A day in in the life in early 2001.
It was a clear and sunny morning at Willow Springs International Raceway in Rosamond, California, an oasis (of sorts) located halfway between Mojave and Palmdale, in the dry upper desert West of Edwards Air Force Base.
As a Performance Marketing Specialist with Yokohama Tires, I'd been tapped to help shake down several new open-wheel race cars that would be used in the nascent Suzuki Formula Hayabusa Racing Series. Based around the Hayabusa motorcycle engine, a 1300cc monster that pumped out 174 horsepower, the lightweight 1,000 pound single-seaters promised to be a handful.
I'd spent the night before in a nondescript motel in Rosamond, my only real memory of it being the heavy footsteps of the giant Japanese guy from Suzuki's corporate office who was in the room above mine. He was easily 300 lbs., affable and funny when we met earlier that evening, and he seemed to stomp from one side of my ceiling to the other... all night long.
Early the next morning, I showed up trackside with helmet in-hand to inspect the cars we'd be lapping on the Streets of Willow Springs, the so-called 'small track' at the facility. Our task: to ensure the cars were solid and ready to be leased out to prospective Andrettis with enough cash money to participate in the series.
The cars gleamed in the morning sun while being prepped by Suzuki technicians, eager to see how they'd perform in their first stateside track test. My initial inspection of the cars revealed a surprise: the motorcycle-style manual sequential shift lever was on the LEFT side of the cockpit, Japanese-spec, so I'd need to get used to that for sure. Otherwise, a sweet little rocket that I was informed only really grabbed power above 8,000 RPM (!!!).
The plan was to do a few dozen hot rotations on the skid pad, in both directions, to heat up the Yokohama race slicks enough to head out onto the adjacent track. Then a lap or two of recon before serious hot-lapping. Simple enough, right?
I geared up and was strapped into a Red car like the one pictured above. While the techs started and warmed up the engine, I got acquainted with the cockpit. Test-shift the sequential gears up and down, test the clutch and brake pedals, snug up the 5-point belts and helmet strap, memorize the gauge placement and rev band, adjust the mirrors and wait for the wave-out onto the Skid Pad. Snick into 1st gear, revs up, slowly release the clutch and I'm rolling. The first dozen skid-pad clockwise circles go fine, so I reverse direction and do another dozen at higher speed, the Yokies squealing but sticking. Time to head onto the track.
I drove the first lap counter-clockwise at slow speed to familiarize myself with the track, an undulating asphalt surface that rises and falls, left and right, with a nice long straightaway. I kept my left hand on the shifter the entire lap to get used to it being on my left side, opposite most of the other manuals I'd driven before. At the end of that first lap, I decided to get my speed on.
OMG... it happened soooo fast.
No sooner had I accelerated into the second lap, I started the turn and reached down to grab for the downshift... with my right hand. In that split-second, I reached for the shifter that wasn't there, realized my mistake and attempted to switch hands, but it was too late. I missed the turn-in point, tried to brake but the semi-hot tires just didn't have enough traction and I left the asphalt, spinning out into the dry trackside runoff area, dust and gravel flying everywhere. An 'off' at the First Turn on the first hot lap.
A fair representation of the spin-out.
Once the car came to a rest, I sat there feeling humiliated and embarrassed, with the dust and dirt settling all over the car and inside the cockpit. How stupid was I, forgetting about the opposite-side shifter?! And on the first hot lap?! Surely, everyone on-hand watched me toss the car into the dirt, and I felt my face grow beet-red inside the helmet. I raised my right arm straight into the air to indicate I was dead-stick and needed a tow. Within a few minutes, I was at the end of the tow strap being hauled outta the dirt and back to the pits.
Before I'd even climbed outta the car, the techs were assessing the damage. Luckily, it was limited to a mildly pranged front wing, which they immediately took a rubber mallet to and banged back into shape. I felt awful, messing up their brand new race car, so when they finished up, I grabbed a detailer's towel and proceeded to wipe the car back to clean and shiny.
