Race Day writeup (long):

I took the G to "Import Showdown" at the Talladega Gran Prix track this last Sat.

http://www.istrackday.com/
http://www.tgprace.com/about_track.htm

This track is 90 minutes W of Atlanta. It is a flat, 1.33mile road course with
a great layout! There is an awesome decreasing-radius U-shaped turn which
really defines the track and seperates the drivers. There is a fast, slightly
banked bend between two straights which is really fun to take.

The event was $125 for 80 minutes of track time (4 x 20min sessions)
(turned out to be 2 x 20minutes, and 1 x 30min cause everything was running
late)

I should note this is my first actual track day (I've done autocross).
Obviously then, I've never run this track before - and never pushed the G to
the limit on a full length, designed, purpose built racetrack without worrying about cops, pedestrians, commuters, etc. There was even an ambulance present.

An awesome array of fast cars was represented.
Racing that day:

G35 6mt (mine)
Eclipse GSX (3)
Prelude
Galant
240SX (3)
Viper RT10
Corvette C4
Corvette C5
Corvette C6
Eagle Talon AWD
S2000
IS300
325i (2)
WRX STI (2)
RX8 (2)
M3 (2)
Golf R32 (2)
Porsche 997
EVO
Miata (2)

You shoulda seen all these cars lined up! Schweet!
Some cars were race cars only and arrived on trailers, like the Viper and a
Miata. One of the 240SX was heavily race-prepped with a full susp upgrade,and a full interior roll cage with a Drivers seat only. Many people came well prepared (spare set of tires, jacks, compressors, tools, helmets, etc). Obviously several autocrossers in the mix. The WRX STIs looked really fast with the BBS wheels and the same gold BREMBO brakes as my G35.

Drivers were split into A (experienced), B (Intermediate), C (Novice).
I was in Group A with one of the BMW M3, a 240SX (or eclipe?..can't remember now), and a Corvette C5.
This was a time attack race with 4-5 cars on the track at a time and passing
allowed on Front and Back straights only.
Also, everyone got a walkie-talkie in the car, and they would tell you if you
needed to let someone pass (blue flag by voice, I guess).
We ran counter-clockwise for those of you looking at the website track layout.

Session 1:
Group A was first on the track, we were out of pit lane in this order:
Vette, G35, M3, 240SX.

It was a time trial, so we left space between the cars (a few seconds apart)
The first lap, I took my time, got the feel, etc.
The second lap was green flag, and I started to push it.

-Pit Straight up to 85mph or so in 4th gear, lift, bend right, straighten
wheel, stand on the brakes & downshift for hard left. This was tricky for me
because of the right, brake, left quick combo - the weight transfer is tricky.

-Floor it into the small straight, shift to 4th, then lift into a very fast,
banked left bend to the back straightaway. (This was the FUNNEST corner for me, and I was able to take it faster and faster as the day went on)

-End of back straight I'm going about 95 - 100mph. Brake - HARD! ...and early enough to navigate slightly banked, wide-U turn. They call it "The Carousel", but I quickly named this corner "brake-fade turn:...but not because of my brakes, because of others-more on that later.

-In third gear, back on the gas for a little bit into the difficult, defining,
thedriversfromtheposers, flat, tight,
decreasing-radius U-turn. Everyone had trouble with this turn. After the first
session, I immediately went to an instructor who gratefully decided to hang out for the day for free. He's very experienced on this track. I asked him to
explain that corner for me - Take it wide,wide,wide, carry some speed into the turn and look for a white "V" painted on the track (Who knew? Glad I asked!)
The "V" is the slowest point/most steering input and if you keep it just to the right (run over it with your right front tire) it will send you perfectly into the
required apex - and it worked! I mastered this corner by the end of the 2nd
session and owned it by the 3rd session. Many people never did get it, however.

-still in 3rd, on the gas out of the famous U and into the G Circle. The Circle
actually goes all the way around for lateral Gforce measuring, but for racing
obviously you only go about 3/4 of the way around. This is a long, steady, left hand turn which theoretically you can navigate by throttle-steering -> Turn in, get the car set, keep the steeing wheel constant, and use the gas pedal to get yourself around the corner. Then correct to the right side, hug the cone into the pit straight, into 4th gear, then back to the left/brake/right combo turn #1.

I could feel myself getting faster and faster as I got to know the track.
I didn't think I was really fast until I started pulling closer and closer to
the corvette, and then passed him on the pit straight. After the first corner,
and into the fast bend, he was no longer behind me either. After a few more
laps, I was coming up fast behind the BMW M3. I then passed him on the pit
straight also. (I think he was radioed to let me pass, but I thought to myself
"Whats going on here? I just caught and passed both a Vette and an M3 on a
racetrack?") I don't know what happened to the other car (SX/Eclipse?)?

