sure. As much as I appreciate your praise of me holding a good average time, it's usually not true lol. Atleast that's my view point. I tend to set a decent time the first run but I generally drop about a second or so afterwords which to me isn't consistent lol. The second event was a fluke, I can't remember another time where I've set my FTD on my first run. And yeah the battle with James this season was great! Definitely made each event that much more enjoyable. I look forward to next season, but I hope he doesn't have any major plans or I'll be in serious trouble lol.

[flohtingPoint]

To be revised later

[ElGordoFeroz]

Woo! Moneysworth!

2nd question whats STD? Slowest time? I probably wouldn't have gotten that if I hadn't quit 1/3 into my final run. I had my radio tuned into the walkie channel and thought I heard my number get called off course. I basically coasted the rest of the way in first gear.

[Claff]

I think week 3 was my first time at Summit Point. I came straight from work (overnight shift), ran the MSM's heavy stock wheels with 'adequate' tires, didn't put my contacts in, basically half-assed the whole day. Then I had to deal with that slick slick pavement! If there was one event I wish I could have done over, that would be it.

[ElGordoFeroz]

If there was one event I wish I could have done over, that would be it.

This was my first event ever, my friend Mark convinced me to go and run with you guys. I had a blast, but I totally blew my last run. I wish I could redo this one as well!