"What I Learned This Weekend"

As time allows, I will be periodically posting random thoughts, ideas, and observations from the week in racing, in the hopes that it will provide a useful knowledge base to other racers, or at the very least, provide myself with reminders.

In-car fans - One of those little plastic 'automotive fans' may be a life-saver, and for more than just comfort. Circulating the air in the car can keep windows from fogging up on humid nights. It was more of a problem up north, where fogging windows was a fairly regular occurrence in cooler night air, but on this weekend's hot and muggy night, it was my glasses that wanted to fog up, making hitting the tree and driving the stripe much more of a challenge... Note to self: Get a fan for the Volare!

Cool Cans - I noticed a racer this weekend who had just gotten back from a run that was filling his cool can with ice, probably several hours before his next run. It occurred to me that it would probably make more sense to fill the cool can right before making a run, because the ice is just going to melt. There's only so much fuel capacity in the amount of fuel line running through a cool can, so it's not like you'd get more of a boost from a long period of cooling... you'll burn through that "colder" fuel just getting to the staging lanes. Save the ice for later. While I haven't played with cool cans myself in over a decade, another racer mentioned that it played a major roll in the consistency of his car, which I can imagine being a factor in Stock manifold combinations with the finicky Thermoquad or Quadrajet carbs.

"Get it in writing" - Not literally, but if you're going to split the purse, make certain that all parties agree on the details. More than once, I've heard "but I thought we said..." Don't take anything for granted, and "spell it out" longhand to make sure there are no misunderstandings and hurt feelings later.