I was feeling pretty good as the checkered flag went up, I took a cool-down lap to keep my brakes happy, came into pit lane, gave up my radio and parked my car. I was inspecting my tires/rotors when a guy walked up to me and introduced himself as the Vette driver. He said he just wanted to shake my hand and tell me what an incredible driving job I did He told me how he saw me catching up in his rear-view mirror, and the next time he looked I was right on his ***, and he just couldn't believe it. He was pushing his car as hard as he could. He also complained of brake fade starting towards the end of the session (after I had passed him).

I walked towards the main bldg to watch the cars in Group B take off from the pits (Golf R32, Evo, Eclipse, Viper), and one-by-one people started coming up to me telling me how quick I was. Even the main dude told me I was definately the quickest car out there. I was in disbelief. The guy in the race-prepped 240SX who wasn't racing until the afternoon sessions asked me if he could ride with me during my next session. uh...sure, why not? I was a bit dizzy from all the attention.

Group B finished (20 minutes), Group C (Vette, Porsche, R32, others) finished
(20 minutes), and it was time for Group A again, session 2:

I did much better this session right away after finding all the brake points,
trouble spots, etc during last session. I was taking the fast bend faster and
faster , and started killing the famous U-turn. Once you know about the
"V"-marker in the road and start looking for it, the turn gets easy. It feels
slow, but its the ONLY way to take that turn.

This session I also proceeded to pass ALL the cars on the track with me, but I noticed that some people just weren't taking the correct line. They were braking too soon for many of the turns (I caught up to all the cars in the start of a turn by braking later, and on the exit of the turns by getting on the gas sooner - because of the better racing line)
Obviously, I wasn't going to catch up to the Vette and M3 in the straights :-)

This was the first timed session and my times were:
181
167
119
163
115
154
194
115 (passed a car)
167
156 (passed a car)
133

You can see my times getting better as I start to take the fast bend quicker
and quicker, and start to master the Famous U turn.

 

(CONT)

After the second session, I was starting to get worried about my tires. The
front tires (especially front RIGHT) was starting to look...well...odd.
There were all these rubber blotches on the tire. "pick-up rubber", I was told?
The tires were very oddly cupped, mainly on the outside of the tire, with
raised ridges, hard to describe (see pictures on my website). The center line of the Pilot Sports (between the two valleys with the wear indicators) used to be straight and flat, but now its angled . The whole tire looks like the rubber was starting to move around - not wear off? It was odd. High-stress for sure.

One guy came over with his pinpoint heat-measuring gun. (cool tool/toy, point it at something and get a heat reading) He pointed at the inside, middle, and outside of the tire, and got 144, 148, 148 degrees, respectively.
The rotors were approaching 390 degrees, the inside of the tailpipe came in at about 380 degrees also.

I asked him to take a reading of my plenum, (FREEPLUG) which has been modified by a MOTORDYNE ENGINEERING 3/8" PLENUM SPACER with an ARAMID THERMAL ISOLATING GASKET that is installed above the intake manifold to significantly reduce heat transfer and allow the plenum assembly to run at much lower temperatures. (/FREEPLUG).
I only mention this because the top of the plenum was cool enough to keep my hand rested on it for a few full seconds. (ok, BARELY cool enough to rest my hand, but nonetheless. It came in at <120 degrees.)

3rd and Last session:
because we were running late, they decided to cancel the 4th session, but give us more time on session 3 (25-30 minutes on track instead of just 20).

My times for the last session:
155
178
131
186
120 (passed car)
150
147
174
191 <-- Best laptime of the DAY! Besting the Viper, Vettes, M3, WRX, etc
174
135
110
115
180
113
162 (passed car)
103
some times not recorded, one lap was stopped due to car off track.

I left at 2:30pm, but at that point, the best laptimes for the cars were:
G35 - 191
Vette(1) - 170
Vette(2) - 138
M3(1) - 163
M3(2) - 145
Eclipse - 1xx
Eclipse 3G - 175
Miata - 113 <-- the only one close. AutoX modded & race tires.
Viper - I won't even say, but real slow.
Porsche - its funny to watch a WRX STI stick to a Porsche's ***.

Only 2 people got into the 1xx times, Me and the Miata. Everyone else was stuck in the 1xx ranges, for the most part.
Its very interesting to me the best times have nothing at all to do with the
power of the car. There was a HUGE gap between power and laptimes. It really shows you what driver skill can do.

The Viper (~500HP/500TQ/$75K) was slow, and complained of overheating and brake fade. That V10 sounded weird, too.
The Miata went around the track a full 8 seconds faster than the Viper,
consistantly. (Miata driver was a big Autocross enthusiast, and very fast and
clean around the track - KUDOS)

The corvettes also complained of brake fade setting in quickly, and indeed, brake fade was the defining smell of the day.

