Month: September 2017

Fall Finale At Palmer

The Northeast Region enjoyed spectacular weather for our end-of-season three-day event at Palmer Motorsports Park. We saw record attendance at this event with 170 cars (!!!) and over 180 drivers! That is absolutely incredible by any standard of measurement. And lest you think all those cars might cause congestion out on track – the organizers were right on top of it, making us all practice our “exercises” (point by to the left…point by over the roof to the right…repeat…) before hitting the track on Saturday morning.

Speaking of teaching and practicing, we were lucky to once again have Lee Carpentier, pro driver and coach, to instruct many of the run groups during the course of the weekend. Lee’s sessions, with content tailored for each run group he addresses, helps us all improve in his very cheerful and humorous style. Lee also spent a lot of right-seat time with our instructors, helping to make sure we are all at our best.

As yet another special educational experience, Dr. Andy Kaufman, a PCA member from Syracuse (but a Boston guy to us since he went to MIT), a forensic psychiatrist, and coach to many performance athletes and business leaders, gave memorable and fascinating sessions about how to prime one’s brain for high performance driving by focusing on the mental side of performance using cognitive science. He focused on the two main stumbling blocks many of us face while high-performance-driving: focus and confidence. His qualifications and teaching experience (SUNY Syracuse) allow for a much deeper dive into the workings of the mind than might be typically covered by most coaches. Dr. Kaufman is mentored by Dr. Jacques Dallaire, author of some fascinating books about mental performance and coach to folks like Helio Castroneves and Patrick Dempsey from his office at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

Dr. Kaufman led a session for the White run group on Friday and one for our advanced drivers and instructors on Saturday. He taught them “the three R’s” for maintaining focus and reducing possible anxiety. What are those three R’s? Luckily we’ll all be able to learn more about them next season as our head of DE, John Dunkle, has asked Dr. Kaufman to team up with Lee Carpentier next year to begin to develop some NER-specific programming. We’re blazing a trail in this area and yext year is going to be even better. Our DE team is really putting the “E” (education) back in “DE”. And the kicker – Andy lost third gear in his GT4 during the first session on Friday but stayed with us and did a great job. We hope his car is back out there soon.

If all that weren’t enough already, we had a live auction on Saturday after the track went cold and raised over $1,000 for Homes for our Troops by auctioning Porsche swag donated by Norbert Martel. The one item John Dunkle, auctioneer, wanted for himself – a 1/18 scale 2.7 RS – went for some serious money. We had a lot of laughs that evening.

Many thanks to all the people who came out for the event and huge thanks to the team that pulled it together and to South Shore Autoworks, the event sponsor. It really was a grand finale!

For anyone who wants to check out the track and see some great cars, don’t miss the big Porsche-only show, swap-meet, exhibition at Palmer on October 8th. You’ll even have a chance to drive the track (at parade speeds) to get a feel for how amazing it is. Come join us for what looks to be another great event!

John D. runs the auction in first-class style. But is a bit upset when the item he wanted was bid up a bit high. Great for our charity, Homes for our Troops – not so good for John!

palmer motorsports park september 2017 de ner pca

Bill S. has formed his own run group.

Huge thanks to our event sponsor, Justin Becker and his South Shore Autoworks!

Surely they are discussing the finer points of the line around Palmer’s track.

914-6! And it’s fast!

September 27, 2017/by Sterling Vernon

Autocross

Around the Cones – 2017 PCA Zone 1 Autocross

[ story and photos by Anker Berg-Sonne ] What better way to spend a weekend than threading your Porsche around cones at the Moore airfield in Ayer? Add to that the perfect weather of the 2017 PCA Zone 1 autocross, run by NCR and chaired by Joe Kraetsch. A total of 78 participating drivers from Green Mountain (1 driver), Niagara (1 driver), Northern New Jersey (1 driver), Connecticut Valley (3 drivers), Hudson Champlain (15 drivers), Metropolitan New York (16 drivers), North Country (17 drivers), and Northeast (23 drivers) competed for the region team trophy. Hudson Champlain was the best dressed team with matching T shirts.

Saturday the course was laid out to run counter clockwise as a fairly technical course with some tricky sections. The ones causing the most trouble for drivers were an offset slalom with 5 cones, all with double pointers, and a V box with two clam shells bracketing it. Each of the two run groups got 5 runs morning and afternoon. At the end of the day North Country was in the lead with 80 points. After the Saturday session there was a barbecue at the Springhill Suites.

