April 10th was a great day for drifting in Atlanta. The sun was shining but it wasn’t oppressively hot or humid. Southeast Drift was throwing an event at the Turner Field Blue Lot. A long list of established and up-and-coming drivers were participating. Tons of people were in attendance to watch the great action that took place. It was a special day for Batlground Racing in particular.
Dan was able to finally debut the LS/Z. It wasn’t without trial though. We had spent the entire night before getting the car ready for the event and at 2:30 in the morning we were pulling it off of the lift to load. And then it happened, the car wouldn’t start. After some testing and inspection it was determined that the ECU had taken a dump. We had a back-up luckily, but the car would have to be strapped back on the dyno to check and adjust the tune. That would have to wait until 6 a.m. when the noise ordinance lifted. At 6:00.01 a.m. Dan cranked it up and made the necessary adjustments.
Upon getting to the track, just in time for the drivers meeting, everything seemed to be going great. The car was running good, all of our custom made, in-house suspension pieces seemed to be doing their job, and Dan was having fun. Unfortunately the ECU was not the end of our troubles. After making it through 3 runs the 350 dropped on its belly. Our custom made TC rods gave up. In our attempt to keep all of our custom pieces light weight we had not considered that they may not be strong enough to withstand the amount of stress they would be subjected to. So after a quick run to the shop to get stronger replacement pieces and a little bit of parking lot engineering, the car was back up. Dan was able to finish out his day of practice in the Z and accumulate valuable information about how the car was going to perform and what changes we needed to make.
While Dan was shaking down the Z, Tracy had been tearing it up on track in the Screamscicle 240. Tracy is certainly no stranger to the 240 and has had plenty of seat time in “Dans” car, ever since her 240 was sold. Today however was her day to step it up and master the third gear/high speed drift. After practicing all day on her technique, and getting comfortable with the car at a much higher speed she was ready to compete.
Competition qualifying had Dan and Tracy driving in the same car. Dan had enough time in the 350 and felt he would park it for the day. Both drivers performed incredibly well in qualifying considering Dan had not driven the car all day and Tracy was learning a new technique. However neither was an issue with both Dan and Tracy qualifying high in the top 16. The issue was-that they actually TIED! Both were able to drive the car to a 3rd place qualifying position and now they had to decide who was going to continue on in tandem competition. This was not nearly as dramatic as many people would think. Tracy was there for fun and for learning and she felt that Dan deserved to be the one to compete. Big Congrats should go out to Tracy for her newly acquired advanced driving abilities and her great accomplishment of qualifying 3rd. WHA WHA WHA….NO DRAMA FO YO MOMMA!
The competition ladder had Dan facing David Jones in the first round. Not an easy task as David is definitely a high level driver in the local scene and is no stranger to driving with Dan and being familiar with his style. He was no match for Dan on this day though and after hitting a couple cones, David’s day was done. It did not get any easier from there as Dan moved on to face Harrison Ritchie. After a tight battle it came down to the judges. They decided, and I agreed, Dan would be going on to the finals. Dan would face his toughest test yet, he would be facing Chris “Black Trash” Ward in his LS1 powered S13 coupe. It was not be for Dan in the finals. In a battle that was so close it had me believing it would go to “one more time”-Dan made one small fatal mistake when he hit a cone during his follow lap, and that was all it took to decide who would be number 1. Losing in the finals and losing to Chris, who we have seen progress steadily over the past couple years into a top Atlanta driver, is no reason to be down. We will take it in a heart beat and it will propel us into a win the next time out. Better bring your “A” game.
Thank You to Abby from NOS Energy Drinks for the pics and free stuff. Check out more pics of the event: SEDC3 2010
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