Here’s a recap of DMCC this weekend. I was feeling more comfortable with the car after NJMP, so I didn’t change anything on the car, basically just reset the alignment and did maintenance. I drove most of Friday and got to Montmagny Friday night. On Saturday, there was practice from 2-6pm, so I got plenty of time to feel the car out and learn the track. It was a banked oval that they ran in a figure 8. You enter one bank, go around through the center, come out and go around the other bank.
The most difficult part of the course was entering and staying high on the bank for the first turn without flying off. This track has no walls on top of the bank, so you basically shoot off the top of the bank, hit some grass, and then hit a wall at some point if you go off. It’s hard to judge how high you are on the bank since you don’t see a wall for a reference point. The bank at the other end of the track also doesn’t have a wall. You basically fly off into the woods if you go too high. There were a bunch of ridiculous crashes throughout the weekend. They also moved the start line further back than previous years, so that seemed to be getting people in trouble. Average entry speeds were in the mid 60s, and the highest speeds were low 70s.
The other challenging part of the course was linking the section from the middle of the figure 8/crossover to the second bank. The crossover in the middle isn’t actually in the middle of the oval, so you have a really long section of straightaway from the middle to second bank. I took it easy in practice and tried to find the right speed and location to enter the first turn and also the best line to run through the crossover so that I would have the most speed coming out. The track was eating tires quickly since you had to be on throttle for a long time, so I had to conserve by letting off halfway through the bank instead of roasting tires for no reason. I used up one set in practice, then did a couple of runs to scrub in a new set for qualifying.
I did a safe run on the first qualifying pass, and I got a pretty good score with a 75. I went faster on the second run into the first bank, but I had kind of a shallow line going into the crossover which killed my speed, so I didn’t make the cutoff for the second speed trap. I ended up in 5th place. It would have been second or third place if I was a couple mph faster through the crossover.
For top 16, I would be going against 12th place qualifier Tania Bourbonnais in Rhys Millen’s old GTO. I set the tire pressures a bit higher because I could see she was one of the slower drivers in practice. I led first, and she had a big correction following me, so I had the advantage. I gave her a one-car lead on the straightaway on my follow run. She was moving with good speed, but just as I clutch kicked into the first turn, she completely jumped off the throttle. I locked front brakes, almost ate the wall, then clutch kicked again and was right on her. She was super slow coming out of the crossover heading to the other bank, so I had to throw the car with huge angle and a lot of e-brake to stay drifting behind her, and I still almost hit her. I was right on her door through the last bank and most of the course so got the win easily. I beat Rhys’ old car and did not lose to a girl… mission accomplished!
Next, I went against Mats in the top 8. I lowered tire pressures a bit but the car was getting faster anyway from the track cooling down so I was confident I could stay with him. I had a good chase run with him, lost him a bit through the crossover in the middle of the track but caught right back up going into the second bank and stayed on his bumper through to the end of the course. I don’t think he was able to follow me as closely so I got the win.
In the top 4, I’d be going against Dave Briggs who was, by far, the fastest driver that day. I put on new tires and lowered pressures a lot. I followed him first but gave him a bit too much space on the start, and there was basically a 1-2 car gap between us throughout the whole course. I knew I had to drive my ass off for my lead run to get a OMT or force him into making a mistake. I went full throttle into the first turn and did a big flick entry clutch kicking towards the wall and then throwing it the other way into the bank. I was basically trying anything I could to phaze Dave… lol. I kept the angle low and just tried to go as fast as possible the whole way. I could see in the mirror that I had about a car length on him at the end of the course.
We waited forever for the decision, and we got a OMT! The judges told me to stop doing “fake entries”… lol.
In the OMT battle, I was so focused on staying with him in the first turn that I wasn’t paying any attention to launching off the line. I ended up kind of bogging it in second gear, and Dave got a big jump on me which he held throughout the course. He followed me pretty well on the next run. He actually straightened through the crossover on his lead run, so I was hoping that was enough to have another OMT, but the judges called it in his favor.
For third place, I went against Evan Tuerck. We had relatively clean runs, and I was able to stay on his door pretty well, so I got the win.
Overall, I’m happy with how I drove. It sucked to lose to Briggs because of a stupid mistake on the launch, but it gives me some confidence to know my car is basically just as fast as his. This event was a blast and set a new attendance record for a DMCC event. The fans were insane and brought a ton of energy to the competition. I can’t wait to drive at this track again.
I’ll be driving next in two weeks at XDC West Virginia.
