What Are The Odds?

  I think I should have made a blog about being obsessed with numbers because this is where I'm headed on this one.  If it were really about racing, I wouldn't have time to do it, so number obsessing it is.  This excerpt involves the run time analysis of our closest competitors going into the last race at Famoso in 19 days.

  As I've gone on about for what seems like a million years; the top three fuel funny car teams are within 24 points, or just over round apart.  For me, this means - examine the data!  I'm pretty certain that I've diced, sliced and dissected the numbers every way you possibly can.  This results are the same and that's why we don't race 'em on paper....

   While I'm doing this, I'm also watching the Lambrecht auto auction on television.  Fascinating!  I wish the man who put all of these treasures away could be here to see this event; it's pretty amazing.  There are estimates of 10,000 people there to bid.  The challenge is to understand why it was that he wouldn't sell any used cars.  There are a ton of cars out there that will make beautiful restorations and even prettier race cars.

  There's not much more to say about the number crunching...I think I'll check out this auto auction!

Odd Fellows

  There have been a couple of other folks that have lent a hand for a race or two this year, but none as memorable as John.  John is Richard's brother and somewhat resembles a Hell's Angel member, but has a heart of gold.  Nicknames can strike at any time and John earned his in Salt Lake City.  The last points race was held for the first time at Rocky Mountain Raceways and the weather was not cooperating.  Thunderstorms had plagued racing all day Friday, with the result being cancellation of our qualifying pass on Friday night.  We knew we'd be going rounds on Saturday, but had no idea the day would be as long as it turned out to be.

  We arrived at the track pretty early on Saturday morning; crew call was 8:30 am and after stopping for supplies and whatnot, we arrived about 10:00 am. The skies were still threatening and a strong breeze blew most of the morning, but we were able to get a qualifying pass in and did fairly well, posting a 6.06 elapsed time at 240 mph. The fairly regular pace of the day halted to a stop when we started getting some light rain late in the morning.  Racing was postponed for about an hour due to the precip, which further delayed qualifying.  The challenge with this race is that it was only scheduled for Saturday; whereas the previous race in Boise was spread out over three. This meant that we had to qualify and hopefully go rounds - all on Saturday.

   So back to John and the story behind the story.  So John helped to get the hauler out from LA and is now helping out with between round servicing.  Mid way through Saturday, one of us spotted him asleep on top of one of the pit tables.  Not only was he asleep - he was sound asleep and snoring.  I wish I had taken a picture or a video because it was a pretty funny sight.  We got him awake and went on with the rest of this 18 hour day, but he earned his nickname there.  Yep, he's Sleeping Beauty, or Beauty for short.  Again, I wish I had a picture of him, because then you'd understand the humor of a guy who looks like a HA being called Beauty around the pits.   I love drag racing....

Oddly Enough...

  Not sure if I'm going to be able to come up with something that includes "odd" or  a derivative of the word in every post, but I'll give it shot. The reason why I started including each is vague now, but since I've started it; I guess I'll do it until it's dead....

  No racing this weekend for me.  I talked to our Car Chief yesterday and I understand that the car needs some servicing.  The team is based out of LA and the crew is somewhat spread out - so I guess this would probably be a great time to tell you about the crew. 

   There are five other crew members, including the Crew Chief, that make up the team.  Our Car Chief is David, but goes by the nickname, Huggy Bear, or Huggy, for short.  I don't think I've ever called him by his given name and I can't recall anyone using anything other than Huggy when referring to him.  Hugg lives in Indianapolis and was a professional crew member for a number of NHRA fuel funny car teams.  He has an incredible work ethic and absolutely loves drag racing.  He knows how to operate a race car better than most people I know and I appreciate the time he's spent teaching me the various jobs I perform on the car.  He's a funny dude and continually points out that no matter what we do, someone is watching us, so be aware of what you do - especially at the track.

   Carl is our clutch guy and lives down in the Los Angeles area.  He jumps out of airplanes for fun and responds with, "Out-fucking-standing", when he agrees with something you said or a job performed well.  He taught me how to pack parachutes and doesn't settle for incomplete or half-ass performance on tasks related to the car.  He also drives the tow-car (which would drive me bananas) and is hell on the horn when we have a tight turn around coming.  Funniest moment so far - before going to the staging lanes, he asked me if he had anything on his face.  I responded with, "Well of course you do!  You're the clutch guy - you're supposed to look like you just climbed out of a West Virginia coal mine!"  Carl busts his butt to give our driver the best car he can for the upcoming lap.

