2009 VINEMAN 70.3 RACE REPORT

I am writing this on Tuesday, 60 hours after the race, and still my legs barely work. Lets go through this sequentially though, because legs are a topic all to themselves.

RACE BASE

We (Tessins and Crokers) stayed at Bodega Bay on the California coast for the 4 day race weekend. Temperatures were in the low 50's to the mid 70's all weekend. How hot can it possibly be hot 25 miles to the east of here where the race is?!?

VINEMAN RACE (AKA CRAMP-A-PALOOZA)

The race is a tad unique in that it has two separate transition areas. The first is a rocky beach on the side of the Russian River. The beach is not particularly large, and once you put 2200 bikes there, its even smaller.

SWIM (1900 meters) - 37:00 minutes (top 36%)

Dave and I swam in the same swim wave, which is only the second time that's happened in 2 years. My goal for the swim was to complete the swim in around 35:30, and finished slightly slower than that. During the swim (which got pretty boring, apart from the woman who I mistakenly slapped on the butt during the swim), Dave and I swam literally next to one another for the first half. He eventually pulled away, and finished about 30 seconds quicker. One odd thing about swimming in a shallow river - you sometimes have people running in the shallow water next to you rather than swim. And yes, your hands do hit the bottom of the river every now and then. I had some slight calf cramping at the end of the swim, but wasn't alarmed by it due to achilles problems recently. Coming out of the water and the first transition area, I was about 1:30 behind my goal.

Here is a picture of our swim start:

Picture of me coming in from the swim:

BIKE (56 Miles) - 2:54:00 (top 38%)

The bike ride was incredible. Very scenic, and moderately hilly. Coming out of the water, it was a cool 60 degrees, and slowly warmed up over the next 3 hours. I rode most of the race with the same group of people, and had a running joke about passing them on the downhills, and they passing me on the uphills. Definitely broke up the ride boredom. My goal was to average 18mph, and actually averaged 19.1mph. The ride has 2 major hill climbs...the first one was pretty unremarkable, and Chalk Hill was harder than expected. Chalk Hill is the signature part of the ride, and there was ONE person spectating there. One. And he wasn't even clapping. He just said "you're at the top." Thanks dude.

At the top of the hill, and for the next 5 miles, I had a quad cramp, which was a first for me on a ride. I rode the last 10 miles pretty easy, knowing I was way ahead of my goal and trying to save my legs for the half marathon approaching. And it was getting hot.

Coming out of the 2nd transition area, I was around 8-9 minutes ahead of my goal. Both Dave and I expected an exceedingly hard ride given the terrain, but both of us believe that our training rides were quite a bit tougher than this route...most notably the Chappell Hill routes west of Houston.

Some pictures from the ride from the Crew:

Mile 27 (I about hit that guy in front of me while paying attention to the fans!)

Finish line for the bike

Caroline waiting on Daddy!

End of the ride - feeling very good for the run.

RUN (13.1 miles) - 3 hours 50 minutes (top 80%)

No that isn't typo. And no, it wasn't a full marathon distance! Yes, I ran the 13 miles at a 17:45 pace per mile. I'll go through this in order. Coming out of transition, I felt better than I have EVER felt going into a run in a triathlon. My legs felt amazing, my heart rate was low, my hamstrings were fresh....

Here I am passing the Crew at around 300 yards into the run.

At around 350 yards (as in, like 30 seconds after passing them), my race started to unravel at a pace that was very alarming. I immediately started cramping in both quads, bad enough that I had to stop and stretch for 2-3 minutes for them to release. After that, I tried to run for about 2 minutes, and walk 1-2 minutes for the next 3 miles or so. My original goal was to run without stopping to mile 6.5, and survive the rest. My first mile was a 12 minute pace, my second mile was a 13 minute pace, and at mile 3, the run started getting hilly. For most people, these hills were a joke. For someone from Houston, they felt massive. My running is basically a thing of the past, and I am facing walking almost every inch of this race.

Around mile 5, I was running for maybe 30 seconds, cramping in some leg area (you name it, it cramped up), and walking for 3-5 minutes. Cramping was now in my quads, calves, and hamstrings, but subsided everytime. I saw Dave around mile 5.5 (he was at mile 8), and he looked pretty dang good (though he said he was really struggling). At this point, I was also trading places with a 55 year old man, who was only walking. He was outpacing my jog-walk-jog-walk strategy, which was pretty demoralizing!

