First Champ event of 2010

Boy, time sure flies. The first event of the year has rolled around and it has been almost 2 months since I last raced. Happy New Year everybody. I hope that you had a safe and fun filled holiday season.

Anyhow, I started the day at 4 AM, driving from my home to Jason's house to pick up the Civic because he could not make the event. At least the weather was decent and it wasn't raining.

I go through the routine setting the car up for the event and trying to double check and remember to do all the steps that Jason usually takes care of. I think I have it all done.

I'm a little nervous not having raced in a while and also already tired from the early drive. I was looking forward to my work session and then a break to regroup before I have to drive.

At the drivers meeting, the groups are combined and ST ends up running first - oh boy. Now I have to make sure everything is ready immediately.

We line up in grid and this is an interesting course that everybody is calling transitional. There is a section where I think I can make the turn by lifting and rotating instead of using the brakes. It doesn't work on my first run and I slide into the outside cone - oops. I make my second run on sorta warm tires and still slide wide. Now I have two runs and nothing clean. I'm also quite a bit off the pace of Jeff and Sebastian's raw times. I make my third run and it's clean, putting me in 2nd place, about 6/10 behind Jeff. I never felt like I had driven well, missing my apexes and just being late in general. Jon and Sebastian both had runs left and figured the 2nd place would not last.

However, Sebastian was not able to get a clean faster run and Jon didn't get a faster run either, so I end up in 2nd place. Better than I expected. The big surprise was finishing in 7th place overall for the entire event in Pax. I need to work on regaining the edge and going faster.

Play hard everybody! See you online again soon.