Sunday started out with heavy fog that made the new course – this time going counter clockwise – difficult to see for the early course walkers. The tricky sections were retained, but this time in the opposite direction, and a new one was added on the main runway with a sharp left around a cone shortly before getting to the offset slalom. The final section was initially laid out to be an almost straight run to the timing gate, but was modified to slow it down after the safety inspection. In order to get visitors on the road at a decent hour the decision was made to run just one group in the morning and switch over lunch to the other group.

You would have thought all drivers would have figured out the tricky sections carried over from Saturday, but they still vexed several drivers. Jeff Johnson managed to hit cones in the offset slalom in four out of his 6 Sunday runs. Partway through the afternoon session Neil Halbert’s cooling fan decided to chew through a cooling hose, which put his 944 out of the action for at least one run. Fortunately he was able to get a spare from another driver so he could drive it home.

At the award ceremony at the end of the day North Country took the trophy with Northeast in second place. Trophies taken by Northeast members were in IO1 1st for Mark Skala in IO1 in his blue 1970 914-6, and 2nd for Bill Aubion in his 1984 black 944; in P1 1st for John Goudreau in his silver 1973 914; in P3 1st Adam Small in his bronze 1984 911, and 2nd Robert Canter in his black 1984 911; in P4 1st, Nick Durham in his black 1991 911 C4, and 3rd Georges Rouhart in his black 1993 968; in P6 Robert Galejs in his black 2014 Cayman S; in P7 2nd Chris Lindquist in his white 2009 Carrera S; in S1 1st Adam Blauer in his gray 1994 968, and 3rd Jim Fox in his white 1994 964; in S2 4th Anker Berg-Sonne in his silver 2004 Boxster S; in S3 2nd Jeff Johnson in his gray 2009 Cayman S, and 4th Chris Doty in his gray 2014 Cayman; and in S4 4th Alan Davis in his blue 2015 911 GT3. Looks like NER will have to do better in S2, S3 and S5 classes to beat NCR next time.

Personally I had a great weekend. I have new rubber on the rears after finally, and gladly, wearing the old HTR IIs down to the wear strips. The new rubbers are HTR IIIs, not ideal AX rubber, but a fair compromise as long as I only have one set of rims. In spite of the tires and the nut behind the wheel, I ended up with a fourth place in S2. Even beyond the compromised tires, I know there are several more seconds to gain with more practice. I am having a lot of trouble with tight turns and need some instructor help with those. I feel good about my slalom performance and getting the wheels where I want them, maybe even getting a bit too close. On both of my fastest runs I hit a cone and had those times ruined. I do hope to find a set of 17” Boxster rims before next season that I can put 200 wear tires on for AX and DE.

FUNTOY, the 2004 Boxster S that my wife and I bought exactly a year ago, has been a wonderful car, great on the track and around cones, but also a joy to drive around with the top down. We even took a trip up to the Nova Scotia and PEI that added another 5K miles to the 104K that the car had on it when we bought it. It is amazing that a 100K-mile-plus, 12-year-old car can be in such great shape. This is my first year autocrossing with NER and it has been a blast. I am getting to know and finally learning the names of the regulars at our events. The AX school at the start of the season was terrific and the instructors have been extremely helpful.

I took a large number of photos that you can peruse at http://tinyurl.com/y9oaq8w2 and http://tinyurl.com/yddzogl6

September 20, 2017/by Sterling Vernon

Uncategorized

Updating our Club Communications

The Northeast Region Board has voted to make major changes to the way that our club communicates with the membership. The key elements of the new approach include renaming the position of “Newsletter Editor” to “Communications Chair,” streamlining communications by integrating website/outbound emails/social media, and eliminating the monthly printed Nor’Easter after the December 2017 issue.

Why did we do this?

New features. We have been receiving a lot of positive comments on the updated website (thanks Sterling!). We are going to make it better by utilizing more advanced features available only online that can connect us and keep the information more up-to-date. We look forward to your feedback and thoughts on how to make it work best for you.

More accurate information. Due to the inherent lag in print communication there have been occasions when the Nor’Easter had outdated information causing confusion. Some articles have been on the website, not the Nor’Easter, and vice versa.

Use of new technology. Like an article that is now online? Forward it or share it. Like a picture? Download it!

