My first Staggered and holy cow was it a blast! Ended up getting a boatload of seat time and only had one minor thing go wrong. Got plenty of photos and videos so I figured I’d show you guys around my weekend!
Day one
My buddy Tyler and I headed out to Thompson and got there a few minutes early. Once we got in we headed to the infield of the oval track where we would be camping this weekend and unloaded his car off the trailer and unpacked our stuff. We arrived when gates opened at 10:00am and didn’t start our first track session until 3:00pm so we hung around the pits and chatted with our friends who were near us until drivers meeting.
My friend Jordan has an super cool NB Miata which has a bored up 1.9 liter ITB engine and now it’s equipped with a Rotrex C30-74 supercharger! Made possible by a custom intake plenum mated to the ITB’s designed by a company called Hummelink Modifications. They make a lot of really cool Miata focused products and I highly recommend you check them out I personally run their Toyota coil on plug conversion kit! Jordan also had one of those electric scooters and he let me and Tyler take it for a test ride, safe to say I definitely want one especially since it seemed like everyone there this weekend was using them to get around the pits.
Also these two guys were pitted next to us and man do I love their cars!
Finally the time came to get some laps in and I was ready to rip! Ended up trying out a lot less PSI in my tires(25 instead of 40) and man does my car feel a lot better. It’s been really stupid of me not to mess with this sooner as for the past couple of events I felt like my car wasn’t acting how I wanted it to ever since I swapped in a 6 speed transmission. From 3:00-6:00 we were on the skidpad running a modified version of the kidney bean layout.
Photo By @b.marchulaitis on Instagram
Once 6:00 rolled around we lined up in the oval to run reverse clubhouse, entering from under the bridge was a real treat as usually we start from the access road and go down the hill. You are able to get much more speed this way under the bridge and at first I thought I needed to start in 3rd for the entry and downshift to second once I came into the first transition. I spend half of the session trying this and every time I would mess up the shift or I just wasn’t going fast enough. Eventually I tried leaving it in 3rd the whole time and the car really liked that, I wish I had done that from the beginning but oh well. This session on clubhouse was some of the fastest driving I’ve done yet and it made me really excited to do it again the next day!
Photos By @b.marchulaitis on Instagram
After driving clubhouse we headed back over to skidpad for some more fun and this was one of the very few times I have drifted in the dark. Lot’s of fun and I got to test out the strobe light’s and under glow I installed prior to the event!
After running skidpad for 45 minutes I called it a night on driving and headed into the pits. Everyone was having a good time camping out and partying and after a bit we headed up to the bonfire for a little while. After bonfire it was more pits hangs and then bed.
DAY TWO
Woke up and went to get some gas, GPS took me to a station without 93 while narrowly avoiding 2 stations that did 
Eventually got what I needed and headed back to the track. Drivers meeting at 9:00 and then driving started for us at 10:45, not even the full first session and my car is running wacky. I’ve been battling a low idle after driving for a little bit for some time now but always thought it was due to the car heat soaking and not having a proper tune. My car ends up stalling in grid and I cannot get it started only clicks from the starter. Thankfully the awesome lock city staff and patrons helped me push it off to the side and let me borrow a jump pack to get back to my pit area. From the reading on the jump pack I could tell that my alternator isn’t charging the battery anymore(bummer). Luckily our friend Gwyn came down earlier that day to watch us and hang out and she offered to bring me to an O’Reillys to get a new alternator. An hour drive and 25 minute swap out and I was back and ready to turn some laps!
At this point I was ready to take a break so I chilled out for a session got some lunch and watched the other festivities happening around me.
Ended up forgetting to charge my go pro so unfortunately no inside footage of Saturdays clubhouse runs but I really felt like I got it that night. The car wanted to eat in 3rd gear and it felt like every time I hit the entry it was faster and better. My friend Cedric was standing on the bridge and got these awesome clips!
After that we packed up and headed home. Overall this weekend is one I will never forget, saw many good friends and even made a couple new ones! This was my second time camping for an event and now I want to do it as much as possible, it really takes the event to the next level and also it’s nice not having to wake up at 5:30 to drive there Saturday lol. This event has also lit the fire under my ass to get going on my 240 as I saw a bunch of hot SR cars ripping. Two biggest concerns I need to take care of before moving on and getting the car assembled are a broken exhaust manifold stud and the fact that somehow the passenger side motor mount wasn’t installed into the sub frame by my buddy. I don’t know how but it was a dark shop he was working in so ill chalk it up to that.
If you made it this far in the post it means a lot to me that you read this far. Thanks for your time and I will post again when I have an update on the 240!
Bino W0rld 