I had just replaced my rotors with StopTech 2-piece slotted Aerorotors front
and rear, and Project Mu Titan-KAI pads, and stainless steel brake lines, and
new DOT 4 fluid, and with the BREMBO calipers I experienced little to NO BRAKE FADE AT ALL. I changed all this and bedded them in a few weeks before this event, but I didn't bed them aggressively enough and they had been squeeling badly. About midway through the first session, I could really smell my brakes, but it was like they were only getting bedded in properly. During the second and third session, I barely noticed my brakes at all, except for the never-ending stopping power. Absolutely the best thing about this car are the BREMBO brakes. I don't doubt the non-brembos stop just as well, but I believe that brake fade would set in quickly during a hard track run.
I swear I could feel my tires starting to lose grip towards the end of the
sessions, but not the braking power. I'm very satisfied. The car held up
fantastically. No overheating problems, no brake problems, nothing.

The G is a heavy car though. Even with Stillen Sway Bars (Thankyou, thankyou, thankyou to the swaybars - worth every penny and more), the car still feels heavy. Especially around the long Gforce turn. On the other hand, you can easily control the car on fast corners, even drifing. (I got into some drifting on some of my last few laps - the car is Very controllable, good balance)

I have great respect for the Corvette and absolutely idolize the M3 and
Porsche, and I'm just estatic to have set the best time of the day in a Nissan. I was grinning from ear-to-ear inside my helmet when I passed the vette and was honored when the driver congratulated me afterward. What a great guy.
Its possible, of course, that some drivers were not pushing their cars, or they
had just bought the car, or are just inexperienced, or whatever. But if you are an enthusiast enough to pay for a trackday, and drive the distance to get there, I expect you would want to push it to the limit. Anyway, I'm happy.

I've got a few photos (not many) & (videos coming soon) here:
http://www.houseofheil.com/g35/
Please comment on the tire wear.

 

Awesome job, Napoleon! Must've been tons of fun racing on a track. Got any pics or vids??

 

Oops - just got to the part where you added the link for pics!

 

Im taking your G isnt even close to stock cuz there is no way you can beat M3's unless other drivers were handicaped.

 

The last time that I went, my buddy Rick got a few 1:11 sec passes in his G, but then again he used to race sprint cars. The best I did the first day out there was a 1:17, so looks like you did real good.

 

Dude. I want to talk to you. Let me buy you lunch one day, lets talk.
Remember, we ran counter-clockwise. They tell me Clockwise is the norm.
I don't know what times look like forward vs reverse?

VIDEOS are starting to appear here:
http://www.houseofheil.com/G35/video.html

only 3 videos right now:
1. The Viper takes a lap.
2. The Porsche can't shake the R32 in the turns
3. My G35 widening the gap between an M3 and Vette.
(please, DON'T STREAM...right-click and save as .wmv)

I'm capturing them now, and they will go up on the website.

 

Nice job !!!

I think the walkie-talkie idea is cool too.

 

Could you go in depth a little more?

 

Napoleon - Thanks for posting. Now you are hooked and you'll start adding expensive mods to make you even faster.

 

Why are Corvette's and a Viper in an "Import Showdown"?

 

In a straight line its a no brainer the M3 would have won, but on a track with a lot of turns, drivers skill really goes a long way.. Even on an autocross where you never leave second it still goes a long way.. But who knows the other drivers may really have not been pushing their cars.. I've never taken a vette or an m3 to any high speed tracks before, but i would imagine that the more power you have in the car, the less forgiving, and maybe the other drivers just didnt have the stones to push their cars to the limit???

not to take anything away from the g35 driver of course..

Good show, and I know what you mean about getting progressively better as you start to know the track..

 

^ well, but not only HP matters, suspension and weight distribution. If same person drives G35 and M3, I dont think G35 would win. I know driver makes all the diff in the world though. I find the G35 understeery, more than my friend's M3. Tires also matter a HUGE deal. Were you like 100% stock? Tires and all?

M3 though is heavier than our G so that part I see how a G would corner better with some mods. But did you also beat the 997 porsche? and EVO? How can this be when the EVO is track-oriented 4x4?

I wanna go to Georgia and run there. 200$ for a track day though =( and 6 hours away from here too. GOd damn, they dont let you run your car at Sebring florida (2 hours away)!

 

Napolean - How do you like the Stop-Techs compared to stock? Could you post up some pics of what they look like on the car? Thanks.

Btw, what class do you run when auto-x'ing? I run in BSP, but I have been told either BSP or ESP.

 

My car is "close" to stock (no turbo, no supercharger):

Z-tube
K&N filter
3/8" plenum spacer
Stillen Sway bars
StopTech 2-piece slotted rotors, SS Lines, Project Mu pads, Dot 4 Fluid.
+ other non-performance mods (pedals, corners...)

The Porsche was in Class C (novice), so I didn't expect him to do much.

I don't know why Corvettes and Vipers were at the "Import Showdown"?