2001 One Lap of America
The car has been entered into numerous autocross and dragrace events with only road race style event being the Michelin One Lap of America by Car and Driver in May of 2001.
The OLOA event began on 4 May 01 and included timed events on Watkins Glen(NY), Mid-Michigan Dragway(MI),Michigan International Speedway(MI), Heartland Park Topeka(KS), Motorsports Ranch(TX), Road Atlanta(GA), and Virginia International Raceway(VIR). Upon finishing the lap we covered little over 3900 miles in seven days and competed in fifteen events at six different venues. My brother, Andrew, was my co-driver. We ended up covering 7200 miles in 12 days as we had to drive from Nebraska to reach the start and we detoured into NYC on the way home. This equates to 600 mile a day average for the duration of the trip! We ran one bracket type drag race (at Mid-Michigan) and had a best time of 13.49 at 106, the rest were road courses.
We attained a 7th in class (out of 18) and 14th overall (out of 89 vehicles). Our class were the top dogs as it is based on original MSRP with a cut off of $35,000 and up.
The only vehicle difficulty was a right side caliper that was braking prematurely and a intermittant power steering failure on the last event. Neither of which slowed my times significantly.
For a sports-type car owner, this event has got to be one of the all time favorite experiences one can have. We expected an enjoyable time no matter how we placed-just to visit all the tracks was worth the admission.
Road racing is much harder than it looks I came to figure out-had some idea it is not easy, this just confirmed it!
We hope to try again in 2004...
The OLOA event began on 4 May 01 and included timed events on Watkins Glen(NY), Mid-Michigan Dragway(MI),Michigan International Speedway(MI), Heartland Park Topeka(KS), Motorsports Ranch(TX), Road Atlanta(GA), and Virginia International Raceway(VIR). Upon finishing the lap we covered little over 3900 miles in seven days and competed in fifteen events at six different venues. My brother, Andrew, was my co-driver. We ended up covering 7200 miles in 12 days as we had to drive from Nebraska to reach the start and we detoured into NYC on the way home. This equates to 600 mile a day average for the duration of the trip! We ran one bracket type drag race (at Mid-Michigan) and had a best time of 13.49 at 106, the rest were road courses.
We attained a 7th in class (out of 18) and 14th overall (out of 89 vehicles). Our class were the top dogs as it is based on original MSRP with a cut off of $35,000 and up.
The only vehicle difficulty was a right side caliper that was braking prematurely and a intermittant power steering failure on the last event. Neither of which slowed my times significantly.
For a sports-type car owner, this event has got to be one of the all time favorite experiences one can have. We expected an enjoyable time no matter how we placed-just to visit all the tracks was worth the admission.
Road racing is much harder than it looks I came to figure out-had some idea it is not easy, this just confirmed it!
We hope to try again in 2004...
Comments: tmcarthurs@hotmail.com