Woods Racing

Detroit: May 25th

.
So we packed up the Woods Racing crew truck, the 2010 Ford F-150, and got movin’ by 9am.
.

.
Checked in to the Gold in the Net facility as we passed it on the highway to the demise of Mats…(as I’m trying to steal his mayorship)…and was through Toronto before traffic knew we were coming. We got lucky with construction an all, as we all know, the 401 can get pretty dicey when it comes to the orange cones.
.
Weather was good up until we hit the Strathroy area, then it got a lil touchy with the tornado warnings and all. You have to understand, I make this trip every year, and this one, (well, we ain’t in Indy yet) has been the first in 5 years that I haven’t been through a tornado on the way down. Yup, last 4 in a row I drove straight into a tornado somewhere either on the 401 or 402.
.

.
By the time we got to the Blue Water Bridge in Sarnia, it was coming down pretty hard…the bridge is pretty high over the Sarnia/Port Huron border (233ft to be exact) so when you’re up there and it’s raining like that…you keep an eye out for any funny business. We passed customs without a hitch and headed on to Detroit in the pouring rain.
.

.
We ended up safe and sound in West Bloomfield Michigan at our cousin’s place where we were treated to dinner at a local pub while we watched Tampa sneak by Boston to head to game 7. We pretty much feel at home here in the outskirts of Detroit. We’ve been coming here to visit family since I was born and it’s a great stop off point to break up the would be 16 hour drive straight to Indy. They always bring us to a local bar, or pub or restaurant where they always know people, and everyone makes us feel welcome and at home. It’s great to come here. I also got a kick out of the posters and stuff advertising “Blue, Imported from Canada”. As we know from home, it’s really spelled “Bleue” and in place of that little Canadian maple leaf is actually a Fleur-de-lis.
.

.

So here we are back at the house, thought I’d send a little update here on the blog for ya’s all. Tomorrow we pick up Louis at the airport and make our way down to Indianapolis…check back for more updates as I’ll keep this blogroll as one single post as I go. I’ll have lots’o’pics!

.

Night all! Thanks for askin me how the trip went!

Indianapolis May 28th
.
Well we’ve been here for 2 days now and its been busy. Awesome, but busy.
.
We picked up Louis Thursday morning at the Detroit metro airport and headed towards Indy. With the WR crew truck, or as he says…”the cowboy Cadillac” we were ready to tackle anything that we were headed into. Including the ridiculous amounts of tornado warnings and sketchy looking skies.
.

The mid west…it’s like a constant vortex just waiting to rip apart small towns and corn fields.
.
Luckily enough though, we dodged every touch down that was reported by about 20 miles or so and really only ran through pretty intense rain.
.
Once we finally got here, we waited for Rebecca to get home and we were pretty surprised to see her pull into the driveway with the Indy 500 pacecar camaro. For real, right there in the garage we looked it over and I must say, Chevy did a pretty good job with all the details. Embroidered seats, door sills, decals…all perfect.
.
After messing around with that, off to dinner we went. It was bec’s birthday the next day and giving that the race an all the festivities that were lined up we celebrated on the eve!
.
The next morning, Friday, or affectionately known around here was carb day was nothing short of amazing.
.
Off to the track we went, got our credentials and headed in with the other half a million people.
.
Our buddy Casey took us into the Penske garage where we had a great look at Helio’s car, a 2010 chassis, parked next to Briscoe’s and Power’s cars. What an amazing lil spot they have there..the tools, equipment and technology is simply out of this world.
.
Afterwards we got ourselves a couple “indydogs” and had some beers while watching the hot wheels crew practice for their insane jump that will happen at the race. (more on that tomorrow!)
.
After watching the shenanigans of the crowd for awhile, it was off to get dressed for the izod invitational party. This was a serious good time. With celebrities, stars and plenty of drinks, we were on the top floor warehouse of the Hurst Beanery in the shadow of the gigantic Lucas Oil Stadium.
.
We go-karted, (where my dad came so close to spinning out Al Unser Jr) had some fancy food, met all kinds of people and had an overall great time. Not to mention the awesome set of vintage Indy cars parked out front.
.
Here we are Saturday morning, takin it a little easy since we’ve been goin at it pretty hard. I’m gonna go try and find an internet connection to properly load pics an all…but as for now I’m on my blackberry so this setup will have to do.
.
So stay tuned, cause there’s a ton more comin!

