My First Autocross In An FFR
By: Bill Peirce
Pictures from my
second autocross.
I woke up early in the morning thinking
that I would go over the car one more time before driving it down to the
track. I also wanted to check the tire pressures and set the rear ride
height up a little. The front is at 4.5", but the rear has settled to
3.9". I wasn't going to mess with it because I have a coil-over kit
on order, but I figured I better do it for this event. Laziness took over
and I didn’t get anything done, except check the fluids and tires. I
just hate messing with the stock springs, what a pain! I’ll wait until
the kit gets here before messing with it.
Our house is about 50 miles from the track
so I sweet-talked my wife into loading some tools up in her NSX to meet me
there. A couple of friends also planned on meeting me there. I guess
everyone wanted to see me spin the car! I had to be at the track before
noon and I still needed gas, but a guy from Corpus Christi was in town
visiting his family and he really wanted to see an FFR roadster up close.
I met him through the FFCobra forum. he really wants to build a car, so I
took the time to stop for a few minutes. He loved the car and I
think he’ll be building one soon. Real nice people. So now I’m running
late and then I remember that I had forgotten my helmet! Dang it! So I
called my wife from my cell phone and begged her to go back and get the
helmet. Thank goodness I have such a great wife. By the way, using a cell
phone sure is interesting in these cars!
The drive down to the track was cold. I
think is was low 50’s, so I bundled up pretty good. After getting some
gas and getting the track 5 minutes late, I was ready to go. The SCCA
website suggested that our cars should run in ASP. That’s a pretty
tough class and I figured to get spanked bad. But only two people showed
for that class, so I was sure to finish in the top two! They had 225
people in the morning group, but less than 100 in the afternoon group
because of the Super Bowl game.
I signed up and asked what class they were
putting me in. They were thinking I could run in SS (Super Stock), which
sounds right because that’s the Z06 Vette’s, Viper’s, NSX’s, etc.
But a couple of Vette guys said, “He can’t run with us! He’ll kill
us!” I said, “Trust me, this car was just finished a few weeks ago,
I’m running street tires and I haven’t autocrossed in 2 years. So
don’t worry about me!” The officials finally said to put me in ASP
(“A” Street Prepared).
I decided to use Gordon Levy’s
recommended tire pressures on my first run. I have 17” PS wheels with
245/45-17 and 285/40-17 Yokohama A520’s. They are not the most sticky
tire I could buy, but they will work great on the street and fine for the
track every now and then. (So I thought… more later on tires.) I had 23
psi up front and 28 psi in the rears. Then some “know-it-all”, future
National Champion driving autocross expert came over and talked me into
pumping up the air to 30 psi all around. What a mistake! My car is
basically stock, with a FR 1”15 rack, and a E303 cam. My first run was a
69 second run, which was a good 5-6 seconds behind the fastest C5-Vettes.
The car was really loose. I had a lot of push and the rear end would step
out with the smallest amount of throttle. The second run, I was planning
on letting some air out, but forgot to because I was too bust talking to
everyone who came over to ask questions about the car. I run another 69
seconds, but that was because I took out 3 cones in a late braking
experience. They add 2 seconds per cone, so it would have been much
better. Again, the car was really fast, but the tires were not working.
After getting back to the pits we had to pry a cone out from under the
car. That was funny!
The last run was the best. I ran 25 psi up
front and 28 psi in the rear. The car felt solid and was very easy to turn
in. The rear end was more manageable too. I need to bleed the brakes, they
still suck! Anyway, I ran a solid 66 second lap without touching a cone.
It felt good and wish we could have had another run, but maybe next time!
As a comparison, the fastest Viper ran a 69 second lap, but the fastest
Z06 was a 61 second lap. Of course those guys are running Hoosier
autocross slicks or Yokohama A032 race tires. And they have traction
control, ABS, stability control, and sway bars!
I finished second in class. Or you could
say I finished last in class! The other ASP car was a twin turbo RX7 that
only weighted 2,500 pounds and had every imaginable trick part you could
think of. Plus big fat slicks! His best time was a 63 second lap. I’ll
get him next time! 
If you live near Houston, visit www.houscca.com
to see the autocross schedule. We’ll go back and you should join us!
Click on the pictures to enlarge them!
getting ready for my first run. I love my new PS Engineering
wheels! |
At the start gate... |
Wow... look at the tires smoke! |
The car handled great! |
High speed radius turn. |
Don't those 285's look great on the back? |
Carl and Bill. These are the builders of FFR 3035K. My car is small compared to 500+ pounds of man!
And yes, 6'-4"
guys can fit an FFR Roadster. |
This was my last and best run of the day. |
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