Formula Drift Utah has passed and the season is coming towards an end. It has been a great season for all of our drivers so far and everyone hopes to end it on a high note. Each driver and their teams run into their fair share of problems along the way and need to make adjustments on the fly. Here is a little peak at what these drivers and their teams go through to be successful.
A season update from our FD pro driver Alec Robbins: “It’s been a hard fought few weeks for the team! After a great weekend at Gridlife Alpine Horizon festival we found an oil leak while doing general maintenance on the car. We replaced the leaking seal and got the car prepped for a new round of FD at Utah Motorsports Complex. Being a new track practice was pretty crucial, however after just two runs we noticed our new oil seal was again starting to leak. Because the seal is not an easy one to replace we decided to do two more runs then cut our practice short to save the car for qualifying. The car however had different plans and on our 3rd run the seal blew completely out spraying oil on the hot exhaust and catching fire. Luckily the fire was contained under the car and went out before I even noticed anything had happened. We got the car back to the pit and got to work, pulling the transmission, clutch, bell housing, ect. in order to get to the rear main seal and get it replaced before qualifying started. We finished the job and got up to the line no more than 5 mins before our qualifying run! I got my thoughts together and went out for my first pass, I got a little too aggressive and overshot the 2nd outside zone which put my rear tires in the dirt and messed up my line for the remainder of the run. We got a chance at a second run and I was able to put it together and get a score high enough to get us into competition. However our engine again started leaking. We had all day Friday to get the seal replaced once again, however after some compression and leak down testing it was clear our motor was getting worn and showing signs of worn piston rings or cylinder damage. In order to get through competition the team came up with an ingenuitive plan to mount a vacuum in the car attached to the valve cover to attempt to suck excess pressure from the crankcase. The plan worked and I was able to get two practice runs before competition started. We still had our work cut out for us, going against 2 time champion Fredric Aasbo in top 32. The Engine was starting to misfire on run up but I stayed on throttle and was able to put down a pretty solid chase run behind Fredric. This was only my second chase run I had all weekend. In my lead I was able to drive one of my best laps of the weekend. The car pushed wide on the last outside zone when the tires wore out, putting me two tires off. however it was still a great showing after pushing through all of our issues. Fredric was able to take the win, but it still felt like a win for me and the team. We have a Fresh Motor going into the car for the final round in just about 1 month!”
Alec, congratulations to you and your team on a great season so far. We wish you the best of luck at Irwindale. Cheers.
