As mentioned in this post, the wife and I raced the LODRS (Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series) at Yellowstone Dragstrip this weekend in the Sportsman ET class in our W124's. Race 1 (Thursday/Friday) was, ahem, forgettable. We won't go there. 
Qualifying on Saturday went ok, and Race 2 on Sunday went a little better.
First round, my wife lined up against a local lady, and my wife had a reaction time advantage and won the round. My opponent broke on the starting line so I got a "single" run - phew. So far, so good!
Unfortunately, my wife and I were forced to race each other in Round #2 on the ladder. First round (E1, Elimination #1) is "random", whomever you pull up next to in the lanes is who you race. For Round #2 (and the rest of the race) you are on a "ladder", which assigns your opponent based on the results of E1. We don't like having to race each other prior to semi-finals, but it was out of our hands.
Anyway. Our race against each other in E2 was epic. We both had fantastic reaction times (0.027 for her, 0.010 for me) and both our cars ran faster than expected, resulting in a "double breakout" where both cars run quicker than our dials. I thought she wasn't going to catch me so I scrubbed (pumped the brake pedal 1 time while keeping the throttle pinned) - this slows my car by maybe 1 hundredth of a second. One-hundredth seems like nothing, until you see that I had the stripe (finish line) by 0.0032 (thirty-two ten-thousandths of a second), and the margin of victory (MOV) was 0.0142 (bit over 14 thousandths). In this case, for the double breakout, the winner is who is least under their dial-in. I was slightly less below the dial because I hit the brakes near the finish line. Had I not done this, I don't know who would have won E2... it was that close. Great race! Kinda got lucky there.
In E3, I faced a local hot-shoe, a multi-time track champion with a dozen or so Wally trophies on his mantle already. Something weird happened with the weather and both our cars went on "fliers", where we both ran WAY faster than expected. Might have had a tailwind kick up during our run. This resulted in another double breakout, this time I had the stripe by 0.0083 (eight-thousandths and change) and the MOV was 0.0063 (six-thousandths and change). This was a a stupid close race, even stupider close than E2 with my wife. Hot-shoe and I both had embarrassingly slow reaction times, but we'll not talk about that.
In the final round, we were called back to the lanes very quickly. This is a problem for 2 reasons: First, with only ~20 minutes of cool-down time, the engine is hot and the transmission is hot. Second, with everything hot, it's difficult to predict what ET (elapsed time) the car will run. It could run close to the previous run, or it could slow down by multiple hundredths of a second (which is a LOT in bracket racing). Worse yet, the E3 numbers were unexpectedly fast. Would the car run anywhere near the 14.38 that it just did in E3? Or would it run closer to the 14.45-14.46 that it ran in E2? I had a 14.42 on the window, and just before we were called up the sun went behind a cloud and the wind kicked up. I changed to a 14.40 dial (bit quicker) and put on my helmet.
The agonizing over my dial ended up being all for naught, as I went -0.003 red at the starting line (left 3 thousandths of a second before the green light). Sigh. Instant loss, my opponent won the coveted Wally trophy - we only have 3 chances per year to win one of these (LODRS Race 1, Race 2, and one other race during the year). Since I went red, I "played the stripe" near the finish line. I was going to pass him, but I wanted to practice closing the gap so I would only be ahead by a small margin (ideally, 0.01-0.02 seconds). I screwed this up as well and "gave back the stripe", meaning I finished behind him... by 0.0251, which was quite a bit of an error on my part. Had I not done this, I think my car was going to run a 14.44 on my 14.40 dial.
My opponent had a decent 0.055 reaction time, and ran his 0.009 over his dial, meaning he had a total 0.064 "package" (reaction time plus time above dial-in). Since I was an estimated 0.040 off my dial, I needed a 0.024 green light (or better) to win. Bottom line, he had a GOOD run, and since I misjudged the dial, I needed a fabulous reaction time to win. I'm not too upset about going 0.003 red since I needed a killer light to win. Had I been napping at the tree (slow reaction time) I'd have been annoyed that I hadn't pushed harder. In retrospect, 20/20 hindsight, I should have left my 14.42 dial - would have "only" needed a 0.044 reaction time to win, had I not lifted at the end. Better yet, I should have dialed 14.44 (just under my E3 time, basically ignoring the "fast" E3 run)... could have won with an 0.064 reaction time, theoretically.
Oh well. There's always next year! Videos below are linked to the beginning of the Sportsman ET class for each elimination round.