Its worth noting here that it was hot. DAMN HOT. 95-98 degrees hot according to weather.com, and the run route had minimal shade. It was blistering out there. And I forgot to take my salt tablets during the race (big mistake I think).

After mile 6, running was no longer an option. Now I was speed walking like a fairy. In spandex. I think around mile 8, my overall goal of 6 hours passed, which was pretty funny to me at the time.

At mile 9.5, both calves and both quads totally locked up on me. I fell over immediately on the road screaming words that I can't repeat here. A couple people tried to help me stretch the cramps, but it was so bad they couldn't move my ankles or feet. Totally locked. And I was sitting on a 100 degree piece of road. They rolled me over into the dirt in the shade, and left me for dead. And thanks to the runners who ran over me while laying in the road. You guys were great. Really.

I stayed in the dirt for 10-15 minutes until my leg muscles released, got up, and started progressively walking more and more. 2 steps. Stop. Stretch for 2 minutes. 4 steps. Stretch. etc etc. Everyone who passed me on the run asked why my back was covered in dirt. "Did you pass out?" "Did you crash?" "Were you wrestling a cow?" "Were you helping repave these roads?"

The back of the race is full of great people, all fighting various problems (mostly cramping this day). Very encouraging people, and all in a lot of pain. But all positive. Very positive. It was definitely the highlight of the race for me. I eventually walked all the way to the finish line, having walked 90% of the 13.1 miles. I figured my cheering Crew had left and gone home by this point!

The finish line was pretty funny, as Caroline and Landon both walked across with me. The announcer was making fun of me, because neither kid would hold my hand since I probably smelled so bad. I did trot across the last 5 feet though.

Here is a picture of the finish:

Walking over to the tent after finishing...

I finished in 7 hours, 34 minutes....you know, roughly 94 minutes slower than my goal (top 76%). Would I do it again? Of course (but not anytime soon). I really need to be another 20-25 lbs lighter to do this again, and that will become the next goal. Overall, the race was easier (through the bike) than I expected, and significantly harder than I expected on the run (obviously). I think the running injuries in the past 5-6 weeks didn't do me any favors, though none of that seemed to have crept up during the race. I think the majority of my problems were race-nutrition related...and things that are easily solved. We're planning on doing the Austin Triathlon in September, then concentrating on strength and speed through the fall.

DAVE'S RACE

Dave had an awesome race. I was blown away by his pace. He averaged 20.5mph (2.5 above his goal), and bought enough time on the bike that his slower-than-expected run didn't keep him from beating his goal by 3 minutes (he finished in 5 hours 40 minutes). He fought some cramping at the end as well, but nothing too bad. He really had an incredible race, and at the end said he had hit hit endurance limit for these types of races and wasn't interested in going further or doing it again. The next day, he was already plotting the next 70.3 race.

Picture from beginning of Dave's run

Picture of Dave finishing:

The CREW!!!

We had an incredible support crew made up of Mom, Dad, Candice, Caroline, Landon, Jennifer Tessin, and Paige Tessin....all wearing custom made yellow shirts (turns out there was a DJ crew from Sacramento called "Phil and Dave" who were racing too, and some thought they were cheering for them). They were super easy to spot on the course (partly due to the shirts, mostly due to their loud cheering). It was also a ton of fun with Landon and his "code word". Everytime we saw each other, we yelled "SALAMI!!!!" to each other. The word ultimately was appropriate, because the race turned me into fatty, cooked meat. The crew was awesome, and made the race WAY more fun and was something to look forward to over the 70 miles. They endured a LONG day in the heat, and I think I would have rather been out there racing than corraling kids!!! Candice also deserves a big thank you for allowing me to train for this big event, as it took a significant amount of time away from the family.

Here's a picture of everyone at the finish, and other pictures of the Crew.

Jennifer, Paige, and Caroline

WE'RE OFF!

Finally...it's time to race this Sunday. After...

