BMW CCA Roundel October 2011 Issue features my BMW Centric One Lap Article

Roundel is the official monthly magazine of the BMW Car Club of America.

The publication goes to every primary member of the BMW CCA.

I'm proud to say that my 2011 One Lap Article appears in the October 2011 issue of Roundel.

In spite of Team DaveM3Fan's misfortune, it makes a pretty funny story.
The considerable effort and achievements of the other V8 M3 teams are profiled in the article.

My article starts on page 60 of the October issue.
Please see below for the "digital edition" pages containing the article.

Special thanks to Steve Rossini and Bill Guy of Highland Design Studio for the excellent photography.
I wish the magazine had given the photos more space.

I sincerely apologize that I was not able to cover every One Lap BMW team in the 2011 event.
All feedback welcome.

The field carries on...

I'm home crying in my soup, and trying to get back to normal... Editing photos, updating the blog and de-lousing the car. But the field carries on, making more great stories and memories.

Here are some links to that great stuff...

Our friends Robin and Woody were on their way to Daytona after Carolina Motorsports Park and at highway speed, hit an Armadillo on the road near Savanna, Georgia!

Read Robin's great story about overcoming adversity at this link:
Part one: Pesky little creatures...
Tale of triumph: They made it to the second Daytona!

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At Daytona, the (currently leading the overall) winning Nissan GTR went over 181 mph on street tires, then proceeded to travel to Gainesville (home of the NHRA Gator Nationals) and went 10.6 @ 124 MPH.

See the Daytona run here: (Leh makes it look easy!)
181 on Street Tires @ Daytona

Read Leh and Doug's blog here:
TopSpeed GTR is incredible!

The Barber run is streaming LIVE as of 9:52 am Eastern here:
LIVE STREAMING!

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My Pals AC and Eric are doing really well in the Semi-Famous Axis of Oversteer Z3 M Coupe!
At Daytona, they went 158.76 up on the banking... Not bad for a 10 year old car!
Rad their blog here:  We're still alive!

Today at the gorgeous Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, it is apparently 71 and Sunny.
Nevermind that it is on eof the world's finest motorsport facilities.

Yep, I'm quite jealous... As you should be too.

Day One: wet skidpad challenge and Grissom AFB Autocross

Each official start at the Tire Rack begins with the wet skidpad competition. It is a smooth 200' diameter asphalt surface with Sprinklers arranged at regular intervals in the center AND around the outside.

With the sprinklers doing their thing and with wipers running, each driver is to attack the pad for two timed laps counter-clockwise, then you turn around in the delta to take two timed laps clockwise. The highest speed you can carry without spinning out against the time over distance allows the judges to calculate the g force. Michelin makes some lofty claims about the wet performance of the Pilot Super Sport tire, and at full tread depth, this challenge is an ideal way to see if Pierre is full of Brie or not.

Brock Yates Jr. First did a demo run in the 550hp X5 M suv. Is is a heavy but powerful truck. The top seeded leaders went in order of car number.... Our car number is 18. Regardless of All wheel drive, tire width, power or otherwise, none of the big dogs was able to beat Brock's G reading.

Brock's Demo: Photo by Solomon Rosenthal, Rosenthal Media

We ran some higher than normal tire pressure, put the adjustable shocks on soft and put the car in "M Dynamic Mode". As I approached the line for my turn I was able to go slowly but saw at the steering wheel to try and put some heat into the tires. Nothing too fancy but a little quick slaloming.

With wipers swishing away I did my circles and the car felt really great considering the amount of water. Second gear was just right to balance the car. Turns out I was the first to beat Brock's number and by a fair margin!

My car during the run... Photo by Tire Rack

We were happy with that and we departed for the next destination assuming that some of the smaller and more nimble front wheel drives with exotic setups would beat our number.

The incredible 93 Civic of William Chan and John Harrison: Photo by Solomon Rosenthal, Rosenthal Media

Catesby Jones' Nissan GTR: Photo by Solomon Rosenthal, Rosenthal Media

In the end, NOBODY beat my score and we took 1st overall in event #1,
briefly leading the entire event... As my friend at Speedco often says, that certainly "did not suck"!

