Automation Sunday Cup - Race 4: Laguna Seca

wow same

“Anyone wanna buy my car? 
Anyone?”

2rJ

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Yeah I had a lucky draw but then I still could only pick one :frowning:

Well I did have clear intentions to buy one. Intentions which then crashed into my terrible gambling, hoping to snag a rally-bred car from a homolgation dealership. Should’ve known gambling is my dump stat
 :sweat:

Hey, I did!

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Team ‘Southend Or Bust’
Circa 1998

The cars the lads will be driving is finally ready.


James arrived in his usual fashion; blaring the living shit out of some 1991-ish Seattle-area grunge band’s casette tape over the worn out sound system of his 1983 Merciel 120. Stepping out, he grabbed his oval sunglasses and slid them on. Sunglasses were such a part of his character that he never quite felt comfortable without them on if it was sunny outside.

The garage - a small lot in the extra-urban area of Bristol - he’d come to was the one Martin’s brother worked at. Seb and Martin had been working on the car for the past few days, and had told James he “probably wasn’t going to like it it”.

–

“What the hell is that” James blurted out, standing dead centre in front of Southend’s newest motoring escapade.

“That” Martin began, confidently, “is a Gabatron Xenus TSR. 16V spec too”.

James looked blankly at the car, and then turned to Martin, beginning to chuckle. Seb, who stood by him, tried to hide his smirk, the whites of his Fila tracksuit being caught by the mid-June sunlight pouring through the open garage door.

“Told you Martin” said Seb at last, giving into his amusement. Martin returned a pissed-off expression.

“Look, it’s not even done 50k, and it had room for a turbo, which I was adamant about adding the moment I read the rules” Martin said, clearly fighting to justify his purchase.

“Mate, it’s a curvy French thing” said James, strutting about, “And not even the good kind”.

He did have a point. The Xenus was peak mid-90s curvacious crooniness, save for the slight aggresiveness in its lights and that mean lower-front fascia.

Martin sighed. “We’ve got plenty of power from it” he returned.

That caught James’ attention. “Yeah?” he replied.

Seb nodded. “Yeah indeed. It’s pretty damn quick that’s for sure”.

“Well, no use in complaining” said James, “though I’m trusting you guys”.

“Oh you can trust us” said Seb. Him and Martin were damn confident in what they had made, having spent an extensive amount of time retuning it from its sporty-but-limited road going setup into something more akin to the track day machine they needed it to be.

The lads walked out the garage in search of much-needed lunch. James looked back at their car. “Who’s idea were the white racing wheels?”

“Seb’s idea” said Martin, patting the Spanish man on his back.

“I approve” said James.

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Team Cat eye

Thick Tyres: Check
Boost: Check
Schport: Check

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Team Sunday Strikers - Car Reveal

After several hours of tinkering, the Sunday Strikers revealed their tuned '88 Mosport Arrow. It was now entirely bright red - previously its roof was black - and bore the number 37.

Henry described the upgrades in brief: “As you can see, this is no ordinary Mosport Arrow. We increased the boost to 1 bar, yielding over 200 horsepower in the process. In addition, we fitted a Quaife LSD, vented front discs, and a wider wheel/tire package, while also tweaking the gear ratios and suspension to better suit the engine’s increased output. Finally, we removed some unnecessary weight and installed a new aero kit. All this adds up to a much faster car than we initially had - at least, in theory.”

“Fingers crossed it all works well come race day”, Pat continued. “We have high hopes this season and are confident that our Mosport Arrow can consistently live up to its giant-killing reputation.”

Walter nodded in silence, knowing that his teammates had done the best job they could with the Arrow’s modest engine capacity. Now all that the Sunday Strikers had to do was wait


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Just a heads up, the deadline is under 2 hours away and 4 teams have not entered a tuned car yet.

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Well I wasn’t able to do much, but here it is:

Just retuned the engine for more efficiency, tweaked the suspension and that’s about it.

Oh, and put a bitchin’ stripe on it too.

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Mmmmmm
 stripey

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Am considering seriously offering to tune several of the cars post cup to run around a particular track (flying lap), just to showcase which car had what potential (approximately, no more than 10 minutes a tune).

coz I guarantee you nobody gonna have tuned my cars faster than I can get them

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Meanwhile in the NR Group Team


Kai: Hey, I bought a car!
Others: What car?
Kai: A Baltazar Zeppelin S
 I’m pretty sure that’s how it’s spelled. I almost bought a bad condition Epoch M10 Ansom RSA. The Tania and the Vernum Scaffel S is ugly AF and the los is too ricey
 The Emotion was too slow. The final choice for me was clearly the Baltazar. It was clean and never abused. Anyways, let’s work on it shall we?
Others: Right!

Next day


Others: you happy with it?
Kai: Awesome!

