Cal Club Pacific Coast Road Racing Championships - Buttonwillow Raceway 10-26-2013

This was a really cool event to see, not as fun as driving though, that is for sure.... We went up to watch a friend of ours race his classic MGB and enjoyed the nice day at the track. The event had less cars than expected because of other events, but there were still plenty of cars to see.



I decided to put this Tamron 70-300mm Di VC USD lens to the test and work on my panning technique. I had recently looked at some photos where the photographer did panning shots with the camera angled, so of course I had to try this.. The lens's vibration control was able to auto detect and handle the panning motion even when at an angle, pretty fancy...



I took a majority of my shots at 1/60 so a low percentage of my shots came out to my liking.. but the ones that did really made it worth it. Honestly, I really over did the angled panning.. so there is not much variety. A few more mistakes I made were shooting into the sun when I could have just shot elsewhere, and over exposing many of the images. These were not much of a problem though, I was able to clean most of it up with the View NX 2 software that came with my camera.





I am starting to learn to take a better look at "mistakes" as they can turn out to be quite interesting photos, like the one directly above. The front of the car was cut off, but by cropping the image, it really turned out quite interesting. Or like the black & white image above it, just by being lazy and removing color.. it solves a lot of lighting, color, and exposure problems after a few simple adjustments.



Shooting into the sun was quite difficult, but really I was impressed with how many of the photos came out. I am not exactly sure if it is the glass in this lens, the longer lens hood, personal improvement, or a combination of all three, but back in March at the Sonoma LeMons race, no shots I took into the sun were worth a damn..







Most importantly for me.. was that I had a great day with my girl, and a few friends, watching race cars do their thing while taking pictures to my heart's content.

The rest of the photos from the event that I uploaded can be found Here Enjoy!

24 Hour of LeMons - Button Turrible '13 - HOT HOT HOT

No really.. it was freaking HOT. Local air temp was 110F and the asphalt in the pits and on the track exceeded 140F.. which means while standing on it you are basically in 130F... If that is not technically correct.. I don't really care my brain and body are still recovering from the heat. I lost 7 lbs between Friday morning and Monday morning.. and I ate food and drank beer so it was all water weight .. Brain is still not functioning normally.. I almost passed out on the tow home, my fiance got sick from the heat at the track... 30 people were hauled off in an ambulance even though there was a cool down tent run by the local fire department giving away free water and gatorade. Anyways on to the good news !!



The Spitwad took it like a seasoned hooker and just kept on taking it! We ran all weekend without any failures. Sure the motor rings are going bad letting oil blow by out the dipstick then onto the headers leading my teammate Justin to believe the car was on fire and consequently distracting him just long enough that he went off track... but what-the-fuck ever. The team survived the whole race from start to finish and placed (as we have been labeled by The Rusty Hub) a "less-than-stellar" 88th out of 155 and somewhere in the middle of the epic Class C.



The team drove well with Justin outpacing the rest of us by a huge 10 seconds a lap average.. I could make excuses like "I was saving the car" or "I kept getting stuck in traffic" but naw.. that kind of data just went to show he was on it while I was tickling my taint and having a jolly time cruising around the track all weekend. My fiance, already messed up from the heat, went out on Buttonwillow Raceway for her first time completely lost and managed to turn laps for 25mins before safely returning to the pits. Michael, our new arrive and drive driver, drove great all weekend keeping up a respectable pace only going off track once in one of the more deceiving corners of the course. That pretty much sums it up.. oh except for when I was hit on track but that has already been settled and nothing bad really came of it.

Videos are being gone through and uploaded but I am too lazy to embed them now so go to my youtube page Here and check out the latest videos.. maybe some more pics will come up... otherwise that's pretty much how the dump was taken.

So.... lovingly from the Sex Piston's Team Captain,

Never Mind the Bollocks.. and... Piss off!

Getting Ready for Button Terrible '13

Well here we are again... only a few more days till the race. We are hauling up to Buttonwillow Raceway to putt the Spitwad down the ever so long drag strip. At Buttonwillow, some of the cars can do over 125mph and we do a blazing 75mph. So it is really on me to make sure my drivers understand they are to stay on one side of the track when going down the strait and do not cross over. No sudden moves ... Really this is my only worry at this track, otherwise we do alright.