Mike Babcock about to start: Photo Cyndy Yates

At Grissom AFB, we did a full SCCA rules autocross. I would euphemistically describe Mike and I as "reluctant" auto-xers. The 3700 pound M3 may have disregarded the rain, but on dry grippy concrete runway affair, the "normal" state of affairs resumed. We managed 32nd overall in the autocross.
This placed us in a tie with two cars in the 11th-13th range.

Mike getting it done in front of the "Bunker of Doom": Photo by Solomon Rosenthal, Rosenthal Media

Mike in the high-speed slalom: Photo by Solomon Rosenthal, Rosenthal Media

Summit Point main circuit is my home track and I will lead-off in the batting order on Sunday morning.

We have a friendly BMW competition with some of our pals, we have tentatively dubbed "the Johnson Cup". More on that later, I suppose.

My eyes and thumbs are tired!

First day of camp... Start out on the red eye!

It's about 640 miles from Spring City to to South Bend Indiana.
Ed and I did not want to spend a whole vacation day on the transit, so we agreed to depart Thursday evening after a "normal day" at work and to say proper goodbyes to the families.

Annie issued stern warnings to behave myself!

Our teammate Mike Babcock flew in on his own red-eye from Phoenix, AZ to Detroit and then to South Bend. Ed and I wanted to pick him up at the airport for a little team building moment.

After a 11:40pm departure, we drove thru PA, Ohio and into Indiana without incident, and ultimately made the airport 30 minutes after Mike got his bag. Thru the night, Ed and I swapped driving... But Ed did more of it because I crapped out after a short stint in early Ohio. The M3's passenger front seat is better for snoozing than I remembered.

Mike, Dave and Ed enjoy the freezing wind of the Tire Rack HQ Parking lot

One Lap is very social, and as I mentioned Mike is quite a popular fixture with the One Lap family. Our friendly rival Brian Hair had some die cut vinyl stickers made up based on the "For Norm" plate we are running to memorialize Mike's dad, Norm Babcock. Many cars in the paddock are now wearing these.

In between socializing, we discussed how to manage all of our stuff, washed the car and applied even more logos. The car is really pigged up now! On the roof, we installed the donor stickers we have collected thus far from generous friends and neighbors.

The donation signature stickers begin... Thanks everyone!

The real action starts Saturday.
Stay tuned!

Fuel The Cure!

I went into my decision to do One Lap of America knowing that the teams (and friends) I admire most are the men and women who have raised money for the causes, concerns and charities they believe in.

Here are some inspiring example links:
Robin Sparrow's One Lap Campaign to eliminate Prostate Cancer
Fay and David Teal's "Laps to conquer MS"
Roy, Adrienne and Nancy's work for the Ronald McDonald House
Linda Cheatham's Organ Donation awareness efforts...

I'm a very lucky guy with a great job, great friends, a healthy family and enough resources to indulge my passion for high performance driving. Motorsports and racing related activities tend to be selfish pursuits. The "exposure" we can get in the automotive enthusiast community give us an opportunity to help worthwhile charities.

This is my first self-entry (of my own car) in the Tire Rack One Lap of America. To kick it off, we are pleased to announce that we are raising donations for the Children's Tumor Foundation and NF awareness. For more background on our recipient charity, visit CTF.org but please consider donating to us so we can build a ongoing donation program.

We are offering sponsorship levels that can suit all budgets. We are collecting during the event handing out wrist bands and signature panel stickers that can be signed and placed on the roof of the car as we go. The more stickers, the better we are doing!

For more mature budgets, we are offering event mileage (approximately 3,700) based amounts based on penny, nickel, dime, quarter and dollar per mile.  Please donate what you can and help our team make a big contribution in our very first outing.

Special thanks to our very first contributor, Steve C. for his generous support!

My contact at CTF.org also posted about us on Facebook on 4/27/11

http://www.facebook.com/racing4research

UPDATE: WOW and WOW!


We are humbled by the generosity of our "early adopter"sponsors.