.

May 28th – Indianapolis

.

After gathering ourselves in the morning, we had a bit more of a relaxing day. We kinda lounged around the house with all kinds of plans…but decided a morning off would be alright. After all the travel we did, and the week prior to leaving was pretty intense trying to wrap things up and get the Canada Synthetics / Gold in the Net drift car RTC for the Dirft4cash event.

.

We ended up heading out in the afternoon and got some groceries and what not done in the afternoon…need to pack decent food for the race and all. Afterwards, before heading out to the Indianapolis Museum of Arts for the IZOD/Indy party we hit up the Boathouse Grill for some good eats. A quick change of clothes and off to the museum we went. (Which I ended up being completely under dressed for but ended up fun anyhow.

.

We mingled, shook hands and did all those fancy things then made an escape since we had tickets waiting for us at the Lucas Oil Speedway for some short track excitement. Mazda Star, Midgets and USF2000 cars ripped around the track and impressed us to no end.

.

.

.
These mini Indy cars tear it up man…I love watching these guys. They are the future for sure and it’s great to see this sport alive and well in America. I find Canada is struggling and wish it was as strong at home as it is here.
.

.

Despite the treat of rain and a wicked thunderstorm showing up on the radar, all kinds of folks made it out to watch the “Night before the 500” racing. It was pretty good for us in the sense that it was relaxing to just sit, have some beers and watch some real good racing.

.

It was a fairly early night since it was an early morning start for raceday. We set the alarm for 4:30am and tried to get some sleep.

.

Have a look at my post Destination Indy: The Centennial for a full update about Raceday!

.

May 26th by Bannon

Continue Reading

That’s pretty much what they are. Race cars are one giant puzzle, gotta get all the pieces lined up right.
.
It was a bit of a tough weekend at the Woods Racing / Canada Synthetics Camp. For a lot of our cars, it was pretty much the first time on the track this year. Fastco Motorsports were in Mosport, 7x Racing in Cornwall and GITN in St. Eustache.
.
First outs are tough. Just when you think you are ready, the race gods hammer down to make sure you’re paying attention.
.
Out in Mosport, Martin and his crew got into practice when 74 & 75 both blew transmissions ending their chance at a CTCC win this Victoria Day Weekend. Their weekend ended before it started. It’s a tough day when that happens, Martin is one of the best crew chiefs out there and has worked hard getting the cars ready for a 1st out and the season. Tranny problems plagued them last year so let’s hope they can get it sorted out before the ICAR event in 2 weeks. Nick Wittmer will be taking Glenn’s spot in the 74. He was last years Super Class Champion and the 2009 Super Touring Champ and the FASQ Canadian Road Racer of the Year so it’s bound to be exciting for the Fastco crew.
.

.
Onto Dave Seguin and the 7x team. It was a bitter sweet dirt weekend for those boys. Saturday night they hit up Brockville and finished 3rd. Pretty good for the first time out this year. For the Cornwall race, I mentally dismissed any chance of rain and headed out to watch them tear up the dirt oval there. And that they did, up until the last lap actually. The whole race he played around between 1st and 3rd place even as the track got slippier with the rain. The RWD Nissan is fast, but coming out of turn 2, Dave got that Woods Racing / Canada Synthetics mini-stock about 8 inches to high up the track, lost traction and the pack flew by.
.
But what came from that is the decision to go to another suspension setup which will eliminate this in the future. If the track was dry it wouldn’t have been a problem, but Mother Nature decided she wanted to step in, and that, is what we call racing.
.
The car looks good though, it’s gonna be a good season for us for sure. Dave and the crew has spent countless hours on that car and as every year, I’m more and more impressed with the crew.
.

