First Race of 2024

Gorman Perforamce Spring Shakdown 2.0 Race

Race day was an absolute blast! I had the opportunity to engage in a mix of FPV racing, but unfortunately, my 7” drone already met its demise. On the bright side, I managed to secure a spot in the top 10 of my class for the time trial.

According to Pat’s PDF in my class, “Non-American Muscle,” I clinched 8th place with a time of 47.232 for the layout of the day. That’s 8th out of 32 drivers! I didn’t realize I was that fast.

But let me humblebrag for a moment: every car/driver that placed higher than me either has years of experience on me or drives a much more heavily modified car, or both! Take, for example, cars 677 and 977—they’re both 2003 Mazda Miatas with superchargers, full aero kits, and standalone ECUs. Then there’s car number 86, driven by an insanely fast driver with expertly dialed-in suspension work and far more experience behind the wheel than I have. In fact, I clocked my fastest lap time when I joined Jacob for a ride and mirrored his line with my Miata. Hopefully, someday I’ll be as quick as Jacob.

Now, onto a less glamorous topic: I ordered some custom-sized battery straps for the new drone from Amazon because my previous ones were too small for the larger battery. But, Amazon being Amazon, they decided to delay my package until the day of the race. Not helpful at all! I ended up resorting to zip ties as an alternative, which turned out to be a terrible idea. Within the first 45 seconds of flight, the battery ejected itself from the zip tie hold, causing the entire drone to crash into the grass. Thankfully, it was a relatively smooth landing, but the drone receiver had ripped off the UFL connector in the crash, leaving me unable to get a signal to the drone. Now, I’ll have to fix it up and get it ready for the next two months.