  On the right bank cylinders is Shaun.  Shaun is from the SF Bay Area and has been on the team for a number of years.  He's capable of working very quickly, under pretty intense pressure and producing exceptional results.  He takes a lot of pride in our crew's ability to service the car quickly and efficiently and likes to push everyone to do better each time.  He also knows where to find everything for the car in the hauler.  He recognizes and appreciates hard work and loves to win.

   Richard is on the left bank cylinders and lives in the Los Angeles area too.  He's been a good friend of the owner/driver of the car since they were kids and is very calm and steady.  I don't think I've ever seen Richard upset - I have seen everyone else upset at one point or another, but not Richard.  He takes everything in stride, but is one of the fastest workers when it comes to servicing the car between rounds.  I enjoy working with him and appreciate his steady demeanor.

   The responsibility for the car set up on each run falls to Ronnie, our Crew Chief.  It's a bit of a misnomer to call Ronnie the Crew Chief and Huggy, the Car Chief because Ronnie sets the car and Huggy oversees the crew.  Ronnie examines the data from past runs and sets the car's timing according to his best estimate of what it can do in the given situation.  Ronnie now lives in the Los Angeles area and has worked as a professional tuner for many years.  He's been with this car for a number of years as well and is very talented.  It's his job to translate the air temperature, humidity, and track surface into a fast, clean lap.  Tied for first place in the series is a good place to be sitting going into the last race and much of that is due to Ronnie's race translation.

 

Mathematics and Being Odd

   Oddly enough; I enjoy math.  If you saw my high school and college transcripts you'd find that hard to believe - I find it hard to believe, but I do like it.  Numbers fascinate me; I love analyzing them and reanalyzing them, resorting them...but I guess that isn't really math - it's just sorting.   Anyway, that's what I was doing yesterday afternoon and this evening.  What type of numbers?  Racing numbers; points tallies to be specific.

   Right now, the three top fuel funny car teams running for the NHRA Heritage Series championship, are all within 25 points of each other.  This equates to one round and less than five qualifying positions between the three cars.  What's even more bitchen is we are one of the three contenders.  Since we can't race until next month - I have to be content with sorting and analyzing numbers.  It wouldn't be any fun if the powers that be up in Glendora made calculating the points easy.  SO, it looks like this:

   You earn points in a couple of different ways.  The first way is by showing up at the meet, car in tow with someone willing to mash the fun pedal in a firesuit.  The points are awarded to drivers, not to the car, team or owner; although any combination of these are fine as long as the same guy (or gal) plants their fanny in the seat for points races.  So you show up, fill out a tech card and try like hell to qualify.  For your efforts; good or bad, NHRA awards you 10 points.  You receive these even if you don't qualify for the show.  It's almost like "everyone gets a trophy", but comes into play later on down the road.  The next way you earn points is through qualifying.  Points are awarded for how you qualify in the field; keep in mind that for the Heritage series, there are two types of fields run.  There is a 16- car field and an 8- car field...this is where it can get confusing.

   A 16-car field awards qualifying points like this:

Qualifying Position                    Points
1st                                            8
2nd                                           7
3rd                                           6
4th                                            5
5th & 6th                                  4
7th & 8th                                  3
9th through 12th                        2
13th through 16th                      1

Seems logical, right?  Well it is until you look at the way an 8-car field awards Q points:

Qualifying Position                    Points
1st                                           8
2nd                                          7
3rd                                          6
4th                                           5
5th                                           4
6th                                           3
7th                                           2
8th                                           1

Try keeping this all straight in your head.  Then the last and most heavily weighted portion of the points are awarded based on --winning!  More rounds - more points; exactly as it should be.  Once again, the size of the class field determines points.  See how it breaks down:

16-car field
Winner                     100 points
Runner Up                 80 points
Semi-Finals                60 points
Round 2                     40 points
Round 1                     20 points

