Page 45 - KCRPCA Sept-Oct

Above: Rule 1 of packing. If you think you might need it, bring it.
Below: It is lonely at night
in on a corner. Oh, did I mention that at High Plains Raceway outside of Denver, there isn’t a yard light for about 5 miles? Other than having lights running at about 20% inside the pits, it’s dark.....really dark at night. So we added numerous outside cornering LED lights, in addition to a light bar across the nose, along with the high beam headlights. Our lighting during the race was superb, though we had to be extra cautious about not bumping anyone with our front nose for fear of losing the lights during the race! Hours upon hours were spent replacing anything that could possibly fail in this race.
Then we needed more drivers. Our base crew of myself, Aaron Winter and Mike Armentrout were in. Our regular 4th driver, Chris Arbuckle, made up an
Above: Our deluxe accommodations for the weekend Below: The team who never gave up
excuse about some national quilting show he was going to, so he couldn’t make it. We needed another 3 drivers, and getting guys to sign up for a 24 is impossible. After a bit of work, eventually we stole our old “Car 54” regular, Kris Loveless, back from LMR (another Kansas City team), then added Mike Defenbau, and Rygh Galloway to the team.....suckers. The team was complete. 6 drivers would give each man 4 hours of total seat time.
Now preparing to support a 24 hour race isn’t a small feat. The nearest hotel is 45 minutes away in Denver, so that was out and meant we would be sleeping at the track (lots of sleeping bags and cots). In hindsight, none of that worked; we slept Thursday night, and really didn’t sleep again until Sunday night. Try to fall asleep with adrenaline
The team. L to R: Mike Armentrout, Rygh Galloway, Kris Loveless, Karl Wilen, Mike Defenbau, Aaron Winter
Sep / Oct 2017
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