The Streets

Photo: Luis Vivar

By Steve Town

The Streets of Willow is always an excellent test for driver and machine and this past month, our Taste of POC PDS and TT event was all of that and more. We had a terrific group of drivers, with a wide range of experience, and Porsche street cars of all types, other manufacturer’s cars, and as usual the weather, combined for a memorable weekend. Few tracks offer as many learning components as Streets. It’s such a unique combination of a relatively short lap length, good sight lines in and out of the car, elevation changes, a wide variation of corner styles, narrow track, and short but eye-opening straights. Add to that changing directions from CW Saturday to CCW Sunday, and you have a fantastic track to learn, to challenge yourself, and your car.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Don Matz, for your many years of PDS stewardship, which came to a close in 2020. It’s hard to imagine how many PDS, TT, and Cup Racing members began with Don’s PDS events, and are still running in various categories in the POC and other clubs. Thanks for all you did and your PDS experience, time, and guidance to me last year too. Lets take a “track walk” through the paddock and the profile of our event. It truly reflects the landscape of Porsche and other manufactures that provides all of us with machinery that can, mostly, be driven to the track and home again, which is the core of the PDS experience. The mostly comment does come with the reality that, like our track prepped TT and Race Cars, they don’t always go home Sunday in the same condition they arrived in! We had a handful of belts, hoses, leaks, and tire issues, and thankfully only 1 or 2 that had to really stop running and get assistance to get home. I think that’s pretty remarkable. We had a good turn out of 44 drivers in PDS, which allowed us to run a full field of 3 run groups, structured by prior track experience. As can happen in the first run session on Saturday, the process of point-by-passing and spreading the field out, takes each group some getting used to, but by mid Saturday that was sorted and all 3 groups were moving around the track efficiently, helping each other with passing, and working through the challenging bowl to waterfall passing section. That section is

Photos: Luis Vivar

actually one of the most difficult passing zones any street car event is going to throw at a driver. As each car generation goes by, power goes up and the difference of speeds to prior generations expands. I can’t say enough how appreciative I am that our run groups managed that passing zone without incident! Way to go all the drivers. The range of cars’ horsepower, weight, and tires was eye opening and enjoyable to see. While the run groups were set by experience levels, the variance of cars made for a fun and interesting mix on track, which everyone managed well. When you consider that almost all the cars arrived with the basic street seat belt and seat, that frankly can’t hold much in place on a race track, it’s a testimony to all the drivers how well they managed a challenging Streets circuit (both directions), traffic, unfamiliar corner work flag situations, and good old Willow heat and wind. When running Time Trials or Cup Racing with harnesses and a track seat, it’s easy to forget just how challenging it is to drive a street car on a track, especially on a circuit like Streets. After a day or two of that, there will be some new muscle groups being tested on all of us. When I took stock of the range of cars running that weekend, I realized I had to mention the array. Here’s a quick summary:

Porsches: 914s, 996s, late model 911s from base Carerra to GT3RS; late model Caymans through GT4; Boxsters and BSR race cars. And how about this Streets array of cars: Mini 4 door; Audi RS 4 door; BMW M2, M4, M8; Golf R; AMG C63: Corvettes; Nissan Z; Camaros; Dodge; Ford; Lexus RCF; a Lamborgini (now that was fun to see Jim Yang run that around Streets – good driving Jim!); and……. a Tesla made an appearance on track Sunday. Elon needs to put a closer charging station in for his customers than Palmdale, but hats off to the Brinks for making the charge run, twice, to keep on track! Our race weekend PDS events often have a wide range of driver experience, but our non-race Streets events tend to have an even wider range, which I think is great to see. This weekend was no different with 10 drivers having less than 2 track events and, on the other end of the spectrum, 10 drivers with over 8 years of track and Auto X experience. A lot of stories developed over the weekend... here are few: Dave Bent gets the “I’m going to be on that track no matter what” award. Dave’s 996 engine ended it’s life on track last month, and after Enterprise pulled his Camry “track car” entry, he made it to the track with a C63 rental. Dave we aren’t telling Merc about this, but great job getting the track rental program started! Eben Benade’s daughter Kate made her track debut in her Mini 4 door, and ran great (she made no comment to the media on how brother Colin went in TT!). It was especially fun to see Wes Hambach out from Texas in his orange 914, and pushing it hard through the corners, running fast times, even matching up with the Brinks 914. Daniel Ross has made four PDS events in a row and is really starting to push the Ross’s Cayman to the limit. We think he’s ready for a track

Photos: Luis Vivar

prepped car (come on Dad!). Tristan Zafra worked some magic in his GT3RS, running good lap times, and showing all of us why the Michelin Cup 2Rs are the most incredible “street legal” tire in the world. And finally a special thanks to all of you for helping on so many levels and making this event a reality. Thank you Kevin Wolfe and Brian Cooner and all the Auto X gang for organizing, for timing/scoring, and for transforming Streets to a nearly one lap timed Auto X course. Thank you John Momeyer for making the trip from Phoenix, running registration and competition directing, and doing the truly heavy lifting for our club. Thank you Joe Wiederholt for making the trip from San Diego and managing the weekend. Thank you Dwain Dement and Vision Motorsports for all the brake zone, apex and exits cones. Set up time and take down is significant, as is the cone placement knowledge. That’s a huge assist to all the PDS drivers. And finally thanks to Eben Benade, Seth Hodosh, Jim Salzer, and Martina Kwan for your time instructing and for all you did to help the weekend go smoothly! See you all at the next event! Steve Town

Photos: Luis Vivar

Photos: Luis Vivar

Photo: Luis Vivar

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