I was anxious to get back to my home track after putting in the 6MT differential in my 5AT to take advantage of the lower 3.54's that the manual has. I wanted to sneak into the 13's in my stock Touring with the lower gearing, but it was not to be. The only thing I can lay the blame on was the extreme heat today. By the time I got to the track @ 8:30pm, it was still @ 98 degrees after a high of 109 today!
Anyway, it was time n' tune only tonight and you run whoever pre-stages beside you. I was really launching well tonight, including a couple of .540's (.500 being perfect) and had every car out of the hole. Several Civic's spraying, a modded LS-1, two 5.0 stangs and two C-5's. Oh and a bright yellow SRT-4! I lined up w/the Neon on my 2nd run and nearly threw the white flag because of my slow times tonight. I have a best of 13.801 at another track and my best here at my home track is 14.102 and tonight I couldn't get out of the mid 14's. Though I felt a little better seeing the C-5's both in the mid 14's and a 5.0 @ 14.6.
One thing I have to say about my (heavy!) Touring is that it can get out of the hole nicely. I ran a modded LS-1 that turned a 13.187 @ 110.064 and I pulled a 2.191 60' against his 2.245 60'.
Anyway, back to my most pleasing run of the night against the SRT. Once again, a BIG hole shot. My rt was .680 against his 1.278! Yeow!!! I may beat this puppy, I thought. He now has to play some pretty serious "catch up!" I still had him @ 1,000' and I couldn't see his headlights when I looked quick to my right quarter window. YEAH, I "got there first" and I could care less what my times were, my 5AT Touring whupped up on the vaunted SRT!!! I later talked to him and he couldn't get over my reaction time of .680. Unspoken, but obvious, he couldn't figure out how a 63 year old beat the rt of a 20 yr. old! In fact, tonight was probably one of the very best nights I have had as far as launch/rt times. I had two in the .540's tonight (.500 being perfect) and those are my best ever. BTW, I ended up @ 27# air pressure in the Nitto's tonight. As far as rt's, I am usually in the low .700's to mid '600's which is still something this "Old man" is pretty proud of. I ran 11 cars tonight and put a hole shot on every one of them. Of course I didn't tell any of them that I always leave on the third yellow either!
In the end, my 5AT is a terror off the line and up thru 60+ with a 2.191 60' best tonight in this heat, but is running out of gas when going into third gear which is a pretty tall gear in the 5AT. I may go back to some 17" dr's and see how that may help my 60' times anyway, but I am out of ideas as to how I can get my finishing (1,000' +) times down.
All in all, it was enjoyable tonight, (thank you SRT-4!) even if it was too hot to touch the asphalt! Regards, Jim

 

Sheesh, sorry, but I forgot to post the times! He finished w/ a 14.632 @ 99.007 against my 14.409 @ 98.048. My 60' was 2.196 against his 2.479. Regards, Jim

 

Nice times! Wait until the air cools down in fall (if it even does in AZ )

 

It was still 92 in Tucson when I drove to work at 11:30 pm last night. Nice Kill.

 

He had a 1.278 and a 2.479 60' ?? Talk about a beginner driver ouch.. .540 R/T good job.. My best so far in 10 runs was .520 R/T and a 2.047 60'

 

Seems to me like the track was hot and humid, did you run at night or day? If not run at night and run mids 13's@100+, 98 ain't cutting for a 350z.

 

Good Kill on the SRT-4...
Ive cut a .510 light once..the rest of the time I don't care all that much. Like tell people that i meet who are focused on their RT. Its just part of the drag racing. You can sleep at the light and get a 2.0 it doesn't affect E/T so don't worry about it too much. It definately comes with experience. 2 summers ago I was hitting .7 ~ 1.1 RTs. Im still not focused on it and usually hit .510 ~ .620 <- worst one in the last year. Its all for fun during test and tune anyways Of course if you can hit .500 solid.. bracket racing pays nicely.

 

last week at bithlo there was a SRT-4 bone stock with a gentlemen in his early 50's and still wearing his suit and tie work clothes pulling 14.0's at 102 mph in some extreme heat. The car is impressive in a straightline. I chatted with him for a second I never asked what he was doing but it sounded like he worked for dodge. He was defending the cars OPEN dif and mentioned there should be a dealer option LSD soon.