8-car field
Winner                     100 points
Runner Up                 80 points
Round 2                     60 points
Round 1                     40 points

So, the calculation of your event points goes something like this:

Showed up, filled out tech card, made at least one Q run = 10 points
Ran a good enough (or awesome lap) qualified second in an eight-car field = 7 points
Car was like jellied lightning; you couldn't be beat on the tree, runnered - up = 80 points
Take the total of those 3 areas and voila, you have your meet total = 97 points

If you have enough money and/or luck to make each of the six meets, you'll be throwing one of those races out in calculating your final points because you can only count five.  For us it went something like this:

Bakersfield MM - 33 points
Boise 1 - 90-something points (too lazy to get up and look it up in my book)
Mission - 80-something points (see above excuse)
Boise 2 - 90-something points (yep...again)
SLC - 70-something points (duh)

The max points we'll be giving up going into the last race this year will be 33.  The other two teams in the top three didn't even qualify at one of the five races we have listed above.  Their points loss is far less; only 10 points each.  They have similar points as us because they each won at least one of the meets.

Having said all of that - here's how it looks going into the CHRR next month:

Team one - 378 points             After throwing out 33 points = 345
Team two - 378 points            After throwing out 10 points = 368
Team three - 364 points          After throwing out 10 points = 344

With each round being worth 20 points and the total point separation only 24 points between the three teams; every qualifying position and each round is beyondcritical.com

Odd Man Out

    My name is Toni and I'm the odd man out.  I'm the only female crew member on our NHRA Nitro Nostalgia Funny Car team which is pretty unique in drag racing.  Girls drive, girls date or are married to drivers/crew; but very few are involved in the dirty, hard-work of the pit crew because they want to do it.  I'm connected to the car only out of a love for racing and loyalty to my guys.  They are amazingly talented and bust ass every round, every meet, every time.

   I'm responsible for the back half of the car, which means; the chutes, wheelie bar, body between runs, fresh air bottle, driver's compartment, puke tank, in-pit tire pressure, and of course; fetch refreshments and make sandwiches.  I also help with potential sponsors, dump used oil, keep track of qualifying ladders and points, run to the store, research services in new cities, find auto parts stores, hold flashlights, maintain peace, am sympathetic to bullshit, listen to stories, make hotel reservations, cancel hotel reservations, make more hotel reservations; whatever is needed to help the team be successful and win.  If I could do this every day, I would.

 Nostalgia cars differ from their "big show" counterparts significantly and only slightly resemble the actual cars they represent from the heyday of the sport.  Body styles are limited to pre-1980 makes; fuel pumps are restricted to about 20 gals p/min; we run only one generator and are limited to a specific type of blower atop the motor.  These fuel funny cars run elapsed times of somewhere between 5.70 and 6.20 seconds in the quarter mile at speeds averaging/topping out in the mid-250, mile an hour range.

   I grew up in the epicenter of drag racing; Southern California during the 1960's and 70's.  My dad was a racer and Famoso Raceway, outside of Bakersfield, was his home track. Currently known as Auto Club Famoso Raceway, it's the home of the annual March Meet race and kicks off the nostalgia nitro drag racing season.  He and his buddies campaigned a top fuel dragster for a number of years and we spent many weekends at the famous dragstrips of the day; like Lions, Fremont, Fresno, OCIR, Irwindale, Pomona, Sonoma and Famoso. 

   Back then, all classes of drag racing was a family sport.  There's nothing like waking up at 2:30 am and having a bowl of Cheerios while it's still dark outside and the Chaparral is being loaded; but you can't eat because you're so excited about the trip.  At the track, Dad and his buddies worked on the car while our moms made lunch, drove the push car and kept track of us "pit rats".  Racers kids were often referred to as pit-rats and you could spot us a mile away.  Usually covered in dirt of some sort, we'd be playing with other pit rats and avoiding our moms as best possible. 

I love the one second of silence before the starter spins the motor to life; when the cadence of lifters, valves, connectors and pistons, wrap me up in a comforting blanket of childhood memories. This is what I chase I suppose; that excited feeling I had as a kid, when nothing else mattered and all was right with the world.  It's race day, baby; let's go rounds!!!