Let's hear your best racing story... win, lose, crash, whatever, as long as it's interesting. Keep it legal, don't want this thread getting locked.
My best story is from an autocross a few weeks ago. I met up with Mike & Scott (SmokingTires & Ne0z) for the race. I had to drive Mike's car (stockish V6 Gen3) since mine was in another state with a blown tranny. On my last run I broke into the 69's, but had one stupid cone, so it was a 0:71 something. Best run was a 70.2XX, good for 5th out of 15 in STS (beating out two SRT-4's & two Integra's among others), 15th out of 42 in PAX, and my first trophy from an autocross.
On the other hand, my worst story follows. This summer I was working crew for a friend racing down in Illinois. I don't remember what kind of car it was (Open wheel, Irish made I think, Lotus powered). Friday practice he was hearing some funny noises from the top end, but when we checked it out on Saturday morning, we found nothing. Warmed up the engine, listened for everything, it seemed perfect. He went to grid for the qualifying session and I went to a spot to watch... after a few laps, he was a no show. I got on the moped to head back, and saw the car pulled off on the side of the main straight with a gigantic puddle of oil underneath. We tow it back to our spot in the paddock, and take the body panels off, only to reveal a hole in the side of the block the size of a silver dollar! The piston that went wrong had come up higher than normal, and the added compression blew out the core of the spark plug! The electrode was there and unharmed, but the core was nowhere to be seen. He had spun a bearing, thrown a rod, something or another... I wasn't around for the tear-down. Granted, this is a risk you take when racing... however this car was practically brand new. He bought it in the spring for $35-40K, and it had less than 2 hours on it. How much to replace the engine? $15,000... USD. Needless to say, there were MANY profanities that day.
My best story is from an autocross a few weeks ago. I met up with Mike & Scott (SmokingTires & Ne0z) for the race. I had to drive Mike's car (stockish V6 Gen3) since mine was in another state with a blown tranny. On my last run I broke into the 69's, but had one stupid cone, so it was a 0:71 something. Best run was a 70.2XX, good for 5th out of 15 in STS (beating out two SRT-4's & two Integra's among others), 15th out of 42 in PAX, and my first trophy from an autocross.
On the other hand, my worst story follows. This summer I was working crew for a friend racing down in Illinois. I don't remember what kind of car it was (Open wheel, Irish made I think, Lotus powered). Friday practice he was hearing some funny noises from the top end, but when we checked it out on Saturday morning, we found nothing. Warmed up the engine, listened for everything, it seemed perfect. He went to grid for the qualifying session and I went to a spot to watch... after a few laps, he was a no show.
I got on the moped to head back, and saw the car pulled off on the side of the main straight with a gigantic puddle of oil underneath. We tow it back to our spot in the paddock, and take the body panels off, only to reveal a hole in the side of the block the size of a silver dollar! The piston that went wrong had come up higher than normal, and the added compression blew out the core of the spark plug! The electrode was there and unharmed, but the core was nowhere to be seen. He had spun a bearing, thrown a rod, something or another... I wasn't around for the tear-down. Granted, this is a risk you take when racing... however this car was practically brand new. He bought it in the spring for $35-40K, and it had less than 2 hours on it. How much to replace the engine? $15,000... USD. Needless to say, there were MANY profanities that day.
