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Monday, March 14, 2005

The Weekend came, the weekend went and it was gooooood.
Well, after all those butterflies and tense moments where I thought I wouldn't make it through the day... I have had an awesome weekend. Shakespear was right!

The weekend started with me leaving for Sydney late on Thrusday afternoon for a homecomming at about 8:30pm. I grabbed some dinner and headed for bed as I knew what an early morning it would be.

Friday came all too early as I stumbled out of bed... thankful for at least being home.
Dad went to Muirs Holden in Ashfield to go and pick up the new tow vehicle for Lasts and Lasts... His new work vehicle, a VZ Commodore Crewman. As the excitement subsided after his arrival we got to work packing the trailer and the tray.
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After packing we made a few trips around the place to tie up loose ends for the weekend and headed down south and out west to get the weekend underway. With Friday non-compulsory for the race weekend, we thought we would take our time in getting down to Wakefiled Park in a bid to keep with our plans for a relaxing weekend.

Knowing our track record with all things paperwork, we decided to drop into the secretary's office on arrival to get it all out of the way so that we could concentrate on a good weekend of racing. After this was over with(After about an hour of standing in line and then only to find out that our paperwork had myseteriously disappeared and that my name had somehow changed to Kisty!), we made a bee-line for the scrutineers to take advantage of the early scrutineering. As we made it to the line however, we were told that the cut off had passed and that we would have to come back in the morning.

A little disappointed that we couldn't get this out of the way, we headed back to pack up again and to move on in to our Motel room... As I said in my last post, this is our first away race and it was VERY exciting to be staying in a motel and doing all those "Away game" things!

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Our Motel was the LOVELY Alpine Heritage on Sloane St, with generous parking and helpful employees. We decided that instead of going to the Soldier's Club with everyone else to cash our free Gift voucher for the weekend, we would have a nice, quiet Itallian Dinner in a Pizzaria on the main drag.

Here we ate up a hearty meal and hot footed it back to the Motel room after a touch of shopping for essentials at woolies(ie: Lollies, Grapes and Water!), all in time to catch the first few minutes of the St George vs Bulldogs game!

Welcome Saturday Morning.

Fighting back fears of overnight rain, I pulled the curatins of our motel room apart to find something slightly worse in my books. Fog and heavy Dew.
Whilist Dad made jokes about it, I think even he was a little terrified once we got in the car to drive out to the track at 6am to find that we could hardly see a few feet in front of us due to the fog!

We did make it however and got un-packed to start the weekend and get through scrutineering to kick it off.
Whilist we waited for the fog to clear Dad got us through scrutineering and I through the Driver's briefing, and were finally ready to get on with Qualifying!

But even that took some time as the fog just wouldn't lift! It was getting so bad that whilist you couldn't see very much around you, you could see droplets in the mist and after only a few minutes, Dad's once dry hair and clothes were soaked from the exposure!

We also finally made it out once the sun had come up for long enough to dry the fog up and it made out to be quite a warm day. Thankfully enough too! We had a new set of Dunlops on... our ONLY set, and they had not yet been scrubbed in! Procedure for doing this being to do 5 laps or so to get them to temp and then jack the car up and let them cool down again. She'll be right mate...

So, out I went for Qualifying... knowing that I had only 4 tyres to last me for the weekend, I went noticably slower than I would normally. But got through Qualifying without major issue.
Once back in the pits we were delighted to see how much tempreature that they could hold and I was VERY happy with the way that the car was feeling. Inside I felt that there was a LITTTTTTLE bit of Oversteer(Where you keep turning but feel like you are running out of road!), but that it was enough to be fun and little enough to not worry about mentioning.

But one short trip around the track in Race 1 told me differently. After only about 2 laps that little bit of Oversteer had turned itself into a big problem as I finally got the power on round the whole back section of the first part of the track. Where I would have liked to hold my foot flat to the floor around the place, I was instead relegated to having to ease off. Something I wasn't very partial to! Seeing as I was about 8 seconds off the pace of the guy in front of me, I wasn't really willing to let go of any more time!

So, into the pits we came. Whilist I had escaped many an issue with others blowing engines, going off at the sweeper at the end of the straight and just having a bit of biff and barge, I did want to get that Oversteer issue fixed... and Soon!

