2018 Speed Week

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BIG GAZ
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Joined: Fri Mar 04, 2005 2:52 pm
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2018 Speed Week

Post by BIG GAZ »

What a great time we had this year. A huge thank you to all those people who helped to make the event the best run one to date. Also the club appreciates all the help from up to 80 volunteers every morning to help move the mats. I know I had a captive audience but on the whole everyone got in and got the job done with minimal whinging.
I also think the timers, Bruce and Peter did an outstanding job. They started at 6am every morning and had the track ready before most were out of bed. Having 199 runs on Track 1 on Monday, the first day is unheard of. A big effort from volunteers in all areas helped make it the success it was.
Well done to all.
Thanks,
GAZ
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Re: 2018 Speed Week

Post by DLRA »

The PROVISIONAL results for Speed Week 2018 are now available for download at http://www.dlra.org.au/2018.htm.
It will take me several days to compile the results into an official version, this is mainly due to a number of last minute class changes by entrants.
So don't jump up and down just yet if your class is not what you ran.

Success can be measured in a number of ways. The changes that we made for this year have all fortunately paid off big time. Plus all the officials and volunteers were fantastic this year, most had a real can-do attitude and it showed in the number of runs we were able to produce.
In the timing van Brice and Peter tell me that they were able to train the volunteers and leave them to it and for the first time they had more than enough people in the van. The new queuing software worked a treat and with the implementation of the pre-stage made managing the timing system much better.

We have never had entrants getting 3 and 4 runs on a Monday. PS Gary it was 199 runs for both tracks on the Monday. We set a new event of over 850 runs for the week, with track 2 being closed on the Friday with no one lining up.

This year all personnel at the start line were volunteers, Arthur De Main and his team on the Monday and Norm Hardinge and his team on Tuesday, they set the scene for a really tight start line. It took a little while for entrants to get their head around the centre streamliner lane on track 1, but once they saw how it was to be used it also worked very well. Special mention to Harry De Ree who spent a lot of time as track 2 starter and did a fantastic job.
The revised pre-stage was manned by Norm Bradshaw and his team for the first couple of days and Carol Dent volunteered for several days "herding the cats". Now that everyone is familiar with this and some minor adjustments for next year, this will be running very smoothly.

The car and motorcycle inspectors were ready and available to do tech on the Friday, but most entrants did not turn up until the Sunday, making it a very hectic day. Entrants need to understand that they can't turn up late Sunday and expect to run Monday morning.

Another new idea that worked well was running all the Rookies on track 2 first thing Monday morning. There was more than 60 rookies this year and we had nearly all of them signed off by the lunch break.

The overwhelming comments from our International Competitors was that our event was world class and that given the opportunity they would be back again. They were very impressed with competency and diligence our medical and rescue teams and were amazed by the professionalism of the organisation and our volunteers.

There was a real vibe this year and we, the collective, inclusive we, have put the world of land speed racing on notice. We can put on a world standard event and have fun doing it.

The catch phrase for next year is "DLRA Speed Week 2019, like Bonneville was 20 years ago", how does that sound?
Keep the shiney side up........
DLRA WebMaster / Editor
David Leikvold
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Re: 2018 Speed Week

Post by David Leikvold »

Greg,
Back in 2014 Scott Andrews, the President of the SCTA, told us how impressed he was with how we did things and told us NOT to copy the way things were at Bonneville. Just imagine what he'd think of it now. Last year Dave Freiburger came back to the pits after his first run in the Camaro and excitedly told his crew "It's like glass!" He couldn't believe how good the salt was and how well the track had been prepared. This year Bill Dube (of Eva Hakansson's electric sidecar streamliner fame) put a video on Facebook of him trying without success to chip the salt with a shovel. I predict that next year we will have even more Americans coming to see how well we do things and to enjoy running on our better than Bonneville salt.

With that in mind maybe our slogan for next year should be "DLRA Speedweek 2019, best salt in the world".
Or "DLRA Speedweek 2019, world class".

See you then.

Cheers
Dave :mrgreen:
Good, Fast, Cheap, pick any two!
GodSilla
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Re: 2018 Speed Week

Post by GodSilla »

DLRA SpeedWeek 2019
the
Fastest place on Earth.
Member 1241
David Leikvold
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Re: 2018 Speed Week

Post by David Leikvold »

Trouble is, it isn't. That is currently the Black Rock Desert in Nevada when Andy Green broke the sound barrier at 763 mph driving Thrust SSC in 1997.
In 1994 Rosco McGlashan did 500 mph at Lake Gairdner, but the record at the time was held by Gary Gabelich driving the Blue Flame at Bonneville in 1970 to 622 mph. Rosco won't be bringing his new rocket powered car to Lake Gairdner. And if we're talking wheel driven records, George Poteet broke their own record and did a 453 mph exit speed with Speed Demon II at Bonneville last year. George now has 23 runs over 400 mph at Bonneville.

And speaking of jets, I still think there's no good reason why we can't allow thrust reaction special construction vehicles at Speedweek. It make no more sense than prohibiting certain brands of cars. Jets have been used in land speed racing since the 1960's. We already have one member who owns a jet dragster. He says it wouldn't be suited to running on the salt as is (probably due to the amount of bouncy flex in a Top Fuel chassis) but you never know what might happen in the future.

Cheers
Dave :mrgreen:
Good, Fast, Cheap, pick any two!
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coffeesnobs
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Re: 2018 Speed Week

Post by coffeesnobs »

It was an excellent week of racing and the whole even ran like clockwork. Kudos to everyone who made it happen.

Of course, it wouldn't have happened without the tireless effort for 12 months by the committee and the huge amount of work on the ground for the racing week.

This was only our second trip to the salt but compared to last year, it was chalk and cheese. The number of runs was amazing, seemed that longest queue we were in all week was 3 hours long (bloody belly tankers) but most queues were about an hour from pre-stage to on the track. Last year near every pass was 4 hours odd till late in the week.

After back to back 198.238 last year it was a long wait to get back and try and find a couple of mph. Happily in the 11 month off-season we found 14.5mph and have already started plans for changes to the bike for next year. My son is also going to enter something (small) next year, he loved crewing for a couple of years but now he has the bug too.

Anyway, thanks heaps to all those the make this the best motorsport event in the country.

Now I'll go back to the DLRA event page, rock back and forward pressing "refresh" on the red hat list. :)
DLRA #1440
2017 - 2015 Kawasaki H2R - 198.238
2018 - 2015 Kawasaki H2R - 212.867
2019 - 2017 Kawasaki H2 - 198.741
2020 - 2017 Kawasaki H2 - ***sigh***
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Re: 2018 Speed Week

Post by DLRA »

Red hats maybe tomorrow.
Keep the shiney side up........
DLRA WebMaster / Editor
GodSilla
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Re: 2018 Speed Week

Post by GodSilla »

Another great effort from the organisers. Lots of runs, lots of happy folks. Well done to all concerned.
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Re: 2018 Speed Week

Post by DLRA »

The Official Results of Speed Week 2018 have now been published.
Contains a short report about the event.
All new records are identified. And trophy winners listed.
New 300 mph club members, 200 mph club members, and 200 mph achievers.

http://www.dlra.org.au/2018.htm
Keep the shiney side up........
DLRA WebMaster / Editor
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