Another issue we face at this race is the weather.. it is going to be Hot. So that means the car will likely be drinking as much water as we do...

Anyways, no reason to draw this out as we are pretty much ready to race. Safety upgrades are made, the car has been gone through and driven around. The only things left are the pre-race maintenance checks we do at the track.

Oh and we need to pick up a large quantity of beer...

Work Days Spring 2013..

Well.. there hasn't been much going on since our last race back in March with the RX7. My pops got the new setup tested on the RX7 and now we are getting the cars ready for Button Terrible which is coming up quickly on June 29-30th. The Spitwad needs a lot more work including some safety upgrades so I dove in and started hacking up the car and my pops helped me get the fabrication done.



I then had a friend of mine come over and properly weld in the new cage modifications. This guy can really weld, unlike me, I am freaking clueless..



Pretty damn sure between the thick steal plate, DOM tubing, and proper welds.. it is almost as strong as the frame of this pile of British excellence. Really glad he does the work for us, in the safety aspect, we need all the help we can get..



Speaking of improved safety... I threw down some cash and picked up a Necksgen for my fiance and I. Racing is not all that dangerous, relatively, but only if you're properly protected. So I really felt it was worth the cash which is over 1/2 my estimated value of the spit in its awesome current condition. The Necksgen helmet posts were quick and easy to install and it is very comfortable. A great feature I did not expect is how easy turning your head is with it on. Compared to the HANS my pops has, that I used to borrow from him, the movement is much better. This will increase our visibility so we can better watch for all the cars we are passing, er well, being passed by. Really glad I went with it verse another brand plus it came with a cool hat and two LeMons get out of jail free cards. Who doesn't love a free cool hat?

Now that the welding is done, the last safety work is to install a new bulkhead/firewall between the fuel cell and the driver compartment. After that, we can finally get to the maintenance work.. and shit it is British so there is plenty to do. Not all of it is required, but the more of it we get done the better. I also bought all the parts to rebuild the brakes and would like to get that done before the race as well. We will see...

Videos from Sears Pointless '13 and Updates on the Sex Pistons Spitfire - 4/2/2013

So I have poorly put together and uploaded two videos from the Willy Wankel Grumpy Nerds RX7 at Sears Pointless. The first is the scary moment my pops had ...



That could have ended up much worse.. thankfully it did not. He was fine, but may have been a little wet in the pants. He checked out the car afterwords and went back out on track. - Balls of Steel

The next is a goofy mix of me behind the wheel. I am kinda a spaz, the camera and mic tell all...



And now onto the future.. or well the past cause it is the old car? Well whatever screw it.. The Team Sex Pistons Triumph Spitfire is to make a return at the 24 hour of LeMons race - Button Terrible '13 @ Buttonwillow Raceway.


My Spitfire is bad ass but does not photograph well. It's like a dirty hooker who could have been a model 10 years ago but took up a healthy habit of slamming heroin instead ~ Colin Craft

So it appears like we will have the same basic team we had at Chuckwalla back in December but one of the other girls is going to race as well. Another rookie to suffer the fate of a first LeMons race in a underpowered British tin can that is managed by me of all people. Haha sucker!

The Spitwad did start up, has good oil pressure, and ran cool this past weekend. The new rubber comes this week and the safety upgrades plans are solid. We have to remove the old backstays and install new ones that land in front of the rear most point of the rear tires. With a very precise plan, precision cutting wheel, and eyeballing... I used a fancy green garden pole to mark it out.





Will get the new tires mounted this Saturday but then I leave for two weeks on a work trip. When I return I will purchase the materials for the new backstays and spreader plates, then a friend and quality welder will help me install it properly.

Wish I had more time to work on the car, but work pays for this filthy affliction...

Video from Arse-Sweat June 2012 - 24hr @ Buttonwillow

Finally I have compressed and uploaded one of the videos from our last race. It was the best one that we had. It is of my teammate Justin driving from daylight into the night at the Full 24 hour race - Arse-Sweat-Apalooza @ Buttonwillow raceway June 2012.

It is about an hour long, sorry I did not take the time to trim it down. Enjoy!



(if you are on a mobile device and can not see the video go to the bottom of the page and click "View Web Version")