E1: 2:08:30 (Wife & I both won our rounds)
E2: 3:23:00 (Wife & I race each other)
E3: 4:02:25 (I beat the local hot-shoe)
E4: 4:28:00 (the 500E loses the final and the Wally)
Qualifying on Saturday went ok, and Race 2 on Sunday went a little better.First round, my wife lined up against a local lady, and my wife had a reaction time advantage and won the round. My opponent broke on the starting line so I got a "single" run - phew. So far, so good!
Unfortunately, my wife and I were forced to race each other in Round #2 on the ladder. First round (E1, Elimination #1) is "random", whomever you pull up next to in the lanes is who you race. For Round #2 (and the rest of the race) you are on a "ladder", which assigns your opponent based on the results of E1. We don't like having to race each other prior to semi-finals, but it was out of our hands.
Anyway. Our race against each other in E2 was epic. We both had fantastic reaction times (0.027 for her, 0.010 for me) and both our cars ran faster than expected, resulting in a "double breakout" where both cars run quicker than our dials. I thought she wasn't going to catch me so I scrubbed (pumped the brake pedal 1 time while keeping the throttle pinned) - this slows my car by maybe 1 hundredth of a second. One-hundredth seems like nothing, until you see that I had the stripe (finish line) by 0.0032 (thirty-two ten-thousandths of a second), and the margin of victory (MOV) was 0.0142 (bit over 14 thousandths). In this case, for the double breakout, the winner is who is least under their dial-in. I was slightly less below the dial because I hit the brakes near the finish line. Had I not done this, I don't know who would have won E2... it was that close. Great race! Kinda got lucky there.
In E3, I faced a local hot-shoe, a multi-time track champion with a dozen or so Wally trophies on his mantle already. Something weird happened with the weather and both our cars went on "fliers", where we both ran WAY faster than expected. Might have had a tailwind kick up during our run. This resulted in another double breakout, this time I had the stripe by 0.0083 (eight-thousandths and change) and the MOV was 0.0063 (six-thousandths and change). This was a a stupid close race, even stupider close than E2 with my wife. Hot-shoe and I both had embarrassingly slow reaction times, but we'll not talk about that.
In the final round, we were called back to the lanes very quickly. This is a problem for 2 reasons: First, with only ~20 minutes of cool-down time, the engine is hot and the transmission is hot. Second, with everything hot, it's difficult to predict what ET (elapsed time) the car will run. It could run close to the previous run, or it could slow down by multiple hundredths of a second (which is a LOT in bracket racing). Worse yet, the E3 numbers were unexpectedly fast. Would the car run anywhere near the 14.38 that it just did in E3? Or would it run closer to the 14.45-14.46 that it ran in E2? I had a 14.42 on the window, and just before we were called up the sun went behind a cloud and the wind kicked up. I changed to a 14.40 dial (bit quicker) and put on my helmet.
The agonizing over my dial ended up being all for naught, as I went -0.003 red at the starting line (left 3 thousandths of a second before the green light). Sigh. Instant loss, my opponent won the coveted Wally trophy - we only have 3 chances per year to win one of these (LODRS Race 1, Race 2, and one other race during the year). Since I went red, I "played the stripe" near the finish line. I was going to pass him, but I wanted to practice closing the gap so I would only be ahead by a small margin (ideally, 0.01-0.02 seconds). I screwed this up as well and "gave back the stripe", meaning I finished behind him... by 0.0251, which was quite a bit of an error on my part. Had I not done this, I think my car was going to run a 14.44 on my 14.40 dial.
My opponent had a decent 0.055 reaction time, and ran his 0.009 over his dial, meaning he had a total 0.064 "package" (reaction time plus time above dial-in). Since I was an estimated 0.040 off my dial, I needed a 0.024 green light (or better) to win. Bottom line, he had a GOOD run, and since I misjudged the dial, I needed a fabulous reaction time to win. I'm not too upset about going 0.003 red since I needed a killer light to win. Had I been napping at the tree (slow reaction time) I'd have been annoyed that I hadn't pushed harder. In retrospect, 20/20 hindsight, I should have left my 14.42 dial - would have "only" needed a 0.044 reaction time to win, had I not lifted at the end. Better yet, I should have dialed 14.44 (just under my E3 time, basically ignoring the "fast" E3 run)... could have won with an 0.064 reaction time, theoretically.
Oh well. There's always next year! Videos below are linked to the beginning of the Sportsman ET class for each elimination round.
E1: 2:08:30 (Wife & I both won our rounds)
E2: 3:23:00 (Wife & I race each other)
E3: 4:02:25 (I beat the local hot-shoe)
E4: 4:28:00 (the 500E loses the final and the Wally)