• 300 miles of running this year
• 68000 meters of swimming (sounds way more impressive in meters than saying 42 miles)
• 800 miles of riding (a huge short-fall really)
• 5 flat tires & 2 broken spokes
• 1 achilles injury and 1 sore hamstring that won't go away
• 184 days of Dave cursing at me while I stretch (he doesn't stretch)
• 8 warmup races, well, 7.5 for me if you take into account Flattire-a-Palooza this past May
• 1 running accident in front of an entire crew of road workers (they were very entertained)

...the Vineman 70.3 is finally here. For up-to-date results after the race, goto http://www.vineman.com/ironman/results_race01.htm. Goals for the race for me is to beat 6 hours, and for Dave to beat 5:45. We'll be hanging out on the coast before and after the race getting ready for 6 hours of pain. Preparation will....you know....look like this:

My New Dubs

Got my new (used) wheels on Friday, a pair of carbon fiber HED 3's. Supposed to be some of the most aerodynamic wheels available, which helps offset the big fat lug on top of the bike. I rode with them on Sunday for our 60 mile ride in Cleveland. Yes, I was still slower than Dave. But it felt faster than before.

Turns out that the Cleveland ride is a great approximator of the Vineman ride. The graph of the elevation change (in meters) for the Cleveland ride vs. the Vineman is in the graph below. That climb in the middle of the black graph (~mile 30) was a real gut buster.

2 more long training rides left before we ship the bikes to California...

The new gear:

BLOG HIJACKED! (AGAIN)

With the Big Race in 30 days (no, not a LeMons race), its time to change the theme of the blog somewhat to include triathlons. Fellow Slaab driver Dave Tessin and I are wrapping up the 6 month build up to the Half Ironman (plus the 5 races we did in 2008), with over 60,000 meters of swimming done, almost 300 miles of running, and over 600 miles of riding (not nearly enough)...its almost time. Assuming we survive this race, I'll be posting our race summary here LeMon's style.

The race? Vineman 70.3 www.vineman.com/ironman.htm

The distance? 1.2 miles swim / 56 mile ride / 13.1 mile run

The date? July 19th - 7:58am start time.

The goal? Me - break 6 hours. Dave - 5 hours 30 minutes. (oh, and do not die is goal #2)

Here is my race report from the Cap Tex Triathlon in May, the last triathlon prior to Vineman:

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Yesterday was the last triathlon / warmup before the Half Ironman (which is in 7 weeks!). This was an Olympic distance race (think – ¼ Ironman), and is similar to the race we did in Austin last August (and the one we did earlier this year in Galveston). Goals were pretty aggressive for this race – I wanted to lower my time by 13 minutes compared to a year ago. This was going to require better times in all three events…

Let me summarize the race easily – DISASTER.

Early Morning / Preparation –

· Alarm didn’t work that morning, so my morning routine was all messed up. Woke up to the sound of my phone ringing (Dave calling to wonder where I was). Not good.

· In the transition area before the race started, I went to pump up my rear tire, and accidently unscrewed the entire stem from the tire (instead of the end piece to fill it up). Woops.

SWIM

· Swim was 1500 meters (Vineman race is 1900M). Water was 69 degrees – which is pretty cold. Anyway – the swim went very very well. I got comfortable quickly and felt good. The 2^nd half of the swim was pretty consistent, and was passing people pretty steadily (a good sign). Had one incident where someone kicked the goggles clean off my face (that was a surprise), and another instance where I purposefully elbowed someone in the ribs (MOVE OVER!) while dunking someone on the other side (YOU TOO!). Needless to say, they stopped swimming for a moment and I passed them. Goal time for the swim – 27:30. Actual time -27:32. Best swim yet in two years. That was in the top 28% of all the swimmers out there (1,300 people). Dave swam it in 26:09 (top 20%).

TRANSITION

· Another slow transition for me. Goal was 3:30, and actual was 4:15. Hard to sprint straight out of the water and straight onto the bike without catching your breath somewhere.

BIKE

· Got onto the bike, and the first 2 miles or so is uphill. I was amazed at how dead my legs were during this part. Once we got to the top of the hill near the Capital Bldg, there was a downhill section and I hit 30mph, which felt great. Until my tire burst. At 30mph.

· On the side of the road – I figured my stem broke after my incident earlier that morning with my tire. So I tightened it up, got my CO2 canister out, and tried to fill the tire up. Didn’t work. Then I took my tire off (I carry a spare tube), and broke the tire tool which helps get the tire/tube off the rim. At that point, my tool was broke, my CO2 was empty, and I was seriously pissed.