Suzuki Tech: "Hey man.. don't worry about that, we'll get it ready for you."
Me: "NO WAY... I tossed it off and bent it, so cleaning it up is the very least I can do."
That cracked up the tech, so I didn't feel so bad. For the rest of the day, I was the self-appointed Wipe-down Boy for all the cars, which I'm sure the techs appreciated.
Humility is a good thing to have around race cars.
Within 15 minutes of my off-track excursion, I was back in the car and doing hot laps, mindful of the leftie shifter the entire time. After a while, it became muscle-memory and I didn't miss it again. When we switched to doing laps in the clockwise direction, the track felt more accessible and I started being able to really make speed, lapping faster and faster, finding apexes with ease. It took some realigning of my senses to keep the Hayabusa engine in the upper rev ranges, but that too became second nature.
The car was spectacular to drive fast, feeling like an extension of my body, going exactly where I wanted, giving me feedback when I pushed too hard. My head filled with the sounds of a high-revving engine, squealing tires and that sequential shifter snicking up and down, down and up. I was among a couple of other drivers that morning, and we jumped in and out of the four test cars for several hours, hot-lapping the whole time.
After a series of really fast laps in my original Red Beast, I pulled into the pit and climbed out of the car. A tech called over to me saying "HEY, who do you think you are... Nelson Piquet?! Your lap times are great!" I had no idea they were timing us, but of course they were.
(Sound of my head swelling three times it's normal size)
Nelson Piquet, handsome Brazilian 3-Time Formula One World Champion
We broke for lunch, and thankfully it was on the light side because cornering G-forces and heavy braking can wreak havoc to a full stomach. Then it was back into the cars for more hot-lapping. So far, all the track time had been for serious testing and evaluation, with the results headed back to Suzuki Motorsports for analysis. At around 3pm, we pitted and the Formula Hayabusa's were rolled into the garage to be prepped for loading into the transporters.
Now it was time for some fun. Parked alongside the pit garage all day were several brand-new Suzuki Aerios, small 5-door hatchbacks in Easter egg colors, waiting patiently for us. These cars were bone-stock 5-speed manual sub-compact grocery-getters, not designed for being anywhere near a racetrack. Heh.
We jumped into the Easter eggs and proceeded to thrash them around the track in a buzzy gang, skinny tires squealing while cornering, inside rear tires lifting at the apexes, us drivers stirring the long shift handles, looking for gears. The speeds weren't that high, but it was absolutely hilarious trying to outdo each other around the track, sawing away at the steering wheel to stay on the asphalt. The term 'swatting at bees' is a good description of how much steering wheel input these cars required.
The crew watching us careen the Easter eggs around the track said afterwards that it was the funniest thing they'd ever seen.
I thought it was AWESOME.
By the time we finished having our way with the Aerios, the sun was ready to drop below the horizon, so we parked the Easter eggs and marveled that none of them had a scratch. Many of the Suzuki staffers were spending another night in Rosamond, so I said my goodbyes and headed out for the three-hour drive back home.
As a teenager in the early 70's, all I could think about was cars and auto racing and girls. As an adult, I lucked into a thirty-year career working in the automotive performance and motorsports industries, which accorded me the chance to drive all kinds of cars on everything from autocross courses in parking lots to high-speed race tracks. I could never have imagined I'd be lucky enough to have a day like the one I just described, let alone many many more just like it. Although I'm now semi-retired, I still have my helmet and fire suit.
Legacy mementos... and they both fit, too.
Right now, I'm looking at the K1 Speed indoor karting gift card on my desk, taunting me. Yep... it's gonna get used very soon. I'm an Old Man now, but I can't wait to strap a bucket to my head and get my speed on again.
Going fast RULES.
All images, Gracias de Google Images; Commander Cody 'Hot Rod Lincoln' video, Muchisimas Gracias de YouTube.
No comments:
Post a Comment