May 6th to May 8th, I was at Formula Drift Round 2 at Road Atlanta working with Doug Van Den Brink on his red 04 Mustang.
We started testing on Thursday, so Doug could get use to the car again and also learn more about the new Falken Azenis RT615K. The Azenis RT615K have more grip which in our case we had to loosen the car up more than before. So after the first session we changed the sway bar to help free the car up in our second session of testing.
On to Friday, we started practice at 4pm and then we went straight to qualifying at 5pm. We went out four since this was Doug's first event of 2010 in FD. He put down a good run with a 65.7 on the first run and a 68.4 on the second which put us at 24th.
Saturday we started practice at 2:30pm before the top 32 rounds at 4pm. We had to get Doug step up to get use to following and get as close as he could so he would have a chance of advancing to the top 16.
In the top 32 first run we had to go up against 9th place Sam Hubinette in his new Dodge Challenger. Since Sam was leading first Doug need to stay close. As they left the starting line, Doug was with Sam until he hit 2nd gear and then Sam pulled a two car lenght gap that Doug never regained throught the run. Sam was leading on round 1 but now it was Doug's turn to lead. Doug had a good start but Sam was very agressive with his entry and even bump Doug. Doug had a good run all the way but it just wasn't enough to over take Sam.
We had a good weekend and the car is still in one piece, so now it's time for round 3 at Wall Speedway in New Jersey on June 4th & 5th. I just hope this year it doesn't rain like last years event where it flooded the infield so much they canceled Friday's event. I'll see everyone there!