So, as we packed up Dad and I discussed how much we were going to change the car by. As it was I was yet to post some consisten times and fast ones at that... things had to change and quick... but for the time being that would have to come after a nice dinner out... and according to Dad... on me!

So down to the Soldier's club at Golburn we go to cash our $10 gift voucher. A fab dinner was had by all and we were able to spot some regular familliar faces with the likes of Tiegan Butchers of Improved Productions under 2lts in front of us and a WHOLE swarm of CAMS officials behind us...

Upon arriving home I did try and get some of that urgent uni work done, but as you can expect after such a good day... not much got done and instead Dad and I discussed further how to right the oversteer issue and what the game plan would be for the next day.

Sunday comes...

Again we were greeted with the crappy sight of a low lying fog for our 2nd morning in a row(Who knows how many Golburn have had before that!). The fog lay around for much longer this time with races being delayed and everyone just taking things very easy until about 9:30-10am when things finally got clearer and things started to move along.

We got through scrutineering okay and we helped Jeff(Uncle in Sports Sedans) and his daughter Emma get through also. We pitted with Jeff at Eastern Creek and both Dad and I had HEAPS of fun just hanging out with Jeff and Emma. Emma races Go-Karts and is looking to get into Fvee in a few years time... when she is old enough! Seems that no matter which side of the family you go to... we are alllllll into racing! hehehe...
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Fvee was the 3rd race of the day and it wasn't long before I was sitting in the martialling area with Dad and Emma feeling mighty Green.
Whilist Dad and Em did their best to Calm my nerves(Thanks guys) I knew that the only thing that would get me right would be to get out on the track already! We had waited a LONG time by this stage due to all the delays.
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Once out though there was no wishing I was anywhere else. I started 26th on the grid with a few 1600's behind me(VERY daunting knowing what last year was like with few over zealous drivers at the back of the grid...). As the lights went down I was determined not to have a repeat performance of yesterday's where I pulled 4th off the line insead of 2nd... But I was without fault as I baralled down the straight towards the rest of the slowly assenting pack.

Oh how I wish that my car had a few more legs!

I again got around without injury, set a personal best time around 1:20 and narrowly missed a few other incidents along the way. All in all a great performance and for the first time EVER since starting racing Dad and I had fixed a vehicle dynamic issue TOGETHER... no outside help necessary. With the shocks dropped 2 clicks to loosen things up in the rear a bit more and a few other of Dad's adjustments that we had discussed the night before, we had solved the oversteer issue and done so quite well!

With one more race left to run we allowed ourselves the luxury of a snag and a soft drink down at the Chivas transporter. Over lunch we discussed the weekends happenings with a coloourful array of Fvee people and then were on out way again to prep the car for our 3rd and final race.

Here I was to start from 23rd on the grid. I had finished 5th in the 1200's in the last race and was sitting pretty for the 1200's championship thus far... chasing my goal of a top 10 1200's finish for the year. As the lights went down this time I was a changed girl. In the last race I felt the ease of hammering the car around the track, only braking in about 2 1/2 places... here I was able to stay in contact with the end of the pack for the entirety of the first lap and was only starting to fall behind 1/2 way through the second. This is a miracle on this track where I soon found that being in the thick of it usually meant being overtaken.

The car handled fair and whilist I did slip and slide around the track a bit here and there... I was pleased to find at the end that whilist un-eventful and un-lapped as the race was(Cut to 6 laps due to delays and incidences in the other categories), I was finally holding some VERY consistent laps. Consistently slow, but consistent all the same.

The day ended on a high with An overall placing in the 1200's of about 6th(We think...still waiting on confirmation on that one), and whilist Jeff didn't finish in the Sports Sedans it was an awesome race all the same.
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Round one of the NSW state championships for 2005 cannot be ever remembered as boring... it was certainly filled with lots of action and drama and was a great round for the team at Lasts and Lasts Motorsports!

And I didn't spin once!!!

Luv Kirst



Go back to Lasts and Lasts Motorsport's Webpage via this URL: www.downshift.to/lasts

Thursday, March 10, 2005

Oh this is just great. I spent like 1/2 and hour standing up at the uni's email stations typing this great pre-race post and then the thing decided to die on me! Well... here we go again...