· I started walking the bike back to the transition area (I broke down around 17^th street. The transition area was around 1^st street. A long ways). Got about ¼ of the way, and decided to try again at removing the tire, and I would attempt to flag Dave down when he rode past to take his CO2 from his bike (bike route was 4 laps…so I would see him multiple times). Dave throws me his CO2, I had the new tube on the tire…things were going GREAT. Got the CO2 working right….filled up the tire….put the tire back on the bike….and the tire burst on the spot.

· At this point – I’m done. I walk the bike all the way back to the transition area….stopping to talk with Candice / Landon / Caroline (who were wondering where the heck I was on the bike route)…and Candice talks me into going and at least finishing the race by running the 6 mile run.

RUN

· Man – I felt great on the run. Of course – I hadn’t done anything since the swim, so that’s obvious. My goal was to run a 9 minute average pace. First mile – 8:52. Second mile – 8:15. Third mile – 8:50. Fourth mile - ~10:30. Fifth mile - ~9:30. Sixth mile - ~9:15. Which one doesn’t belong?!? I have no idea what happened at mile 4….but clearly I passed out somewhere on the road. I ran the race at a 9:20 pace, which is really irritating since a) I was fresh and b) my pace was so good for most of the run. I also was trying a new product out on the run (for the Vineman) which was called LiquidShot (400 calorie gel). Really interested to see how it would work. Yeah – it fell out before mile 1. Never got to try it. Run was in the top 46% of the race, by far my best result in a race….and by far the most tainted since I didn’t do the bike. At one point – some old geezer told me I was doing great as I passed him. I turned around and said “YEAH – BUT I DIDN”T DO THE BIKE!”. He looked at me, and said “REALLY?!?”

· Dave almost made his goal – he wanted to finish in 2 hours 24 mintutes, and missed it by 4 minutes. His finish time was around 15 minutes faster than my goal time.

Anyway – not a great event to lead into the BIG ONE for me. But oh well. We still have a ton of training to do to be able to finish a longer event. Dave and I both agree that we’re going to have to really slow down our pace to finish Vineman (we’re pushing our times pretty aggressively in these shorter races). We’re in great shape for the swim….the bike is getting there…and our run will have to slow down to get more distance. Vineman – swim will be roughly the same as we just did in this race…bike will be double, run will be double.

WE FINISHED!!!

Before diving into our weekend of Slaabin’ around…we need to first mention our friend / mechanic / Jamacian guru Tony Chin and his brother-in-law Mark.

TONY CHIN
Tony and Mark were at the track all weekend, and in particular, with us Saturday night assisting us in repairing our clutch hydraulics. Upon leaving the track to go home…Tony and Mark got into a massive traffic accident at the entrance to the facility (they were t-boned by a Hummer in their Saab 900). Mark was lucky to walk away from the accident / hospital…Tony was not so lucky. Tony is still in the hospital, having broken all his ribs on one side, his shoulder, collar bone, and internal injuries. Tony is lucky to be alive given the accident, but needs all the help he can get (he does not have medical insurance). If you are interested in donating money to help Tony and his family, please let me know. All of the race teams graciously donated their winnings to his cause, and we are EXTREMELY grateful for their good will, thoughts, and donations. I believe donations for Tony are over $4,000 so far.

It was tough to race on Sunday with Tony and his family in such pain. However, the right thing to do was getting our Saab (and the other Saabs) across the finish line for him.




THURSDAY LOAD UP
Its worth mentioning that on Thursday (sorry - no pre-party this year), we loaded up the car into the 18 wheeler after driving the car around the block.  ONCE.  As in 0.25 miles.  We strapped the car down, loaded up the trailer, then heard this giant hissing sound coming from the trailer. Yep – Dad’s sprinkler part redneck fix to our radiator hose burst (it turns out sprinkler PVC parts do not do well with 200 degree water...duh).  At that point, we were thinking our bad luck had reared its Swedish ugly head again, but were also thinking that if this is the worst the Swedish gods can throw at us, its going to be a piece of cake race.  Fat chance.

Its also worth mentioning that during our team dinner, Tony and Mark joined us to eat, but also to continue tweaking our car.  Yes - the night before the big race, we were still wrenching on the car.  NEXT RACE - we're going to be done a week before at least.  

(in this picture...the car is waiting for us to close up the trailer before pissing its water all over the place.  Evil evil car this one)

FRIDAY PRACTICE SESSION
The entire weekend was a replay of “The Cold Winds of Hell Blowing in from Sweden”. It was cold, windy, and the perfect environment for a Norwegian Swede to show its stuff. .Our goal on Friday was simple:  

1. to take it easy on the car, 
2. get familiar with the suspension modifications
3. learn how not to spin with our spin-happy tires, 
4. get acquainted with our newly rebuilt Swedish rocket motah.  