Others: Here’s what we did, lower the car to the lowest ride height possible, 17 inches magnesium NR5 rims, wider tires and I forgot the width, larger brakes, we then slap a turbo on it and adjust the compression ratio so it’s not knocking, 3.25 inch exhaust, higher cam profiles, adjusted the suspension, lighter racing seats, adjust the gearing, fully clad undertrays, slapped a big wing on it, lips and canards, also painted the car and the rims gloss black. That’s it. We can’t get it over 200HP since the pistons can’t handle the torque. Altough it makes 197HP. And the rules mention that we can’t change the internals.
Kai: Damn, should’ve known better about the engine. But, it’s pretty good. I hope we can at least catch up to others
 Even a Mosport Arrow is more capable of making more power.
Others: The car is making so much downforce that we actually need to stiffen up the suspension.
Kai: Let’s take it for a spin shall we?

After a lap in the Automation Airfield


Kai: This setup is good. I’m happy with it. I just hope we’re competitive enough. I can’t wait for the first round of ASC!

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All of that in 1 day? I’m impressed!

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They worked so hard I guess


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How hard could it be ©

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Allright, when do the races start approximately?

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First race will be on Saturday most likely.

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Team Getaway Plan

The Japanese hills are alive to the sound of a turbo I4 as their LLA Comet shoots through them. Eurobeat blasting out the one speaker, which after a harsh bump a few miles ago is now freely swinging by a wire. Maria simply holds on to her seat as she’s thrown about through turns, now regretting asking Skyler to “play Space Boy and step on it”. Skyler just sits there, a blank expression on his face as he scrapes the barrier on entry and exit of a hairpin, and quietly sings to himself. The song ended as he left the mountain pass, when they then pulled into a layby. He turned to her and grinned. “This is amazing. Handling is perfecting for taking turns, although I’m really having to focus on keeping it controlled.”

Maria just stares back, trying to regain her senses. “Thanks
” she says between deep breaths. “Yeah
 The handling is for lap times. Are you saying it’s not good enough?”

“No
 It’s fine!” he quickly replies.

“Good. A lot of effort went into that setup. Oh yeah, can you please slow down a little more? I don’t want to have to have to do any major repairs because you screwed up.”

“Slow
 down? But that was the warm up. I was gonna start pushing it this run!” She stares in disbelief at him. He grins. “I’m kidding! Maybe
”

She looks back to the road, to see the top of the sun rising up over another mountain.

“I think we should head to the track now. Wouldn’t want to get arrested before our break into the legal side of racing.” Skyler just grabs the loose speaker and puts it back in its place, then heads to the track.


A few hours later they enter the paddocks. A few teams had already set up here, a couple even still tuning their cars. They see their pit box and pull in. Maria pulls out a toolbox and drops it next to the car, and begins to examine it. After their late night run, she expected to see some damage. To her surprise the only damage is a few scratches across the black part of the two tone, which she quickly covers with a black permanent marker.

Meanwhile, Skyler sits at the wheel with a map of the track and his music. While Greenday plays in the background, he goes over some racing lines Maria scribbled down on the plane over.

Skyler eventually headed out on track to get some real practice as Maria did a tour of the pitlane, checking out their rivals. The amount of other mid engine cars worried her, a lot of them more modern than their LLA. The selection of cars were less than confidence inspiring, especially the hoards of small and light mid engine cars would be a challenge. And if even the less sporty cars were competently set up, they’d be screwed.

Watching from the sidelines, she sees their LLA lock up into turn 1, then takes the turn in a smoky powerslide. She runs back down the pitlane to the entrance, and waves him back in at the end of the lap. The rear steps out as the car swerves into the pit lane, almost clipping Maria with the oversized wing.

With the car at a stop and Skyler without his music, she takes the opportunity to tear into him. “We have one set of tyres and you’re driving like a goddamn idiot. I swear if we have any flatspots I’m gonna
” she stops yelling for a moment to catch a breath, while Skyler shrinks into his seat. She sighs, “Just stop showing off and actually start trying. Dumbass!”

“Sorry.” is all he timidly replies.

“May as well stay in anyway. We should probably top up on fuel. At least we aren’t paying for gas
” She trails off as Skyler starts blasting Hey Boy Hey Girl from the car, and simply glares at him while he drums the wheel in rhythm.

He yells “Sorry, can’t resist!” as he closes the door and accelerates out again, just as the song shouts “Here we go!”, spinning the wheels and disappearing off into the distance. Maria makes a mental note to not let him turn on the radio while he’s supposed to stay still, and then sits back down.

She considers trash talking the other teams, maybe even unnerve them a little by making up stories about their cars. Or she could just nap. Who knows, maybe some other team is touring the pitlane to see the competition. She grabs a wrench to throw just in case


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