We've had online donations through the PAYPAL widget and cash donations at Quadratec where I am happily employed.


Steve C.
JG
Chuck T.
Brian R.
Bear P.
John S. (x2 !)
Tony I.


Thanks for reading and for your generous support!

You're going to do WHAT?

It is March 1st 2011 and it is just about time to make this "official".

I've lost my mind!
After participating in 6 previous One Lap of America events (as a guest driver), I was always subject to various levels of compromise and I have never formed my own team.

I had plenty of fun on each of my previous One Lap outings, but taking on the challenge of being a team leader has been a burning goal. The only way to "slay that dragon" is to make it happen, accept the various risks, and to enter my own team - in my own car!

2011.5 M3 "Competition Package" Sedan (E90).
It is an incredibly capable car car WITHOUT aftermarket modifications.  

The Challenge:

This competition shapes up differently each year, but with the economy suffering in 2009 and 2010, virtually unmodified E90 M3 Sedans finished in 10th and 9th in the overall OLoA standings. Both of those teams featured very skilled drivers... In 2009 I discovered along the route that my skill set compares favorably with those drivers.

The Motivation:

Over the years, I have been fairly content NOT entering competitions or otherwise quantifying my driving against others. The 2009 One Lap (in TC Kline's one-of-a-kind Z4 Carbon Coupe) gave me enough of a taste of success that I could no longer resist the urge to make a go of it on my own.
It appears that my latest-generation 2011.5 M3 sedan will get a "wee bit of exercise" this spring.

The Mission:

The mission is to HAVE FUN, bring it back in one piece and demonstrate that the current generation M3 V8 is the best all-around (unmodified) performance car that BMW has ever sold. This statement amounts heresy for those BMW "purists" who feel that this 4th generation M3 is "too big", "too heavy", and too far removed from the legendary BMW M car heritage. All of that esoteric carping is mostly bunk. I have confirmed all of my own biases over the last few years, but this vehicle is really the current state of the art for under 100 grand.

The Team:
After exhaustive searching, I've hand-selected two exceptionally talented One Lap of America teammates. My on-track co-driver is a wildly accomplished and gregarious One Lap veteran, and our transit specialist is my closest automotive confidant. Our trainee is a keen enthusiast anxious to get his first taste of the world's original sportsman road course driving challenge event.

The Schedule: The latest revision of the Tire Rack One Lap of America 2011 is published on the event homepage: http://www.onelapofamerica.com/currentEvent/Schedule.do?eventId=30

2011's "East of the Mississippi" route includes a combination of tracks from our collective previous experience, and a few exciting new challenges:

- Summit Point Raceway (West Virginia, where my serious driving passion was ignited)
- Carolina Motorsports Park (South Carolina, where I scored a top 10 on the first day I ever drove it)
- The reconfigurable road test course @ the BMW Performance Center in Greer, SC
- The freshly repaved legendary High banks of Daytona International Speedway (my first time)
- Circuit Grand Bayou Road Course in Belle Rose, LA (an oddball gem of a road course)
- The exceptional, world-class Barber Motorsports Park in Leeds (Birmingham) Alabama
- Autobahn Country Club in Joliet, Illinois

The event begins and ends on the skidpad/test track of the world headquarters of The Tire Rack (http://www.tirerack.com/features/motorsports/one_lap.jsp) in South Bend, Indiana. The commute from Philly to South Bend is about 650 miles by itself. The week long event route insanely snakes 3,527 miles around the eastern USA from April 30th to May 7th 2010. After the awards banquet, we will have one more leisurely 650 mile commute back to Spring City.

If this sounds like a lot of driving for one calendar week, I must point out that by historic One Lap standards, it isn't. Our event route in 1998 was over 5,700 miles in a week. Moreover, my 1998 teammate the Baron Rene von Richthofen was (and happily remains) certifiably unmanageable.

"I'll tell ya, these kids today are soft!"

Stay tuned to this blog for a more formal introduction of our complete 3 man "power trio".
Let's just say you don't need to be crazy to do One Lap of America, but it helps.