Racer Recap: Cameron Benner Redline Time Attack Round 5, Joliet, Illinois

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Cameron Bener

Checking the weather report for our weekend at Autobahn Country Club gave us the first inclination of how our weekend would go: The usual afternoon thunderstorms that frequented the Joliet, Illinois area were going to make Redline Time Attack Round 5 particularly interesting.

We got situated at the track Friday afternoon and after setting up the paddock space, took time to walk the 2.1-mile “South” course. Walking the full length of the course, we got the feeling that the racing surface was going to be exceptionally “green” in places. The thunder showers that are so common place wipe the track clean of any accumulated rubber on nearly a daily basis. We could tell just by scuffing our shoes on the track that this surface was going to be quite slick to start off with. Saturday practice showed us that though the track appeared straightforward, it was definitely nuanced with some intricate technical sections.

Over the course of Saturday and moving into Sunday morning, I worked on perfecting these more technical portions of the track; this process was both challenging and frustrating at times, but finding tenths of a second by altering a line here or modifying a breaking point there rewarded us with lower lap times. As we concluded Saturday practice our times were continuing to drop, our equipment was holding up well and another COBB sweep looked to be in the works. We began Sunday practice by running consistent 1.36’s; our familiar competition from New Jersey, Todd Reid in the Fortune Auto EVO IX was running high 1.35’s. We felt our car was cable of low 1.34’s to high 1.33’s but the chassis had developed a severe oscillation that would make corner exit incredibly jarring.

With the increased bite the car had with the new OS Giken rear diff, the rear dampers were set too soft and the outside rear shock would bounce off the bump stop on corner exit. We remedied the issue by making a quick adjustment to the AST 5200 series struts which reduced the oscillation while maintaining drivability..

With these changes to rebound along with several small changes in driving line, we were able to drop into the low 1.35’s and in our last practice session posted two times consistently in the low 1.34’s. Checking the weather radar brought ominous news. It looked as though it would be a race against the weather for our first time attack session. A large thunderstorm system was moving in and it was questionable if we were going to get any dry laps at all.

Fortunately, our luck held out and we left the grid with the wipers off and dry track ahead. I set out on the warm-up lap — the track was slightly more slick than earlier in the morning, nevertheless my next lap around I got the green and it was onto hot lap one. I ran the car hard but maintained a smooth line; I was shooting for a high 1.33. Brian Marsteller, my crew chief, came on the radio and notified me we had managed a low 1.35. That wasn’t going to be good enough, as the Professional Awesome EVO IX had dropped into high 1.34’s. I set out to match the 1.34.2 we had set earlier in practice, but the racing gods had other things planned.

I started on hot lap 2, and the first third of the lap was a real flyer; section times indicated we were on track for a low 1.34 when disaster struck. I rounded the high speed left-hand kink in 5th gear, checked my mirrors as usual and noticed a massive amount of smoke billowing from the car. I got on the radio, “Brian we’ve got a big problem, repeat pulling off line, we’ve got a problem.”

I tried to stay calm. Initially I thought the brakes had set fire, but the growing amounts of smoke pouring from the hood scoop suggested otherwise. I exited the car and frantically motioned for a fire bottle from a nearby turn worker. I grabbed the fire bottle, lowered my visor and dowsed the engine bay. A slick coating of oil on the inside of the hood was a dead giveaway — an oil line had blown off and ignited on the exhaust header.

We towed the car back to the paddock and assessed the damage. The extent of the damage was surprisingly superficial, albeit it would keep us from making the super session. In the end we had managed a best time of 1.35.093 which broke the track record, was only good enough to put us in second, just .3-seconds off first place.

Our experience at Autobahn continued to reaffirm that our hard work and pragmatic approach to car setup. The fire was a good reminder as to the importance of continued diligence required to keep a car mechanically sound. The STI will be fitted with a new timing belt assembly as well as new rotors and brake pads. We plan to be more than ready to bring the heat back to the west coast at Willow Springs in just a couple more weeks.


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