To avoid the 19 page blog entry from the October 2008 race, let me summarize Friday a bit quicker, because it was FULL of minor issues ALL.  DANG.  DAY.  By the end of Friday, we thought we'd be chasing small issues non-stop.

• Fuel cutoff:  We’d been chasing a fuel cut-off issue for a few weeks, with no avail (credit the dumb-ass team members involved).  The fuel cutoff problem continued to persist intermittently, and we tried every tweak known to NASA to get it sorted.  None of which worked.  Luckily - our Saab neighbor Lyle mentioned it might be a fuel pump issue.  BINGO!
• Radiator Hoses:   We also were plagued by the Curse of the Busting Radiator Hoses. Not one, not two, but THREE busted hoses on Friday (in addition to the busted Sprinkler hose Dad put on the car). 
• Wiring Harness: yes...Dad pointed out a week prior that our wiring harness looked like it got in a knife fight in Tijuana.  Yes...we melted the crap out of it on our exhaust header.  Unfortunately - yes, we had to rebuild the wiring harness on Friday.  

We don't have any pictures from Friday...maybe thats because we were grumpy as hell, our fingers were frozen, or we had no camera.  Choose the reason that works for you.  Here is a picture of the car in the pits to help you visualize though (its inaccurate in the sense that the hood is down though).  I believe I am telling Dad - "so, let me get this straight...you put SPRINKLER parts on the car?!?"

Its worth mentioning that a lot of the same cars are back, with some new ones as well. The themes at the race suck, apart from a few.  And we have the best paint job by far.  We’re a bit quicker than last year, but so is everyone else. We made it though technical inspection with a 1 lap penalty, partially due to our inability to explain the partially painted, new springs…and partly as an insult to our fine looking Swedish machine.

SATURDAY
We’re feeling confident about our Saab after the midnight cannonball run (on retrospect - also highly stupid), and confident that our myriad of minor issues are behind us.   Our goal for the race is to finish in the top 50%, get no black flags, and stay on the track for long trouble free sessions. What could possibly go wrong with that Swedish / Norwegian Plan?!?  I mean, the longest our car had ever run on track was around 30 minutes (last year).

NICK – DRIVING SESSION #1 (11:30am – 2:00pm)
Nick starts the race again for the Slaabs, and manages to drive 18 trouble free laps, and then the gremlins continue. Turns out he’s losing the clutch. Fast. Nick comes into the pits, we notice there is contamination in our brake / clutch fluid, quickly try to replace the fluid, and send Nick back onto the track. The clutch has returned….only to disappear a few laps later. Nick comes back to the pits again, and we set about a lengthy 60 minute fix to the problem. During this period, we’ve dropped from 20th place to somewhere in the mid 80s (out of 97 cars). Nick manages to complete around 33 laps…all conservatively. Despite the faulty clutch…a good session.   Its worth mentioning that this is the 2nd race in a row that Nick has failed to submit a race report (just as a reminder - he speaks proper English...though he can't type a grammatically correct sentence without typos to save his life).  Lets move on.

DAVE – DRIVING SESSION #2 (2:00pm – 3:30pm)
Dave gets into the car with some clutch, and gets our race strategy back on track. Here’s his summary of his session:

Saturday session was delayed due to our clutch problem. After a long session of downtime, we were able to rig the car back together enough to put it back on the track. The car was driving great for about half of my session until I noticed the clutch began to go soft again. I had about a quarter of the pedal left and determined to prevent from incurring additional downtime I would no longer shift the car. My strategy was that for the few shifts we had left, I would save them for time in the pits to switch drivers. For for about 45 minutes I kept the car in 3rd gear the entire time. Under full green, this should not be a problem, but in this race and the number of yellows, it became a little tricky. Just had to pad myself between the car in front of me during yellows to allow for enough track to not have to shift into a lower gear to get going again. The session ended without issue and saved enough of the clutch to enable Phil to start his driving session without issue.

Dave started in 84th position, drove 43 laps (nothing fast), and handed it over to me at 3:30pm in 72nd spot. Not bad – steady and rising. It needs to be also noted that this is the longest, BY FAR, that our car has ever run without issue (well, apart from that clutch going out again).

