April 25-26 Practice Event at El Toro

[Bryan Fargo]

Does anyone have any further information on the scheduled April 25-26 practice event at El Toro? Thanks in advance!

[Giovanni Jaramillo]

Not as of yet as this is a special event put on by an outside group (Motorsports Z) with our region providing the equipment and workers. And also it's a month away so by beginning of April you should see more info on this event.

[Rick Brown]

The normal deal is if you volunteer to work the Z event on Saturday then you run for free on Sunday. We may or may not let in additional people on Sunday, depends on the number of volunteers we get on Saturday. The more volunteers on Saturday the less you have to work. Ideal is to get enough so you only have to work one shift for around 2-3 hours so you are not there all day.

[Bryan Fargo]

Thanks guys. I am a newbie and would like to use the practice to begin dialing in my car. Is SCCA membership required at practice events?

[Giovanni Jaramillo]

Thanks guys. I am a newbie and would like to use the practice to begin dialing in my car. Is SCCA membership required at practice events?

I believe for this event only it "may" be waived.

[Rick Brown]

Thanks guys. I am a newbie and would like to use the practice to begin dialing in my car. Is SCCA membership required at practice events?

SCCA membership is required at all of our events. A $15 weekend membership is available and can be credited to the purchase of a full membership later.

[Doug Teulie]

Thanks guys. I am a newbie and would like to use the practice to begin dialing in my car. Is SCCA membership required at practice events?

Are you the same "Bryan Fargo" I went to high school with?

[Giovanni Jaramillo]

Thanks guys. I am a newbie and would like to use the practice to begin dialing in my car. Is SCCA membership required at practice events?

SCCA membership is required at all of our events. A $15 weekend membership is available and can be credited to the purchase of a full membership later.

I thought something was mentioned at our board meeting about this particular event about waiving. But makes sense to have it for all our events.

[Rick Brown]

Thanks guys. I am a newbie and would like to use the practice to begin dialing in my car. Is SCCA membership required at practice events?

SCCA membership is required at all of our events. A $15 weekend membership is available and can be credited to the purchase of a full membership later.

I thought something was mentioned at our board meeting about this particular event about waiving. But makes sense to have it for all our events.

Pretty sure that was regarding Lone Pine, since it's a charity event.

[Kurt Williams]

All Drivers at the Z Event will have either a permanent or a temporary SCCA membership. All passengers will also be required to sign SCCA documentation.

Kurt Williams

[Steve Ekstrand]

Just to be clear, I don't think anything is ever "waived", charity event or not. The question is what costs the region passes through.

Out of region people do lurk here and next thing we know the SSC and the national office will be all freaked out thinking we are ignoring the temp memberships in violation of our sanction.

[Bryan Fargo]

Thanks guys. I am a newbie and would like to use the practice to begin dialing in my car. Is SCCA membership required at practice events?

Are you the same "Bryan Fargo" I went to high school with?

I dont recognize your name (of course its been a long time), but I went to Millikan High in Long Beach.

[Bryan Fargo]

I dont want this to be taken the wrong way, but I have a fresh setup that likely needs lots of tuning, and I am concerned about having to spend a lot of time helping work the course. How many runs can I expect to make at the average practice event? Is there ample time for me to do some wrenching between runs?

[Mako Koiwai]

What type of wrenching? Typically we have plenty of time to adjust sway bars and shocks. Changing out springs would be dicey.

Different hosts schedule practice days using various formulas. Some are You're Running if You're Not Working, others have three groups split into Run/Rest/Work, and repeat in the afternoon.

Typically around 12 runs. If you stay late, you might get extra runs because people start to leave.

If I recall correctly, on Sat. of the Z Motorsports Practice day, we workers take turn working, but we don't get to run. But there have been times when the Z guys have had so many runs that they stop ... and then we might be able to get some Saturday runs. Sunday is then for us.

