This past weekend I had the excellent opportunity to drive on the Daytona International Speedway Infield during a SCCA PDX. The course is known as the “School Course”, it utilizes a 1.2 mile modified version of the 24hr infield. If you’re unfamiliar with PDX or HPDE track days they are an excellent entry into the world of track driving. I had never ran with SCCA at a track day so I was assigned an instructor. My instructor did an excellent job pointing out the places for improvement and the important understanding of the flags and worker station locations.

Saturday was organized into 3 different groups. Group 1 – Advanced/Intermediate Solo drivers Group 2 – Race Drivers School and Group 3 – Novice/Intermediate with Instructors.

I was in Group 3.

I arrived at the track just after 6:30am and met up with a fellow MSCC member who was driving and instructing that day. It was still dark and registration wasn’t open yet, so I picked the brain of a more experienced driver for a little while. We headed to registration and shortly thereafter through the turn 4 tunnel onto the Daytona International Speedway infield. We got there early enough to snag some garage spots and we unloaded the cars and headed over to tech inspection.

After everything was inspected, we did some parade laps to get a feel for the course and how it was laid out. My instructor drove my car and the first thing he commented on was the Kartboy/TiC Shifter and Bushing setup. After the parade laps we had a quick driver’s meeting then it was time for Group 1 to hit the track. During this time I did some final preparations to the car (checked to make sure the trunk monkey was ok), and waited for Group 1 and Group 2 to finish their sessions.

About 30 minutes later it was time to Grid for Group 3. To say the least I was excited. The rest of the day we’d race then let Groups 1 and 2 run then we’d be up again. Stay HYDRATED. I can’t stress this enough, you’ll think you’ve had enough water then 10 minutes in your mouth is dry and you’re THIRSTY! So drink plenty of fluids during the morning and throughout the day

Here’s the video from Session 1,2,3 and 4.

Continue reading Daytona International Speedway PDX with CFR SCCA (4-13-13) →