80vetteL82

As the title says I went autocrossing yesterday for the first time. I went with a firefighter I work with whos got a whole fleet of cool cars. Hes got a whole fleet of cool cars including a 9sec street driven 99 Corvette he built, 2 early 80s Ferrari 308's, an 82 Delorean, and a Prius haha. Other than the Vette and the Prius hes constantly buying/fixing/flipping cars for profit. The Delorean he has is the 4th one hes owned this year haha. But anyways, Im getting off track...

I obviously took my SS/TC, and seeing his Vettes suspension is set up for drag racing he decided that wouldnt be a great car to take, so he took the Delorean just for fun!

Ive gotta say this was #*%$#@* awesome! Ive known since I bought my SS that this is the kind of stuff it was meant for, but Ive never actually gotten around to trying anything like this.

I had a great time and put down some respectable times, especially considering it was a last minute decision to go so I didnt have time to get tires and was running the car on my stock 3+ year old Contis! haha It was a 2mile course and the best time of the day by one of the experienced guys was 94secs, my best was 107... from talking to the guys there, 107 was good for my first time.

Best part was everyone was really cool with taking passengers, and at the end of the day I went for 2 laps in a Dodge Viper RT/10.....that was AWESOME! I also went for a few rides in the Delorean haha, and one of our buddies 2006 WRX STI.... the STI was only managing 120sec lap times.

All in all Im definitely going to be doing this again and have decided Im not even going to bother drag racing the car any more...Ill leave the strip to my Vette. The Cobalt is so much fun on the road course scene that Im going to focus on setting it up for that.

So, for you experienced autocross guys, other than the obvious need for new tires, what other things should I be doing to make this car a better autocrosser? Any suspension changes I should make?

Mark Aubele

No. Buy tires and drive.

Mechs

Yeah, get better tires for now. The the car is pretty good stock. Learn to drive the car stock, then when you get better you can start modding.

80vetteL82

Sounds good. Yeah, the car seems to be setup great from the factory. I know GM had done a lot of planning and tuning with these cars, including suspension tuning on Nurburgring, and it definitely paid off. I drove it VERY hard and felt nice and tight. The only thing holding me back was the tires... I was squealing through the entire course lol.

Wangspeed

iTrader: (2)

The tire situation might be a little frustrating, but I think it's important to learn on normal old street tires, nothing too sticky. If you want to get humbled, hand the keys over to one of the fastest guys around, and watch him obliterate your time, without any changes to the car.

The sport is 90% driver, 10% car. Don't mess with the car. Just spend the money on tires, and going to more events.

80vetteL82

haha yeah I know! There was a guy there with a 2009 Dodge Viper ACR and he let his buddy, who was the organizer of the event and has been doing this forever, take his car for a couple laps. He's like "yeah, I let him take my car and he blows away my times." lol Im sure there was plenty of guys there that could have done a lot better with my car. Hell, I went for a ride in my buddies STI and I know I could have gone faster than him in that, he wasnt pushing it at all. His best time was a 120, that car has much more potential in it. It was an 06 STI with turbo back exhaust/tune I think.

madcitySS

iTrader: (4)

without throwing tooo much info at you I would learn on the tires you have, get some good summer only tires when you feel like you have a good feel for the car.

The SS/TC is a very well setup for stock class.

Glad you had fun and the people around you were cool, really makes for a better time.