Better use of our resources. The Nor’Easter costs $36,000 a year to print and mail. We can use this money to offer new events (a summer picnic is planned for 2018), reduce fees, and increase our charitable donations. Additionally, designing the layout of the magazine and working to get it printed uses a significant amount of volunteer effort – effort that our current editor has graciously performed for the past seven years and roughly 80 editions (thanks Adrianne!) !

What will the new communications look like?

Monthly emails will continue as in the past. If you are not receiving these, please make sure that PCA National has your current email – our emails go to you through them to protect your privacy. Email Sterling ([email protected]) if you need any help updating your information with national.

Improved website. Take a minute and look at the website now. You will see 6 tabs right now. Here’s what you’ll find under each of these tabs…

Home – this contains the latest news from our club and other articles of interest to our membership. Scroll down and read what interests you. And there is a sidebar for upcoming events.
Events – this displays the full calendar of all future events with links to complete information for each event.
Activities – this contains the information you need about each of the club’s activities. Want to be a concours judge? Need a DE tech form? Need to look up your autocross class? Find it here.
The Nor’Easter – we are looking to evolve this into more of a “month-at-a-time” report of the club’s activities, imitating, in some ways, the current, printed version and presented in magazine format. It will include write-ups/pictures of the previous month’s club events, the columns written by board members and articles of interest to the members. For the comfort of those used to the printed version, it will have links to the calendar and general information. Each month a new “issue” will appear and the old one will be archived, as has been done since 2007.
The Mart – online classifieds. Sell cars. Sell parts. Share info about shops and services. Help us keep it constantly up-to-date.
Information – as before, board members, committee chairs, by-laws, contact info, how to help by volunteering.

And an improvement we are working on: member to member communications. It is not yet worked out completely but this aims to allow two way communications between the club and its membership and between members themselves. Need advice on autocross? Post it here. Looking for a part or a repair shop? Same. Want to meet up with others to go to an event? Let everyone know.

What happens to my subscription?

We are very thankful to all those who have current subscriptions to the Nor’easter. We would like to donate the subscription money received after June 30, 2017 to Homes For Our Troops, our club charity. If you subscribed during this period and would prefer a direct refund, please let us know and we’ll be happy to help you. All recurring subscriptions will be discontinued.

And please note that this is your club! We encourage your participation and engagement by submitting articles and providing feedback. We are all volunteers, like you, working to give you a better communications platform so please use it. Let us know what content you like about the current Nor’easter and how you use it so that we can make sure we build upon that success and history.

September 15, 2017/by Sterling Vernon

For Enthusiasts, News Update, Social, The Nor'Easter Magazine, Tours

First Annual Dow Fall Tour

What a gorgeous day to take a drive around New England, it was this past Sunday! Thirty five cars with sixty people joined us for the First Annual Charlie and Martha Dow Fall Tour. Many thanks to Gary Cooper and Tony Miniscalco for all the work they did to arrange and run this event with help from our veteran tour-meister and ramble-guru, Dennis Friedman, and the activities committee. Charlie Dow’s son, Eric, and his family were kind enough to come and we presented them with a custom plaque made specially for them that will hold a photo of everyone at the event. Thanks to all who participated and thanks to our volunteers for making a very memorable event. We all look forward to continuing this wonderful tradition in Charlie’s name for years to come.

Attendees arrive. Here comes Ramble Master, Dennis Friedman, who is used to a large number of cars at his Rambles.

First Annual Dow Fall Tour - anticipation

When do we get this thing started?

Under Bill’s watchful eye, Gary explaining to the group that McQueen was cool, but the tour drivers are not McQueen.

Charlie’s son Eric telling the group how much his Dad loved NER and Porsche, and how he would be thrilled to know his name will forever be associated with the tour.

The group posed for a shot before taking off

NER only parking at Michael’s Harborside

The tour organizers failed to check the commuter rail schedule. Provided by Linda Montoya Mullen from Michael Kaleel’s car.

Where’s the beef?

Gary telling the group that normally the sweeper car is not the first to arrive at the destination

And thanks to Anker Sonne-Berg for the photos unless otherwise noted!

September 12, 2017/3 Comments/by Sterling Vernon

For Enthusiasts, Social, The Nor'Easter Magazine

Porsche Day

Every year, we look forward to Porsche Day at the Larz Anderson Museum in Brookline, MA. This year was a tremendous success with at least 70 cars. The weather was perfect. And NER was out in force.