Ah June. The weather suddenly gets hot as hell, sunburn and awful little bugs are all over the place and autocross season really hits full swing.

June 9: CDC @ Frederick

BDR almost had a full roster for this event. John was up in PA.

Ed led the BDR crew with an 88 point showing, fighting back in the Old Guy Challenge. The new Koni/Ground Control setup was effective even with worn struts and high spring rates on the chopped up Harry Grove lot. Bruce finished right behind him with 87 points.

Slava struck back as well in the Wig-maka challenge, finishing with 83 points ahead of Mei’s 76. Ben finished with 52. We suspect that, with PAX, the entire team would have finished ahead of “Don’t Blink”.

June 10: CDC Test n’ Tune @ Frederick

Though there were no points at this event, it was clear that BDR was getting faster.

The top time was a 36.9, by an FFR Cobra with ridiculously wide Hoosiers. With the super-Civic not there there was no one within two seconds.

The street-tire gang was hongry for more seat time. Slava and Mei got the MR2 down to a 40.4 and a 40.6, respectively. For a car that would lose in a straight line to most modern minivans, with street tires, this is quite fast.

Ben finished up with a 39.9, in the same tenth as the red Noble M12 that graced us with its presence. The Noble guy was really nice and drove very well for someone only in their second autocross event. And by the way…

*swoon*

John finished with a best time of 39.05, edging out the very fast STS Saturn from the NEPA SCCA region (both drivers got 39.3’s). It was clear immediately that the new Koni / Ground Control coilover rig was fast. For a full review that will stay up to date as the season progresses, click here.

May 3: Burn 3 Down

The BDR DJ crew was in full effect at the NASIOC.com Burn 3 Down OMGWTFBBQ. Kevin was officially inducted in a night that included many shenanigans. Ben, Ed and Kevin were a large part of the B3D DJ staff. Ben’s Super Mario Brothers track was one of the more blessed pieces of wax in attendance.

Al was inducted soon after. Can’t really remember much, other than perhaps some crazy promises about his WRX not getting sent airborne.

May 12: WDCR @ Fedex

This was the second points event in the WDCR season. The course was fun, for those members not on their stock suspension and alignments.

Ben was victimized by another “what do you MEAN I hit a cone?” run. A 68.2 that would have been good for 12th instead turned into a 70.1 that left him in 19th.

Mei struck back in the Wigmaka duel, edging out Slava by about four and a half seconds. After a spin on his final run, she was quoted as saying “Well, I guess I have to ^H^H^H^H. Ian continued to get faster in his CRX.

John ended up 6th in STX. As if stock struts and stock alignment weren’t good enough, John decided to “disconnect” his swaybars by letting a bolt fall out of an endlink on both ends of the car.

Look at that blubber fly!
Al was also present filming. I really need to upload those stupid things.

May 12: CDC @ Frederick

Ed took the day off from Fedex to help out at CDC, since many of the CDC organizers were at Fedex. Bruce finished up with a 41.2 and 80 points. Ed was close behind in the “old guy” duel with 76. I’m not sure what to make of that whole indexing thing so I will leave that part out.

May 19-26: Kill Devil Hills, NC

The yearly pilgrimage to the Outer Banks was a BDR reunion of sorts. Jake, Prinya, and Eric, from the BDR Hall of Fame, were present, as well as Slava, Mei, Ben, and John. It was the Best OBX Ever. Perhaps the highlight was the production of Beast Motoring Volume 1:

May 26: CDC @ Manassas

For those who were not on their way back from OBX, there was still autocrossing to do. Bruce once again nicked Ed in the Old Guy Challenge, by .11 seconds. Ben finished with a 40.23 in one of the bigger CDC events we’ve ever seen.
The memorable event of the day was a JIC strut failure on the Moran Bros’ Super-preza. Though it is only the second such failure I’ve read about it is nonetheless a point of concern.

April wasn’t that interesting. This will be a short entry.

April 15: Autocrossers, Inc @ Ripken

This was a rainy, miserable day. FTPax was set by a DS WRX on RE92’s.

John did not do well: 4th out of 8 in STX, a second and a half back from Josh in his FWD Sentra, and less than a tenth away from a pint glass. Did I mention Josh was fast?

Kevin was here. He was unaware that he was on BDR Double Secret Probation and was about to be inducted. He finished 5th in STU.

April 22: WDCR @ Fedex

The first Fedex points event of the season was actually a pretty nice day.

Ben finished 10th in the absolutely massive STU class with a 62.9. Ben also had FTPAXBDR. Kevin (still not knowing that he was about to be inducted) finished 17th.
Ed, Slava, and Mei finished 4/5/6 in an STS2 class that is only going to get faster with the addition of local hotshoe Ian Baker.

