While I’m not a fan of testing new setups on the track, scheduling has made things really difficult to break in this setup before the track day. I arrived home the day before the track day with a bunch of to-do’s for the Evo: replace the OEM brake air guides (always break when I hit a cone during autox), add some moly to the engine & the transmission (engine & trans), and do a top-off brake bleed. I picked up the Uhaul trailer after the car was prepped and drove 2 hours to Joliet with the Sequoia towing the Evo – which was a good thing I did.

Everything with the travel, arrival, and unloading went smoothly. The Sequoia has an odd issue where the fuel gauge isn’t reading properly, but the fix looks to be quite expensive. In any case, the car is still running great. All of my cars are going to start running that moly in the engine to assist with startup wear, so I’m happy they sell the stuff just as an additive.

In the last event, I was able to test & run most of the new powertrain – turbo, trans (though only 1st and 2nd), t-case, diffs. The car ran flawlessly there, and while I ran on pump for the autox, I decided to switch over to E85 for the trackday for more power and more cooling. This was a test & break-in of the other new parts I’ve added – the wheels & tires and the new brakes setup. This was also my chance to run the new 4th gear in a track environment as it was intended for. The new turbo ran great – power delivery was smooth and quick, spooling up quicker than stock – almost felt like a ball bearing turbo with how quick it was spooling. 4th gear felt good – I wouldn’t know exactly how it was performing in the gearbox, but took the full session without any issues on a relatively warm-ish 80 degrees. I set 8 clicks in the front and 10 clicks in the rear on the coilovers and the balance of the car felt quite good – I didn’t get a chance to run the looser ACD maps as I would have liked, but I’m sure that would have improved the turn-in even more. I need another bleed down of the brakes, but overall they felt good and held up well. I didn’t get the sense they were being worked too hard, and I started getting a better feel for the braking zones again in this car.

I guessed the tire pressures before the first session to 30/32 – which led to ~38psi front and ~36 rear. The rears were perfect, but obviously needed to drop another 2 in the front for the appropriate hot temps. The tires felt great. They were grippy and didn’t really fall off with the heat. I did push them a little too much and the car would understeer a little, but nothing extreme. Really happy with them. It took me a few laps of traffic and passing to get a relatively clean look at the track, which resulted in a 1:36.17. It was by far not my best lap at all, as I was still feeling out the car and ran way too deep for the braking for turn 8. Still would have been in the 1:35s if that flyer had started without traffic, but a GR Corolla held up the entire end of the previous run through the starting straight. The car pulled hard and honestly felt like sometimes the other cars were standing still. I could hammer the brakes and never had any fade or other issues. Handling was great, ran over the curbs without any drama or instability, and had some better balance on reserve via the 2 more aggressive ACD settings and having the tire pressures in the right window for the 2nd session.

Where did it go wrong? In my first flying hot lap for the second session, I heard a loud POP shifting from 3rd to 4th. The pop was very violent, but the car initially seemed fine, so I thought he car had just backfired off throttle like the VN does. I quickly realized there was something wrong – I had almost no forward drive, and had to limp back the entire way while pointing others by. It was a painful limp back into the pits, took probably 5-6 minutes in total. My initial thought was that I had blown a clamp on the intercooler piping – something that happens from time to time with these cars. The pop was so violent though that I thought I had surely blown the turbo. However, there was no smoke, no check engine lights, and no other issues aside from loss of drive.

After pulling into the pits, the culprit was found. All the clamps had actually held fine, but the silicone reducer coupler had exploded – I haven’t gotten it off the car yet but it looks like potentially 2 tears – one running up the middle and another near the clamp itself. It looks like it’s been on the car about 6 years, but the failure was still a little surprising and I’ve opted to get two to keep a spare on hand just in case.

The most disappointing part was missing 2 track sessions – I think I could have easily beaten my previous best (1:36 flat) by at least 2 seconds. I was still getting back the feel of where the grip was and where I could go faster. I think an earlier turn in and trailing brake for 1-2, smoother turn for 3rd and maybe closer to flat. I’ve been experimenting with 4 and got pretty close to the limit there, whereas 5 is a little blind and I always try to leave margin. I finally remembered how to do 6, trailing the brakes through most of the way though I think I could carry a little bit more speed through. 7 is flat, and braking for 8 needs to be done just before the 3 board, with earlier turn-in to carry more speed before a squirt of gas and hard on the brakes for 9-10. I think I can go earlier on the gas for 10 which carries all the way down the straight. Braking down the straight is just after the 5 board and is the longest braking zone on the track before a very slow 11-12. I was pretty happy with those, 11’s curbing is very flat so if you ride that and the line isn’t too bad, you can be flat through 12 before a dab of brakes into 13-14.

I’m still really happy with the car. The biggest part was seeing how the brakes performed, and they held up great. They’re still brand new so may have a tiny bit of air in the calipers, which I’ll take care of next. Tires felt good and grippy and the 18s feel right on the car. The diffs worked great – no instability under braking from using the 1-way in the front and the rear. I’m excited to see how the other tunes on the center diff work, but it seems unlikely I’ll be able to do another track day this year in this car. I wasn’t that happy with my fastest lap so I posted this lap below chasing an M3 and a Vette. I was putting full seconds on everyone and catching everyone else with no point bys of my own, so I was moving pretty well out there. Eager to replace the silicone on the LICP and go again.

Set Up (Evo):

• XA
• Ohlins DFV (Custom valved); Shocks 8/10
• OEM FSB 4/5; WL 26mm RSB: Medium
• RE-ACD: Snow
• Cusco 1-way Type RS front diff (60% springs & 60% plates)
• Cusco 1-way Type RS Gymkhana rear diff (80% springs and 80% plates)
• Camber at -4.0 0 toe, -2.5 rear, 0 toe-in
• Brakes F: Alcon brakes, P3 pads; Brakes R: Girodisc 2-pc & ST43s
• CE28N-plus 18×10+40; 12mm spacer front, 3mm spacer rear
• Vitour P1 265/35-18
• 38psi front 36psi rear (only one session)

Notes (Evo):

• Try 8/8
• Start at 28/32 cold temps for track

2025 Event Count: 5 Autox, 1 track day