Wow! It has been absolute ages since I have posted here. I have been very busy though. Life has been extremlly hardcore. Of course because Uni has started back up AGAIN.

This year I am in second year again, due to spending a little too mcuh time on one particular race-car project and not enough time hitting the books. Last year, in a nutshell, was crap. I must say it did end on a high though with my uni F-sae team winning the Australiasian Championships, but apart from this, it was a year I would rather forget.

This year didn't seem to be starting out much better either. I had only days before the commencement of uni, decided that the world was ending, I had no passion for anything and not even the prospect of an Australian driver's champion in the F1 and a great year of V8's could lure me out of my current state of Henny Penny Syndrome (ie:"The Sky is falling! The sky is falling!").

I didn't want to go back to uni and have to start 2nd year over again, I didn't want to move out of home again and have to get used to all the new people living in College, I didn't want to NOT have much to do with the SAE team at uni and most of all I didn't know whether I had a passion for racing at all. The later scaring me the most as I didn't know whether these blues would be able to permantly squash my fire for motorsports.

Well, in rolled the year whether I liked it or not and brought more suprising things than I could ever have hoped for. Uni suddenly started making sense! And I actually started enjoying it! I have started hitting the books for pure joy of getting the stuff and finding it's relevance and now for the FIRST time ever I have been able to see myself in a few years time, walking up those steps and getting my certificate. That is what has me going now!

College is great too! I have found kindred spirits in internationals, returning students and even my little Aussie 1st year spring chickens. It is great fun and I can't say that I dislike anyone! Not even a little bit!

As for knowing whether or not the passion for racing in me has given up the ghost, I only had to sit down this morning and realise that I am only HOURS out from leaving for my FIRST away race, and the fire in my belly kicked up again. The fire coming mainly in the form of pangs of nautious-ness and anxiety, but the fire was there all the same! And that excited me. I am not ready to give up yet!

As for the outlook on the race this weekend at Golburn's Wakefield Park... well... it is mainly all feelings of terror linked to the issues below, but I know that if I can just get through this weekend in one piece, without Dad having a heart attack and the car in a reasonable enough state to get to EC on the 9th of April... I know that I will have gained HEAPS.

As for those points of terror relating to this weekend, let me just touch on a few.

1. This is my first RACE at Wakefield Park. I have done Happy Laps and drive my car here for the first time, but this is my first RACE here and that is enought to freak ANYONE out... I'd hope.
2. It is a shorter track with just as many cars as the others... so for once I will be in the thick of it whether I like it or not. Hopefully this doesn't mean getting myself into scrapes but will mean that for the first time I won't be lapping by myself. I will be dicing which is a new concept entinrley!
3. This is my first AWAY race. We live smack bang inbetween EC and OP, the other 2 tracks that the NSW state roadshow visits, and so everynight I get to sleep in my OWN bed. But this time around I will not be able to run home to mummy and have a bit of a cry if everything doesn't go according to plan(ie; keeping the car in one piece). I will be staying in a motel room 1 and 1/2 hours away from Mummy and the prospect isn't inviting. I live with 62 other people every other day of the week but that removing of the comfort blanket of home is going to mean a few things. A, I will be more concentrated on the race and stuff to do with it and B, I will probably be chucking up alot more due to A!
4. This is the first race of the season and being a race full stop is scary enough. But being with a bunch of guys who havn't raced for 3-4 months, all the newbies and Me, it is a scary but widely stated fact that things can get a little bit crazy...

Well. I think that is me sufficiently stated out.
I really now must be going as I have spent 1 hour doing this post and should have been in an "Optional" tutorial instead.
I will be back after the weekend to let ya'll know how things went.
Till then I think I will go and console these Parakeet sized butterflies of mine with a lolly and some more studying... And hopefully will keep more of my food down than up!

Goodluck to everyone this weekend. I pray for a safe, but interesting race.
Godbless
Luv Kirst
xxx
ooo

Go back to Lasts and Lasts Motorsport's Webpage via this URL: www.downshift.to/lasts