I generally dislike summer track days. I'm just not a giant fan of sweaty hot weather so when I saw that our schedule for NJMP Lightning was towards the end of June, I was hoping it'd be before things heat up. Well our two days there was absolutely swamp ass weather. Both days topping off at around 95F ambient but definitely felt above 100F.
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| NJMP Lightning - 6-23-2024 |
I was super eager for this even though because of all the recent changes to the car which included:
- Replacing bad sway bar endlinks and collars
- Changing from Continental Force to Bridgestone RE-71RS 245/40R17 tires all around
- Changing the rear springs to 13Kg swift springs to match my fronts
- Added more rear camber (-3 in the rear now)
- Fresh Carbotech XP10/XP8 pads and fresh rotors all around
All these fixes plus the aero had me excited because I was really hoping the car would finally be well balanced and at a high speed track like NJMP lightning, having aero was going to make a ton of difference.
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| NJMP Lightning - S2K Takeover - 6-23-2024 |
My first session on Saturday was a bit sketchy. The tires were still fresh and not scuffed in yet and my new brake pads hadn't been bed in yet so my braking was far from confidence inspiring. After a few sessions though things were starting to feel really good but my driving was lacking. I was still hovering around the 1:19s and I knew I was leaving tons of time out there. After sleeping on it and chatting with the guys about key turns like T1 and T2 where I hadn't been trusting the grip of the car, it eventually clicked and I was able to lean on the car more and trust the grip would be there. I was able to put in a 1:16.32 to set a new PB despite the ambient temps being around 93F at the time. Reviewing the video and data, I definitely left more time on the table so I can't wait to return in cooler temps to see how much faster I can go.
Setup notes:
Tire pressures: 27psi cold
Damper settings: 25 clicks from full stiff (counterclockwise) in the front and 13 clicks from full stiff in the rear.