PHIL – DRIVING SESSION #3 (3:30PM – 5:00PM)
I get in the trusty Slaab, get ready to pull out of the pits, and realize our clutch has about as much grab as Dave’s newborn daughter’s hands. I put the car in third gear, and never come back out of third until 90 minutes later. My driving session was pretty slow, apart from 5 laps where I was around another Slaab just like ours. My session was pretty clean and simple, with a LOT of yellow flags. Yellow flags tend to be traffic jams on the track with 70-90 cars going around, and lots of stopping involved. Now is a good time to remind the reader that we have no clutch…so stopping is not a good option. Thus, I become Captain Slow on the yellow flags, drop way behind the guy in front of me, which helps avoiding stops. It works, I bring the car into the pits, and Dad gets in.

I started in 72nd position, drove the car for 43 laps as well, and ended my session in 58TH. Top 50% is close!

DAD – DRIVING SESSION #4 (5:00PM – 6:15PM)
I’ve left enough clutch to get Dad onto the track, and that’s it.  Dad has also failed to submit a race report...so let me summarize it for him (this is the price you pay for not reporting on your own driving sessions team).

Dad started in 58th position, and brought it home in 48th position to end the day. Top 50% exactly!!! We met our goal.   Dad, however, must be hard of hearing and losing his eyesite, since he ignored the explicit team directions of steady driving, not crazy driving.   He turned in the fastest laps of the day (and the fastest race laps we'd had yet in 2 races).  That night, he claims it to be driving skill. In his next sentence, he explains how he almost spun the car (and gotten a black flag) multiple times, saw the rear tires more than once, how he lost it in this corner and that, and generally sounded like he was driving like an large orangutan. Remember this…

SATURDAY NIGHT WRENCHING SESSION
That night, we set about to fix a variety of issues with the car (leaking fuel tank, broken sway bar, clutch), one of which requires Tony to go back to his shop for a spare part. After having a great time working together through the cold windy night, we bid Tony good night at 10:00pm. We leave 30 minutes later, only to find Tony’s wrecked car at the entrance to the track with 10-12 emergency vehicles around it (and the Life Flight helicopter on the way).

SUNDAY
Dave and I spent much of the night at the emergency room, and returned Sunday morning to continue to see how Tony was doing. As a result, our trusty team of drivers (Dad and Nick) are at the track without our Patton-like management style hanging over their heads.   Last words out of General Patton Sunday morning - "forget speed - just finish the race".  Famous last words.

NICK - DRIVING SESSION #5 9:15 – 11:30
All I know of this driving session is that I received a text message from Bruce while driving to the track from the Hospital. “NICK HAS BEEN BLACK FLAGGED”. The language in the car between Dave and myself was not repeatable among such nice readers.  Nick can't type more than 3 sentences together, so let me just speculate that he was driving too hard, too aggressive, and out of spec for our team.  As a result - he came into the pits hopped up on British Testosterone, and got caught for speeding in the pit lane.

Nick ended the session in the penalty box / dog house after driving 49 laps (an all-time high for our car), gotten to 43rd place (that’s like a win to us, only to be kicked in the groin), and turned 11 laps that we classify as pushing it. The team is sorely lacking leadership. We leave the penalty box in 56th spot.

Below is what Nick had to sit in for 25 minutes.  Its not big. 

DAD – DRIVING SESSION #6 : 11:30 – 12:00
So you'd think the team would be totally keen on moving on from the debacle and getting us sorted again.  Right?  RIGHT?!?  No.  Dad goes out again and drives like a hairy mammal with no thumbs.  Yes - he had fast laps.  But since we weren't there to witness, nor has he submitted his own version of the story, my version will get published.  Dad managed to drive 14 laps (FOURTEEN!!!), set the fastest lap of our team (AGAIN), and spun. See a trend here? Dad gets an easy penalty – screw a tire to the roof. We wish he would have gotten the “take your shirt off and pose for a cowboy calendar” penalty. Dad drove the car for 14 laps, set a bunch of fast (too fast) laps, rose 4 spots, and returned back into the penalty box.