John finished 9th in STX. And that’s all we’ll say about that

The 2007 BDR assault on the local autocross scene began on March 24th at Harry Grove Stadium.

Well, technically, it began a bit before that.

The offseason moves:

Mei and Slava added another handful of cars to their stable. You can never have too many fifteen year old rear wheel drive cars.

Ben got some absolutely absurd deals on some mods for the Evo. For around $1000 he ended up with a new set of Azenis, a downpipe, some springs, a rear swaybar and an alignment. Hell of a deal for what should be a great STU setup.
John shipped his suspension off for a refreshening and some new spring rates. The WRX will get new rates, a new alignment and some proper seats this year.

Ed is sporting some shiny new Team Dynamics wheels with Azenis 615’s.
Neal’s absolutely terrifying car almost runs now.

Dan moved to the great state of Virginia, and along with Paul, may never autocross again.

Jake…?

Prinya has a camera the size of a GT30R and will probably autocross a few times this year.

BDR well-wisher Bruce W joined the team to participate in a fresh year of low horsepower RWD battlestages.

BDR had a mini-installfest the weekend before the season. John, Ben and guest star Al got the springs and rear swaybar installed on Ben’s Evo in… uhm… about eight hours. Somewhere, a Ukrainian was laughing. Those pesky Mitsubishi engineers don’t like to make anything easy, including jacking up the front of the car. Total: one bolt of shame (John on Michelle’s Forester), one bolt rounded into oblivion (everyone on Ben’s rear right LCA bolt), one under panel dremeled (Ben) and many good times.

Event 1: CDC #1: Frederick, MD: March 24

The first event! Finally!

Unfortunately or fortunately, it was a rainy day. 5/6th of BDR was in lightweight rear wheel drive cars; not the optimal drivetrain configuration for the conditions. Ben was the lone AWD b00strocket in this event and even on full-tread Azenis he still was struggling to find traction. Getting on the gas even a little bit early at corner exit was typically enough to get the car loopy. John, having autocrossed AWD cars his whole life, was having serious problems with this concept.

Ben had far and away the best result, with a 38.53 good for 90 points. The RWD battlestage portion of the day was close. In worst-to-first order:

* Slava: 43.11 (no spins?)

* John: 42.98 (dooreeefto!)

* Meimei: 41.15

* Ed: 40.56

* Bruce: 40.29

Ed set a new car-whoring record at this event. His 124,000 mile old Miata was used for thirty autocross runs across five drivers (Ed, John, Bruce, Bryan, Ted). We believe that has got to be some kind of record.

As always, the highlight of the day was chickenbake (chickenbake, chickenbake, chickenbake) and churros at Costco.

Event 2: WDCR Test N’ Tune: Fedex, MD: March 25

Although the crew had tested and tuned the previous day, Sunday’s dry conditions promised much more useful testing and tuning.

Ah, the core of BDR shall assemble and form like Voltron. –Ben

Through flukes of scheduling and John co-driving Ben’s car, all five BDR drivers were in the same heat and only a couple of grid spots away from one another. This allowed easy cheerleading and picturetaking. Prinya showed up with his diesel Nikon to capture all the action.

between heats

The course was slalom heavy. One of the slaloms was at least nine cones long. But it looked like it would be fun – and it was.
After the driver’s meeting, a Wendy’s run, and some sitting around, it was time for heat five.

Ben was fairly amped to try out the new setup on a fast, dry course. “There’s a crapload of grip!”, he exclaimed as he went through the showcase for the first time. The mods had definitely paid off. The car was sharper and grippier than before. Ben adjusted to the new mods quickly, dropping 2.5 seconds on his 2nd run (after getting a re-run) and another 3.1 seconds on his 3rd run. After an irrationally exuberant launch, the clutch could not be coaxed to hold the car’s full power and Ben ended up sitting on his 72.216.

John, inheriting the clutch situation, pulled out a 71.220 while not being able to go wide open throttle. Perhaps secretly hating the Evo (being a Subaru owner) he attacked a large stack of Ben’s CD’s, as well as his own Longacre tire gauge, while pulling out from grid for his last run. This is quite close to the WDCR “property destroyed in grid” value record which is currently held by Craig Garfield.

The STS2 battlestage was hot, as usual. Ed led the charge with a 74.198 on his shiny Team Dynamics wheels. The wheels would soon get the better of his fenders however. The +30 offset Pro Race 1.2’s impatiently rolled the fender themselves, though not the way most of us would have done it. Slava and Mei finished 4th and 6th respectively, with the MR2 losing an oil pressure sensor.
It’s actually June 11 as I’m finishing this entry and backdating it to the date when I started writing it. I love WordPress.