A few weeks back I flew out to Ontario, CA to check out the Redline Time Attack held at California Speedway. I've been attending DE's at various tracks around Texas for the past several years but unfortunately none of the Time Attacks are held even remotely close to Texas. Kuah, the owner of SPL Parts, was towing his 95 300zx across the country to take a stab at the competition and enter the car in it's first Time Attack. Since SPL sponsors my z33 I thought it would be a perfect opportunity to fly out there, lend a hand in the pits, check out the format of the event and meet some folks from the forum. I've driven his z32 before and it's insanely fast so I was definitely curious to see how it would stack up against the big guns an event like this attracts.

We arrived at the track early saturday morning and I was amazed to see the budgets that some of the teams were supported by. The GMG Porsche team, the Scion TC of Chris Rado and a few others pulled up in double decker trailers and full rigs to haul them around in. Looks like these guys don't mess around! Must be nice to show up with an entire support crew. An impressive array of cars showed up - lots of fast Evos, STIs, 350Zs, etc.

Here's a picture of a group of us hanging around the Z32 :



knight_white99 was in the pit next to us on Saturday, sorry that you had to leave early.



Steve Mitchell's Mworkz supercharged 350Z (came in 3rd place Unlimited RWD with I believe Tarzan at the wheel)



Mike Alvarez's yellow twin turbo VRT 350Z (came in 3rd place modified RWD with Tanner Foust at the wheel)



Hmmm.... these arms look familiar



It was interesting to see most of the 350z's competing out there were running the SPL front camber/caster arms (the MWorkz car had them too), which was really cool for me since the arms were developed on my Z.

Kuah mentioned that Verena Mei, who was competing at the event, just purchased a set of the camber arms. As has Chris Forsberg, another pro drifter. It's surprising the number of pro drifters who are getting involved in time attacks including Tanner Foust and Tyler McQuarie. I guess their talents include more than just driving sideways!

Verena Mei ( and Mike Kojima in the first pic )



Mike Bonani, member SinCity350z who came in first in the Street RWD class.


The weather was great on Saturday and I found a good place near the grid area to shoot some video and get some pics. Was a perfect spot to help check the tire pressures and tire temps being right beside the hot pits. It was nice to see such a wide variety of cars. The practice sessions were almost more entertaining to watch than the actual competition due to all the passing out there. It was somewhat painful to only watch and not be able to drive though

The weather decided not to cooperate on Sunday and poured rain all morning long. Luckily it cleared up just in time for the timed sessions in the afternoon. After the first heat we checked the results and the SPL car was in first place by a margin of a half a second! We were all pretty stoked and many more people started to wander by the pits to check out the car. Kuah tweaked his Motec EMS a little more to make sure he maintained the lead and we swapped tires to a fresher set of Nitto NT-01's. We gridded behind the Crawford Evo and took off for the second heat. Unfortunately the shifter linkage broke barely half the lap in, leaving the car dead in the water.

At this point we're all bummed out but hoping that our time from the first heat will stand. I think all of the cars got faster in the second heat (track dried off more and the temps dropped) but the 300zx was still able to hold on to 2nd place in the Modified RWD category! It was a bitter sweet 2nd place getting beat by only 2 or 3 tenths and knowing that we had a shot at the win had the transmission linkage stayed in one piece for just a few minutes longer.

All in all it was a great time with a lot of fun and excitement. It's hard to be disappointed with a second place finish on our first attempt with a non pro driver that's never seen this track before. Congrats to Kuah for building such a bada$$ car and to Ryan Schimsk for piloting the beast. Kuah has a nice writeup on the event from his perspective on the SPL website www.splparts.com with a bunch of cool in-car videos. Definitely worth checking out.

It was great to meet so many members of the forum-WA2GOOD(Scott), mraturbo(Mike A), SinCity350Z(Mike B), knight_white99(Steve) and any others I surely have forgetten. DE's are fun, but adding the true competition factor certainly turns it up a notch. I hope they run a Time Attack closer to Texas someday soon so I can give it a try myself.

I have a whole bunch more pictures I'll post when I get a chance so check back later if you can.

 

nice, looks like fun

 

that thing sounds sick!!!!!!

 

Nice. Been there for the time attack before. You can see some nice cars running there.

 

Nice write up! It was good meeting you and the rest of the SPL crew as well. I didn't know you came all the way from Texas until we got to talking after the event, thats quite a haul! The 300ZX was very fast and sounded great. Too bad about the shifter linkage I think you could have had a real shot at the title. Will you guys be making it to Buttonwillow at the end of April?

 

Great write up Shawn!!! Looked like you had a badass time. Dont know if you remember me but I had a black Z with stillen exhaust and was at a few driving events with you. I just got a new Grand Touring and would be really interested in going to some track events with yall. Pm your cell # and maybe we can meet up sometime.
laters
Blaine Waddell

 

Nice write up and some cool pics. Some bada$$ Zs out there. Excellent opportunity for SPL Parts to represent the Great State of Texas!!!

 

and Kuah came so close to winning as well. Too bad, always another day.

 

I won't be able to make it out as I have a wedding to attend up in Dallas that weekend. I think Kuah is seriously considering heading back to Cali though for another shot at it. Are you hitting all the events this season?

 

Oh, ok. Well hopefully Kuah will show! I really want to hit them all, but I need a sponsor (or a few) to set me up with some cash instead of discounted parts that still, although discounted, cost me money.

 

Nice writeup Sean! Thanks for your help at the event!

 

Hi Mike!

Yes I am pretty sure I will be attending Buttonwillow in April, to give this one more shot; the California Speedway event did not get us as much publicity as we hoped for, hopefully Buttonwillow will be good for us!

 

Hey whats up Kuah! Glad to hear it! You will get a good taste of what a real west coast track is like. Cal Speedway's infield is more of a glorified autocross that is both inconcistant (1/2 the track is made up by cones that get moved around) and, let's be honest, kinda boring. Buttonwillow will better justify the long drive from Texas.

 

Hey Sean, a great read about the adventures at the time attack. Nice pics too!

It was great meeting you and Kuah and the other SPL guys that came all the way from Texas.

Sorry to hear that you guys had problems too. I guess that's racing.

My engine was basically trashed, since I lost oil pressure during the very first practice session. But VRT has built me a new motor, with all new parts, so we will be back, bigger and stronger than ever.

I hope to see you guys at another time attack event!

 

Sean, cool write up, nice to have met you, and I am bummed to hear that mine wasn't the only "woulda, coulda" sad story that was so close to a victory. But for me, at least as a team, M.B. (SinCity) was able to pull something off as far as a win..... I realy didn't even get to run any of the sessions in my two classes and four runs except a sory attempt in a trafic filled attempt in the one Mod. session. Oh well it is redemption time at Buttonwillow, and I am SO glad to hear that Kuah is gonna get out here for that too.

 

Next time i'm going to have to run. I had a great time watching but at the time i only owned my car for a few hours. Now with one PDS and many more to follow a time attack will have to happen.

 

more pics








Not sure who owns these 350's

 

A few mor pics. Kuah left for Cali this morning so that reminded me to post the rest of the pics.














and some action shots:

 

I just *might* make it to BW this weekend afterall. If my Z32 isn't ready for the WCN show, then I'll cruise the ZR to BW Sunday and hang with Kuah, Salah, and crew.

 

Check it out if you can. I had a great time at the last event. I've got a wedding to attend in Dallas this weekend though. How's the z32 running?