I have had the great privelage to drive many of North Americas great race tracks (current count is at like 17) including Road America, Laguna Seca, Mid-Ohio, Road Atlanta, etc, etc, and VIR easily ranks in the top 3. Every time I go back I'm reminded how friggen awesome and fun the track is.

Interestingly, and probably counter to what most people would say (especially this who just attended M@MRLS), Laguna Seca was a pretty big disappointment for me. It just didn't live up to all the hype, at least for me. MRLS wouldn't even rate in my top 5; I don't even think it's the best track in Northern California (that would be Thunderhill IMO).

Anyway, yes, VIR is awesome and it's great to live close to it. We have quite a few awesome tracks "reasonably" close to us here in the SouthEast.


How many TTE cars were there at VIR this last time out?

 

i was out at the last nasa race. i was in TTU class not TTE. the biggest drawback about VIR is your limited on what surrounds VIR. you have no choices for food, tent camping is really the only way to go, the bugs will carry away small dogs. the track itself is on my top 3 for fun. i love that place, having the ***** to go threw the esses flat out is simply amazing.

 

I'd like to try Mid-Ohio and Barber next, I think both of those will be pretty nice. No food near ViR does kinda suck, but it's ok if you pack your own food. I suppose I'm use to large bugs, but it was pretty cool this weekend so I didn't notice any.

There were only 4 TTE cars on Saturday and 5 on Sunday. South-East usually has 5-7 cars. I was more sad that my r-comps turned out to be rocks rather than the lower attendance.

I didn't go flat through the esses until my 3rd session, which was on the first session on the RS3s lol. I always did it in 5th, but I might try to keep it in 4th. Kohler runs his engine to damn near 8k, so I'm not sure if my 7500 limiter would be enough. And then I have to think that my exit speed out of the snake will be higher with R7s as well. I'm key-board racing at this point, whatever.

I always have a thought in the back of my mind..... I have to drive this car back home lol. My friend and I sat at Oak Tree after our last session right before we headed on out on Sunday, it was a beautiful day out.


He won TTB with a 2:07.4 in his S50 M3. It was quite a lap considering it was his first time on that track too.

 

Miata got kicked to the curb and the Z is in spot-light this weekend!





Completely different car with this wheel/tire combo. 18x10.5 squared, 285/35/18 RS3s, all the beef! Need more camber, getting alignment this week before an autox next weekend


Well, some miata related news. I picked up some solid motor mounts from Gio(sfl_miata). Hopefully that will help my miss-shifts on track.

 

that TTB m3 was on fire. glad he wasn't in my class.

when you go to barber, prep the car two weeks early. make sure everything is 100% good to go. once you get on that track you will do every session. having a mechanical issue would be heart breaking. it's such a fun track.

 

It's srzbzn now!



I hope now that I have them, I will never have to use them, right?

Got another set of 15x9s for the purple crack, really really anxious to drive my car on a fresh set of R7s.


Heading down to Roebling at the end of the month, should be a good time!

 

Thread title is 10/10, nice build man.


Those mounts that you got aren't solid, but yeah they will help a **** load with shifting. Before I bought the SuperMiata mounts, one of my stock mounts tore in half and when I went to shift from 3rd to 4th, the engine flopped to the side during corner exit and lined up 2nd gear for me instead. 9000 RPM over rev but thankfully the motor survived and still had the same compression and dyno numbers as before.

One thing to note about those mounts, hopefully you got the softest duro. I went with the medium duro and wish I hadn't. Vibrates the car like ******* crazy from 900 to 1500 RPM range and bolts now like to back themselves out, so keep an eye on that.

 

Thanks!

Yeah I did something similar on the top of 3rd to 2nd shift. Maybe not quite 9k rpm, though. The mounts are 75 duro, the softest with these mounts I believe.

 

Just an FYI

"We strongly recommend the standard 70D bushings. The 88D and 95D options are only recommended for 100% drag or drift cars due to their harsh vibration. "

 

This is the truth haha. When ordering I thought "dedicated track car, medium will be fine". But I am dumb. The only time it vibrates a lot is tooling around in the pits or high idle during cold startup.

I guess I should have added that on the track the mounts are worth every cent and I love them. Also every time I see people replacing the MazdaSpeed mounts once per season it's a good reminder of why the SuperMiata mounts rock. If you have poly diff bushings it gets even better. Makes throttle application more crisp/precise and increases shifting confidence by a lot. I've never done another accidental mechanical over rev by selecting the wrong gear since I've had these mounts in the car.

 

Glad I have the 70D then. I also have poly diff bushings, miss shifts should be minimal now!

I really need to do a shifter rebuild, it's not what it use to be. I put in a brass bushing, but it still feels sloppy.

 

The MiataRoadster short shifter is worth it IMO. I got the tall/straight/bootless option and it's great. Also used the Mazdaspeed aluminum bushing with it.

 

Stay away from the Mazdaspeed aluminum shifter pivot bushing. Ill conceived it is. The Miata Roadster Delrin OTOH works well and lasts. We put them in all our cars.

 

Well **** me... I'll put the MR delrin one back in before my next race then. Thanks for looking out, have a catprop.

 

Aluminum isn't a great material for that location. It's not a lubricated spot. So it just wears metal on metal.

 

I thought that being submerged in transmission fluid counted as being lubricated.

 

Early 5 speed? I guess it is lubricated. 6 speed and later 5 speeds don't have fluid up there all the time.

There may be another reason its not a good idea. I really like the delrin. And hopefully will have an MRSS soon.

 

Hrmph, I'm not seeing tall/straight only tall/angled. I did drive a 6-speed car with this shifter(tall/angled) and it was the bees knees, but ****** hell it's $310. I'll likely get the damn thing in the next few months, especially since I've given up on trying to find decent(stiff) suspension on the Z for sub $2k.


On another note, I've been reading a bit of the ST4/5/6 proposals for 2017 and beyond. Makes me wonder if the current PTE/TTE competitors will stick around. TT4 with a K-swap sounds like a blast to me, though a rotrex or TSE turbo setup would be less expensive.

 

Just message bill (Bill@miataroadster.com) directly for the tall. I did that because i didn't see it listed on the site as well, he is very easy to work with.

Nice build btw!

 

Yeah the shifter is a bit on the expensive side but I learned the hard way, bought a cheap one that fell apart and got sloppy then got the MR shifter and have never had to worry about it again. One of those things you just bite the bullet on.


As for ST4/5/6, I think ST4 would be cool. Getting there with an EFR turbo kit is how I would do it so that I could jump around to other classes as well, wherever the competition is. It'll likely be 12:1 power to weight so about 200WHP and 2400 ish lbs after adjustment and 245 Hoosiers would rip pretty good.

I think ST5 and ST6 will not be a huge departure from D/E/F. Most cars will slot right in there without much modification because the mod factors will penalize expensive parts kind of like how the PT system does, but Greg will still have a year/make/model specific sheet to dole out huge penalties to Miatas in these classes. At least it will get rid of the huge discrepancy between points builds and dyno reclasses so having a maxed power to weight Miata won't require an engine build.