[Steve Ekstrand]

Usually you run 6 in the AM and 6 in the PM. And your only chance to really wrench would be between those halfs.
For example if your group had a rest heat first or last it would be adjacent to lunch. So, you'd neither be running nor working for atleast 2 hour. At reg you'd want to make sure you weren't put in the group that rests 2nd and 5th. That assumes the club uses the most typical approach. Not all do it the same way.

[Bryan Fargo]

What type of wrenching? Typically we have plenty of time to adjust sway bars and shocks. Changing out springs would be dicey.

Different hosts schedule practice days using various formulas. Some are You're Running if You're Not Working, others have three groups split into Run/Rest/Work, and repeat in the afternoon.

Typically around 12 runs. If you stay late, you might get extra runs because people start to leave.

If I recall correctly, on Sat. of the Z Motorsports Practice day, we workers take turn working, but we don't get to run. But there have been times when the Z guys have had so many runs that they stop ... and then we might be able to get some Saturday runs. Sunday is then for us.

Alignment, shock adjustments, carb adjustments, tire pressures, sway bar, and whatever might break! It sounds like I should be ok on time then- I dont anticipate taking more than 30 minutes or so making changes between runs.

If I read your post correctly non- Z Motorsports guys will work the course on Saturday to get the opportunity to run Sunday? Or does this only apply to "staff"?

Sorry for the newbie questions- I would rather be informed than confused the day of!

[Mako Koiwai]

Again, if I recall correctly, for the Z day, you will have a specific time slot when you work on Saturday, ie. you can leave after you're finished working; you don't have to arrive until your work time slot. There have been times when those that stayed late got to do some runs because the Z guys were worn out ... but no guarantees.

We typically continously checking and adjusting our tire pressures while we're in grid, besides making changes to shock settings. Some folks have alignment adjustments down to a fine science, and, sometimes using a super low creeper, make toe/camber adjustments in grid to make fine adjustments to their handling. National Champ Josh Sortor was famous for that. It was interesting to watch his times fall as he made rear toe/camber adjustments in grid at a National Test & Tune.

[Tom Tanquary]

Just a quick reminder........ don't even think of getting under the car while jacked up without jack stands in place...... in grid or any place else out there. You will be set upon by a safety steward.

[Bob Beamesderfer]

Just a quick reminder........ don't even think of getting under the car while jacked up without jack stands in place...... in grid or any place else out there. You will be set upon by a safety steward.

And as you can see by Tom's avatar, they're quite frightening to look at!

[Rick Brown]

I know last year the volunteer turnout was not high so they worked a bit extra on Saturday, but there so few of them on Sunday they got tons of runs, way more than usual. A typical practice is 60-80 people, we rarely get that many volunteers. Since Motorsports covers the lot cost for us on Sunday as payment for working Saturday we don't need to add extra people to pay for anything, it's all for the volunteers.

[Steve Ekstrand]

Our new policy is to feed safety violators to Renee's dogs.

[Will Kalman]

I dont want this to be taken the wrong way, but I have a fresh setup that likely needs lots of tuning, and I am concerned about having to spend a lot of time helping work the course. How many runs can I expect to make at the average practice event? Is there ample time for me to do some wrenching between runs?

Brian, contact the event master tell him that you'd like to be flexible in your runs** because you are tuning and my need some wrenching time during your run group. Tell him that you will be there early and or stay late to help out in any way he needs and I bet you'll get some consideration.

** For example, if you are supposed to work 1st, run 2nd, rest 3rd; you can ask to spread your runs out in the 2nd and 3rd groups and work in the 1st.

[Steve Glusman]

I volunteered last year for the Z event

Sunday was a blast and very hot as I remeber -- we got soooo many runs in, most of the folks quit at lunch

I took a nap in my AC'd truck!

The p.m -- we went with minimal safety workers and every 5 runs or so picked up cones....

LOTS of runs.....and a pretty laid back day where you really could tune the car....

good luck!

and maybe we should tell the Z car's what is required to pass tech before the event this year....
like tighten battery....