Phillip Island II, June 1st 2003 (Rain!)

June 2003

words and pics by Peter Scott, Stan Johnson and Justin Hughes.

Results:

Sunday June 1st 2003 - Phillip Island Auto Race Club Results ( http://www.piarc.com.au ). Download full pdf file of all the results for the day here: Phillip Island - June Sprint  Next Sprint day is August 2nd and 3rd 2003.

Lovely sunny day on the practice Saturday but it poured and poured on Sprint Sunday - we went home early - David stayed and got himself a PB under 2 minutes  - it made it all worthwhile!

Other results from the day:

Sunday 1st June

- about 8am time to drive to the track:

Sunay morning was a wet one - Stan and I stayed at Juzza's holiday house.

Wet day to go to the races!

under the main straight through the tunnel

Park car to the left in the paddock - then go line up to get paperwork filled out. Competition cars can't move until 9am - so scrutineering is not so busy early.

The Soarers

5 turned up - still a very strong presence for street cars - one of the biggest single makes of car. All the regulars know us know.

David Ross's car - real fast real nice. Roll cage, Bride race seats,  4 point harness, 1998 factory manual with 190 rwkw VVTi single turbo 1JZGTE

David uses the Yokohama Advan semi slick tyre.

Peter Goodin's TT manual next to Stans Auto TT. Peter G don't use no stinkin' Internet - we just met him there!

Pretty much stock except for boost and exhaust.

very neat interior - manual TT Soarers are rare.

new tyres for the weekend - same as David - Advan semislicks

Me and Juzza sheltering from the rain.

The mighty Bridgestone RE540S Potenza Semi Slick Motorsport Tyre. Easily the best tyre I have driven on. Noisy, tramlines, pretty uncomfortable on the road but on the track probably the best road legal motorsport tyre you can get in the world. Very common at Phillip Island on the expensive cars - like the Holden Targa Tasmanian Monaros with there big 18 inch 265 tyres all round - me I go for the much much cheaper 225/50/16 tyre on stock 10 spoke wheels. The 225 540s destroys much wider 265 street tyres - more grip than my previous 235/45/17 PIrelli Comp C tyres. Juzza got himself some Pirelli's and loved them.

I found that with these tyres I was faster everywhere. The other improvement Stan, Juzza and I had was the Apexi - now we weren't limited to 178 - now we could go as fast as we wanted. My speed lifted to 221 kph at end of straight. Didn't get any times on the Saturday, but Rob had a go and Suze got him doing 2:02's on the stopwatch - so things were looking good - very happy with the tyres. I was real dissappointed on the Sunday when track was damp and it started to rain! Next time hopefully!

The only problem with the Apexi on the V8 was that we couldn't use full throttle after 200 kph - well we couldn't press the black button under the pedal - otherwise the car would change back to third.

Photo by Stan Johnson.

Stan brought his temperature gun along - great tool to see how pressures in tyres are going and if you need to increase or dercease pressure - we were measuring the temp of everything!

Raytek Raynger ST20 pro,  Non contact thermometer
 Temp range -32 to 545 degrees centigrade with accuracy of + or - 2.5 degrees centigrade
 Area measured for temp at 300mm is a 38 mm circle. Area measured a 1.5 meters is 130mm circle
 Price is about $ 300
 In a car sense its good for checking brakes, radiators for blocked tubes and tyres.
 When used for tire temp checking . If edges are higher than centre then tyre is under inflated. If centre is higher then tyre over inflated. If hotter on one edge than the other by a significant amount then suspension geometry is not suitable for current circuit and should be changed i.e. generally more or less camber. 
 Checking radiators; Scan over core and note cold spots
 Brakes. If different side to side indicates unequal braking effort. Colder side less efficient or tyre has less grip. - Stan Johnson

Phillip Island II  - by Justin Hughes.

After running around like lunatic on Friday (like last time !!)

I finally caught up with Rob', Suz'e and Pete' and we all

headed off to the "Beach House".  After the obligatory Feast

at the Cowes Chinese Restaurant, we went home and fought

bitterly to the last tooth over who was sleeping where !!!!

 

Saturday arrived very soon after and Rob was quietly Spewing

'coz both Mine and Pete's cars were Filthy Dirty. So we washed

'em and then drove on down to the track. By the time we got there

Pete's car was in even worse condition than before and after copping

another short "Spray" from Rob' was heard to mutter "I don't want to talk about it"

 

So ..... Saturday was all about Stan and myself as far as I was concerned

We went straight out and raced fast, close and hard just as if there was no

time delay from April 'till June. It was great, Stan is excellent to drive with

and he dosnt even flinch if your right on his tailpipe under brakes or holding

it in late and deep on the inside ..... we had the best duel I have ever had ever, 

anywhere, EVER !! We jumped out of our cars and gave each other a big HUG

as the goodness of Full-Tilt-Boogie-Action just makes ya feel that way !!!

 

Karl brought down a SEXY RED RX7 which he had a lot of fun with

although I didn't see him much as Stan and I were on our own Trip and 

I was also after Peter Scott as usual.

 

On one of the stints Rob was following me lap after lap after lap,and I'm

thinking "come on pass me , pass me ..." but later on he says in conversation

"oh yeah I was flying around watching Juzza do his thing, but he was holding me up

heaps and blah blah blah ........" !!!!! 

C'mon Rob' holding you up ???? You couldn't pass me mate !!! (I have heard Rob's side of the story and it is just as entertaining - Ed)

 

...... I also got in strife (from Rob) for braking too late and driving like a crazy

man and stuffing up my exit speeds and Pete' said I was coming up on his backside

in Turn 4 too close for comfort; but, I had just installed a new Brake Setup and was

having far too much fun. Sorry Boys I know I Scare Ya's. - Hahahaaaa

I also had the Pirelli P-Zero "C' Tyres which were unbelievable.

 

Sunday was good except our first run was a pain as we were held up by; and were 

holding up a fleet of Mustangs so that was annoying. I cracked the POOPS and

had a little whine for a minute but soon got over it. For the second run we

formulated a plan to allow the BIG Bangers to pass us early, but this was soon

thwarted by the onset of rain. I took no chances and came straight in.

 

That was that pretty much and we called it quits. I managed to do over

3 seconds better than before even on the stuffed up 1st session so I was happy.

Pete was spewing but he had driven very far for little result.

All in all it was a great weekend and heaps of fun hanging out with all the 

dudes in the pits and checking out the real race cars and teams, that get

down there to test their machines. I love it all. 

 

#42 signing off 'till August 3+4 !!!!!!!!!

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