.
This past weekend with the DMCC group was the Drift4Cash event at Autodrome St. Eustache. It’s a non points, pre-season race and we sure learned a lot. The CanadaSynthetics/Gold in the Net JZX90 spent the week here at Woods Racing as we finished up everything we could before loading it into the trailer. Mats even fabbed and painted a brand spankin new bumper for the front. The car got tech’d and all was well.

.

Then we went out for practice.

.

For real, this car is fast. Very fast. We nailed down the fastest speeds and the car looked amazing. The track was a bit bumpy so we played with air pressure and got the car where Mats wanted it. It was nearing the end of practice when Mats clipped a pylon, tearing off the front bumper and taking with it a couple power steering lines. Back into the pits, we got that all fixed up (aside from the bumper of course) and off he went again. All seemed well until the exhaust manifold decided it didn’t want to stay in one piece. I was already on my way to Cornwall when this happened so there was some quick planning that had to be done.

.

.

A huge thanks goes out to Norm at NormalExperts. Mats and the boys took off the turbo, unbolted the manifold and passed it to Norm rugby style and off he went back to his shop to weld it for us. I can’t thank him enough, he’s helped me in so many ways, inside and outside DMCC and I got a case of beer with his name on it.

.

Monday morning, race day, they got the manifold and turbo put back on and I showed up just in time for a pin hole in another power steering line. Got that set up and Mats headed out for practice again.

.

We’ve been fighting with some throttle response issues and they seemed to really kick it up notch by the time qualifying came about. The car looked good in practice and Mats was fast and holding his lines well.

.

When we went out for our first qualifying run, just as he initiated the car shut off. By the time I got from the spotter’s booth to the pit, Cole had the car re-started and all looked ok. Pretty sure that TPS sensor is getting the best of us. Out he went again for another qualifying shot but went in a lil hot after the transition and spun out. We figured that was it for us, we didn’t qualify and headed back to the pits. Mats got changed and we shut the car down as I looked things over. A DMCC staffer came by to let us know that someone is DNF’ing so there was a spot to fill. I started the car and Mats got dressed. He went out for a third time and nailed the line perfectly.

.

We were in.

..

We were first up with Jeff Laflamme who qualified 1st. Mats ran it awesome stayed on track and hit all the marks, Jeff however went off the track 3 out of the 4 times they raced and yet the victory still went to Jeff. We weren’t sure exactly what happened there but off we went to the 2nd bracket. On the other side of the tree, the TPS caught up to us and the car was hesitating pretty good so we gave that win away. Jeff ended up going on to win the competition.
.

.
Ironically, for as many hours I’ve spent with the car, this was my first time seeing the car run. It was a learning experience for me and I now have a better idea what this is all about. I’ve been drag racing for years and this pretty much blows my common thinking out the window. I thank Mats and the crew for putting so much trust into me considering I had no drift experience, I’m mainly domestic and need to learn as I go.
.

.
One thing for sure, once we get this right, there will be no stopping us. The car is fast, smokes well and angles hard. Just gotta work out those lil things. This is what we learn in practice and pre-season events. Next stop is Montmangy for Round 1. The Drift-Zilla will be ready, and rest assured, we will kick some ass.

.

I want to thank everyone who came out to support us, it’s great to have the backing of so many people. I appreciate the fact that you took time out of your holiday weekend to come an say hi, cheer us on and remind us why we do this. It’s all for you, the fans. And a special big thanks to Erin who got her first taste of the crazy racing arena in which I call home, work and play. We were only 5 steps inside the track gate when Poirier slammed his LS powered ride into the wall not 3 feet from us. I’m sure that’s gonna be a vision she won’t soon forget!

.

May 24th by Bannon

Continue Reading