DAVE – DRIVING SESSION #7: 12:30-12:40
Dave has one goal, and one goal only. Pile up laps.   He could putter around in 1st gear, we wouldn't care.  We don’t care how slow, how ugly, how stupid…just don’t come back to the its for at LEAST 90 minutes.   Here is numnuts version:

Car ran great for five laps until I was tagged by a car as I approached the chicane and got black flagged. The incident, in my opinion was caused by the car in front of me on the back straight. After I rounded the corner onto the back straight the yellow 200SX (Browndo) was signaling me to pass. As I attempted to pass, they stomped the gas, and since every car is faster than ours, I had to slow down to avoid going head on into the tire chicane. As I slowed and started to veer behind the 200sx, the taxi rx-7 came in to the chicane hot and could not control their speed and hit the side of our car. As a result I spun as did the rx-7. The only thing that makes me happy about this is our car has barely a scratch and the rx-7 was out for the rest of the race.

Dave drove FIVE (5!!!!!!!) FRIGGIN laps…all too fast, and got in an accident. Surprise surprise. Look – now we have 2 tires on our roof.  

PHIL – DRIVING SESSION #8: 12:45 – 2:15PM
I drove the sloppiest, slowest, most conservative session ever. I was letting everyone by…hell, the tow truck was driving faster than me. My session was so unremarkable, I hardly remember anything about it, except that everyone else on the track was getting overly aggressive. I drove 45 laps, started around 58th, finished around 54th. That’s it. Just like the General ordered (I did manage to cockle up the fuel pit stop…I think I was delusional from all the slow driving).

NICK – DRIVING SESSION #9 – 2:15 – 3:00pm
Nick drives another 22 conservative laps, and brings the car back to the pits for the final session in around 50th spot.  We're finally getting back to our top 50% goal.  Notice that the General's presence has gotten the team back in order.  

DAVE – FINAL DRIVING SESSION #10 – 3:00PM – 4:15PM
Back in the seat for the last hour of the race. Upon climbing into the car I started the stopwatch on the instrument cluster. I knew I had an hour and my goal was to bring the car to the checkered flag. The car was running decent except there were signs the fuel pump was starting to go again, so it was starting to sputter under full acceleration. There was a point in my driving session where I started to get nervous and was driving more tentatively as a result. Like soldiers in a war, I was starting to play every move carefully as my tour came closer to its end. The stop watch had to go as this was creating my anxiety as every minute that went by I was more and more concerned about not making a mistake and not seeing the checkered flag. Like Luke Skywalker in the A New Hope, I turned off my instruments and decided to use the force to get me through the rest of the race. Now I was able to focus on just driving and decided to put the hammer down and finish in style. For the last five laps or so, I put the pedal to the metal and ripped off some decent laps (for this car). Finally, the checkered flag, mission accomplished, Death Star defeated, we're going home victorious (at least in our book of incredibly low expectations).

Dave managed the fastest lap of the race (for us), and brought the car home in 46th place. Considering all the events, problems, and dumbass mistakes we made, 46th is outstanding. Our car was the 78th fastest car out there (not so outstanding), but for 75% of the weekend, we were very consistent. And consistency does well in these races. We think that had we eliminated the clutch problems, our car was an easy top 25% finisher. Without the dumbass drivers on our team, we might have been even higher. Next year – the General never leaves the battlefield. EVER.

Here is a chart that shows our position over each lap.   Red is our team...Black is the other similar Black Saab, gray is the super fast 900 Turbo, and blue is the white 9000 (tony's other car).  The early drop in the line is all the clutch problems, and the drops in the middle area are the penalties.

Another item of note this year – this is the 2nd time a Saab has finished a Lemons race, and in our race…we had FOUR Saabs finish. Yes, we were the last place Saab (thanks Nick, Dave, and Dad). The other “Tony Saab” finished the highest, while the Turbo Saab had the fastest Swedish lap (kind of a back-handed compliment really).

Quick - which Saab is the best looking?



Plenty of coverage of the race out there…a Mustang won this year (1st and 2nd) and the car that won last year placed 4th. We hope to extract more power and speed out of this car yet, and assuming our wives do not divorce us anytime soon over this continued debacle, we would like to give it another shot in October in Tony’s honor.  

While I have made fun of my teams driving in this summary - it has to be mentioned that our team is a lot of fun and all of this is in good spirits.  Everyone gets along great, we're all the same type driver, our skillz are similar, and its a good fit.   We hope to keep the Dream Team together for more races!

(Tony, as of today, continues to progress at the hospital…and might be home early next week.)

PICTURES FROM RACE WEEKEND, IN RANDOM ORDER: