Well it was a roller coaster of emotions and I just now found the time to write about it. As some of you know I just found out about this district race about 2 weeks before the race. Since our area didn't have a district race I just followed the pack rules for our pack race. When I found this district race to race in I found out that we had a few things to change to our car to make it legal for this race.
Finally I got all the changes made after 2 straight days of not sleeping. It was the day before the race and I was expecting some parts in the mail to finish the car and hopefully just put things together and go to the race. I hadn't received the parts yet so I was searching frantically among my dads wheels and nails and my brothers old cars to see what parts would qualify for the race just in case the wheels and nails didn't show. I didn't really find any that would qualify but luckily (I thought) the wheels and nails arrived.
Me and Weston were so excited and we went to my dads to finish the car and I looked in the box when we got there and it was the wrong order!! The wheels were way to light to qualify. So I was back to the drawing board with the race the next day and no wheels to work with. I called my brother who said he had some I could use that met the council rules a couple years back that he swore would meet these rules too.
So I drove to his house late at night and picked them up. Got back to my dads and put the calipers on them.... nope... too small diameter! After a long time of searching through old parts I found some wheels that were at least trued and had some work on the double step and hubs but when I put the calipers on them some measurements met the rules and some were just below - depending on how/where I measured them.. we are talking like .001 too small with our digital calipers.
So I make an executive decision that these were the best wheels we got and hopefully they were not going to be extremely strict at the race. I stayed up all night again - prepped the wheels which obviously had to be rushed without letting the wax cure and the whole nine yards.
Finally got the car together and ran it down the tuning board - it sounded awful and could hear clicking - I suspected that my bores were out of round and were bigger than they should be - who knows they probably had been prepped 2 or 3 times already Ha! So I put it on the test track anyway cuz I was out of time. 1st run down -2.55 which is extremely slow on our track - that was a time I was getting before we discovered this forum and rail running and with graphite.
I changed the steer and ran it again - 2.49. okay that's getting better but still sounded awful on the board so I looked at where the double step had been removed and the plastic had not been shaved wide enough for the nail heads to fit without rubbing the outer edge of the nail head.
So I dismantled and shaved it with an exacto and switched the wheels around to different locations. Down the tuning board it went and sounded a little better but when I spun the wheels I could still hear a clicking noise. It was gonna have to do. Ran it down the track again 2.48, ran it again, 2.48, Then it got into the 2.47s which is a respectable time for our track considering my brother won council a couple years ago doing 2.49.
The car before the pack race was doing 2.461 on my dads track but that was with much better wheels and better wheel base and my fenders were in proper positions. My dad came out about then and said its time to go to the race - did you get some sleep? I just laughed and tried not to fall over.
We went to the race and I tried to sleep in the car but was way too nervous. We got there and this was a big race event - it was a combined district race with two districts and a lot of activities and people there. We went to the inspection table and I saw the guy inspecting the cars from a distance and I almost fell over - he had loupes on his head and light - who knows what magnification and was looking at all the cars like his life depended on it - magnet test - contraptions custom made to check/measure the cars and the works...
I knew this was not going to be good. I overheard him tell the person in front of us that his wheelbase was too wide and he wasn't allowed to race and then the next minute he said well I guess you are okay to race. So I had hope that he was somewhat flexible and understanding. So our turn came up and he was impressed with the car but quickly pulled out his calipers which were not digital like ours at home and he said "theres a problem" your wheels are not going to qualify they are too small - I said I know they are very close depending on where I measured them but most of the measurements were over the allowed diameter - he said I am measuring 1.174 right here and its supposed to be 1.175 .
I tried to think of something to say that would not sound like I wanted him to cheat for us to get in but come on-- .001 off and depending on where you measured? Is that really going to give us an unfair advantage? So after some pleading he said no go - I had to pull out some orange wheels that luckily I had brought that were right out of the box with nothing done to them, I frantically pulled the wheels off the car and took some sandpaper to the orange wheels to smooth a little bit and put a drop of oil in and eyeballed the steer and turned it in just in time for the race.
I looked at my son and I wanted to cry and collapse at the same time due to lack of sleep and I told him "this might not go well buddy. Our car is not going to be as fast as we hoped and we may not be getting a trophy today" He seemed upset but was glad to be able to race.
The cars that I saw there with the little time I had looked fast. The guy behind me had his car decked out with diamond gee fenders front trailers and back and a thin vinyl cover on the top with a printed design and I thought - oh crap! and he just happened to be a wolf just like my son. So the first race started and his car didn't wiggle which I was happy to see but I think the first race was against that gee car and we lost by half a car length. we were doing 2.57s and his car was doing 2.54s I knew we were not going to catch him.
But to our surprise he was still fast compared to the other cars and he got 2nd in the wolf race and a trophy. The top 4 advance to the finals and they let you take the car and do whatever to it before the finals race and then you have to get it reinspected. Sooo... I ate some food real quick and asked my son if he wanted to try and catch the fastest car by changing the car setup and risk making it go slower or leave the car the way it was knowing it wouldn't get first but not knowing how fast the other cars were going to be. He said lets catch the leader!
So I got no rest again and set up a make shift tuning board and grabbed some tape and used his car as a measuring device at 7 inches and we lessened the steer and did some more work on the wheels with some sandpaper and the nail buffer. We got the car reinspected and on to the finals. I had no clue what to expect but just hoped I didn't ruin his chances at another trophy.
First run down his car did 2.46s and then 2.45s and stayed in the 2.45s I knew unless by some fluke chance we were not going to catch the first car but we were going .02 faster each race so I was happy. I started to notice another car who was getting very similar times to ours and beat us in a couple races and you couldn't tell who won until you looked at the screen. It seemed we were going to get a solid 3rd overall as the races went on.
When they announced the names at the end and were giving trophies and showing the times and ranks - the 2nd place car only beat us by overall avg time of .0002 that's right 3 zeros and a 2! I couldn't believe it - I didn't think it was going to be that close- as I watched the race videos afterwards at home I was cringing at every wobble our car made thinking... that right there cost us 2nd place haha. Anyway the first place car avg time was 2.5415 ours was 2.5598.
At the race I was actually very calm and just happy that he got some trophies and the car did as well as it did considering the wheel fiasco. He had a great time and was very happy with the outcome - hes a good kid and never complains. After the race I was tormenting myself with all the crap we think about such as if I had only done this or that and that went on for a few days but I think I'm finally over the disappointment of not knowing what could have been if we could have run some decent wheels. I did try to compare times from before and after the race on my dads track.
I got the car home and ran it down the track without changing anything and it did 2.499 not sure if I can accurately make any conclusion but if it was going 2.475 before the race (difference of .024) then I would have like to think we would have taken it all if I could have kept those wheels on there since total avg time difference at the race was .0183 ... but who knows.
Anyway sorry for the long story but I had to get it all off my chest since this has been eating at me... I think I can finally focus on something else hahaha. On to the next goal! We learned a lot and will be better prepared next time!
Thank you to DD4H for all his awesome advice and products! Thanks to everyone who answered my many questions! You guys rock!
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