One word to describe:
20 yrs ago: Rd Atl Dip FA
One word to describe:
What a shame they take these corners away from us.
looks european except for the clay
RUSH !
"An analog man living in a digital world"
Tame.
Sorry, I grew up at Bridgehampton.
Stonebridge Sports & Classics ltd
15 Great Pasture Rd Danbury, CT. 06810 (203) 744-1120
www.cryosciencetechnologies.com
Cryogenic Processing · REM-ISF Processing · Race Prep & Driver Development
I only ran RA once, in an MG Midget vintage race car, and I went through the bottom of the dip at 8,000 rpm. When I got home I calculated that was 132 mph. In basically a street MG with a roll cage and a tarted up engine. Scared the **** out of me! I could maybe get 7,000 RPM in fourth gear at any other track.
Brian
I miss "THE DIP". It was a lot of fun to drive through it. My brother and I watched many
of the Runoffs from the dip. Great times, gone for every.
longing
After the dip was the bridge
I miss the dip, but the one I miss more is the turn after it...
Rd Atl Dip
I agree with you.
I still remember trying to find my mark for the bridge brake/turn-in, while my helmet was lifting, causing my vision to be distorted. This, all because of the high (air) speed carried through the dip. It was 1982, long before helmets were designed to help prevent this issue for too-tall drivers exposed to air buffeting.
The Gravity Cavity
It was fun.
Bill Bonow
"Wait, which one is the gas pedal again?"
The one and only time I ran at RA was the 1989 Runoffs in FF. Top 20 cars separated by 1 sec as I recall.
That was the year Scott Leibler was killed coming up the hill out of the dip. Was a real bummer that day. I was driving one of Scott's FF's that week.
The dip was really something. I would slide down in my seat as much as I could to pick up any aero advantage possible.
Gary Hickman
Edge Engineering Inc
FB #76
Hmmmm, Well I've never heard the word "Tame" thrown at "The Dip"Originally Posted by stonebridge20
Tame.
Sorry, I grew up at Bridgehampton.
Which begs the question... "Did you ever even run there, Bro?"
That's an easy Buck Fifty Five in those cars, I'd imagine...
Whew ..........
.........approaching the dip, and often times and especially when in a multi car draft:
Your brain said it needs to be flat ..............
Your right foot said it needs to be flat ........
Your right calve said it needs to be flat ......
Your right thigh said it needs to be flat ......
Your left foot moved over to hold down the right ..........
however, and at the very last moment
--- your sphincter said "NOPE", puckered, and up came the foot
Rd Atl Dip
I really liked watching the Corvettes, with their side pipe exhaust and the shower of sparks they would throw when the hit the bottom of the Dip.
Fact!
-Peter Krause
1984 Tiga SC
www.peterkrause.net
"The Driver is the Greatest Performance Variable in the Racing Equation"
I never saw Bridgehampton, much less drove there, but the Dip/Bridge combination at Road Atlanta was the section that separated the men from the boys. As I told my buddy when I did my driver's school there in a big block Corvette back in 1984, "I can stay flat from Seven, thru the Dip, until I hit the brakes going uphill to the Bridge. I CAN do that. But unless I'm on a really hot lap or there's somebody on my ass, I'm going to lift just a touch as I come across Nine just to make sure they haven't moved the track since the last lap!" We were running about a buck-sixty-five there and everything sacred to your body would pucker as you picked up speed going down the hill towards the Dip, but it was a serious hoot every time through there.
I remember watching Carl Shafer run his ASedan Camaro at a mid-70's Runoffs. Smoke would come off the front tires as the fenders bottomed out going through the Dip, then he'd brake at the Three marker/line, downshift at the Two, then turn the car sideways at the One and go under the Bridge with the tail out and the rear tires spinning. As he came under the Bridge (still sideways) he'd lift slightly to let the rears get a bite, then rocket down the hill towards Turn 12. And he'd do it lap, after lap, after lap!
And I believe Scott Leibler's incident was on the front straight side of the Bridge. I recall he was running third in the FA race, got together with another car coming up to (or under) the Bridge, then the roll bar snapped off when came down in the grass upside down. I also believe that prompted the chassis homologation movement, but I could be wrong (about both occurrences).
And my one word? "Legendary".
Butch Kummer
2006, 2007, 2010 SARRC GTA Champion
Hmmmm, Well I've never heard the word "Tame" thrown at "The Dip"
Which begs the question... "Did you ever even run there, Bro?"
That's an easy Buck Fifty Five in those cars, I'd imagine...
1993 Runoffs in FA. My first time in a DB4 after winning NeDiv in a RT4 which was a bad move. Should have stuck with the RT4. Finished 6th.
The Dip just didn't get much of my attention. T1 flat did!
Ever run Bridgehampton, Bro?
Stonebridge Sports & Classics ltd
15 Great Pasture Rd Danbury, CT. 06810 (203) 744-1120
www.cryosciencetechnologies.com
Cryogenic Processing · REM-ISF Processing · Race Prep & Driver Development
One word to describe it then: BALLS
One word to describe it now: castrated
Good story from the 70's. Some may remember Jeff "JJ" Carlin, who raced a Vee. At one of the Nationals that year, JJ took to the grass on the outside of the dip to pass guys more than once - just dropped the left tires off a bit. With 3-4 wide drafting, no one would expect you coming on the left if you had half a car width over there.
Fast forward to the Runoffs: I believe it was the first day of qualifying. JJ gets a hell of a draft off of someone and, thinking he was on a hot lap, dropped the left wheels off...only he bottoms the living $h!t out of his car! Apparently, to divert some pooling rain at some time that fall, track workers had dug a small culvert. If I recall, it took a good chunk out of his left side chassis, peeled back some of his floor pan, and left him with a little limp the rest of the week!
Thread about Bridgehampton...
Dave Weitzenhof
Turn 1 Road Atlanta!!
I remember watching Runoffs FA at turn one in the early 90's and the announcer telling the recorded speeds through turn 1 and climbing the hill from radar gun results ... I think it was 130ish !?!
All I know was my brain said it was impossible as I watched it...
Mike
What is amazing is that the last few times Brandon was at Road Atlanta he was close to those speeds in a FB.
Agreed!
Dixon was seriously fast in one lap after lap the last time I saw him in his FB there a few years ago.
I can't imagine what it would be like at Road Atlanta before the track was changed. Going down into turn 9 before we hit the brakes now is the fastest top speeds I have seen in both the F1600 & F2000 cars compared to any other track I have run at.
Steve Bamford
One word... Cojones!
http://youtu.be/nV38HfKyaHA
First Atlantic race I ran was at RA in 1986 . A 100 miler and I hit a curb about the 50 mile
point and bent a rocker on the March . If I known how bad it was bent I would have stopped .
I noticed something was wrong but kept motoring . Every lap after that coming down the Dip
the bottom of the tub would drag the ground and after about 20 laps it got so hot it started
burning my Ass ! Finished the race but had blisters at the end
Eau Rouge - SPA Belgium
Looks to be Eau Rouge in reverse.
Well I DID enter my first motocross race there in '77, so technicallyyyyyyyyyyy...1993 Runoffs in FA. My first time in a DB4 after winning NeDiv in a RT4 which was a bad move. Should have stuck with the RT4. Finished 6th.
The Dip just didn't get much of my attention. T1 flat did!
Ever run Bridgehampton, Bro?
Drove there once in 1986 and those were/are my fav 2 turns anywhere. Now I was driving an F440 and we were faster than the FV cars but not much else. I was told that you could do both turns flat and I really really tried. I actually did it flat once but did not finish the bridge turn as I spun about 1/3 the way down the hill. Completely sideways and got T BONED in a very big way. Broken ankle, fractured tibia and a crack right up by my left knee.
This was in qualifying 1 for the 86 Runoffs. We fixed the car and I drove the race with a leg cast up to my left knee. A fun week for sure!!!
Thanks ... Jay Novak
313-445-4047
On my 54th year as an SCCA member
with a special thanks to every SCCA worker (NONE OF US WOULD RACE WITHOUT THE WORKERS)
I was trying to explain to my wife what the motocross track looked like. She just couldn't picture it. I took my BMX bike to a RA race once when I was about 10 years old, thinking I could just ride it around. Not a chance. That track was literally carved into the side of the hill. I couldn't even climb the jumps on my bike, so I just sat on the top of one of the huge whoops and imagined what it would be like with a motor. Good memories!Well I DID enter my first motocross race there in '77, so technicallyyyyyyyyyyy...
I did a professional mountain bike race at RA in the mid 90's. It had rained that week, and all the red mud that I couldn't understand as a kid why everyone made a big deal of, made me curse the earth.
Yeah, the MX track at Rd Atl was brutal.
I was actually referring to the MX track at Bridgehampton as my first race.
I grew up on Long Island, but moved away right after High School, and ended up in Atlanta, where I started racing motorcycles in '84.
The Dip on a bike was much more hairball than a car!
"Hi my name is Glenn, and I'm an addict!"
Somewhere on you-tube there is an old IMSA video where they have in car video of the dip, from a mustang driven by Dallenback's kid, I think. Brings back memories. I ran the dip in a one-off piece of junk FF that had a fiberglass seat, a thin metal trip to bolt it to, and a thin fiberglass floor. Nothing you would let on track today. When I hit the dip, the whole thing would bottom out, and I'd "raise up" reflexively, every lap, just like it would help or something. On the plus side, the thing was so slow, I was flat out till the white stripe on the uphill that I used as a brake marker. I can't tell you how many times I spun trying to get more speed over the top, when my [last years runoffs throw-aways taken from trash bins] tires just weren't up to it, but I can tell you how many times I hit the armco!
Jim
Swift DB-1
Talent usually ends up in front, but fun goes from the front of the grid all the way to the back.
In 78 I mowed yards and saved enough money to buy an enduro kart. In early November I went to Rd Atl for the maiden run. All testing and practice was rained out so my first lap in an enduro was gong to be in the race. Diz briefed me on the track and how to work the slippy pipe off of the start and then it was time to fire up. I somehow managed to get the start right and was leading the field coming down the back straight. As we were headed down the dip at full tilt Diz and Wayne Wisplpear blew past me (thankfully) and I tucked in behind. All of a sudden the earth disappeared as we went under the bridge. Somehow I hung onto the thing, but it was like unexpectedly jumping off of a high rise building... I am glad I did that at 15...
1985 IMSA Camel GT race at Road Atlanta -
Near the start, they do a [slightly butchered] lap of the track. Only video I know of that shows the dip. It doesn't do it justice at all, but if you ever rode that rollercoaster, you will remember.
Jim
Swift DB-1
Talent usually ends up in front, but fun goes from the front of the grid all the way to the back.
1989, my first real runoffs, driving the very first F440 KBS MK5, (which had never been driven, let alone raced, before this). Some laps in, I was 6th, on the back straight coming on to a train of 2nd through 5th. Nobody told me I couldn't, so went around all four through the dip and up the hill. For about 5 seconds I was second, (behind David Elliott). But as Jay, I got light and spun. I had the good fortune to save it and eventually finished fourth. What a thrill.
Without a doubt one of the most exciting places on any race track.
John Puccini
147
that is how fast my Air Cooled Lola would hit at the bottom of the dip.
8700 in fourth gear.
Amazing. Halfway down the straight one would be flat in fourth then go down the dip and pick up 500 rpm.
The first few times it was disorienting.
But I was a lot younger and braver and not as aware of my mortality then.
A little wet here. Looks tame from this camera angle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJSE_7jE5Qo
Ha! From the looks of this, DaveW knows how to get through the Dip.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pURtJfInH8I
Yeah, I miss the old configuration. The new one is safer, but the old one was more fun!
Link to related thread...
http://www.apexspeed.com/forums/show...highlight=1980
Dave Weitzenhof
This has to be one of the great races ever.
Thanks ... Jay Novak
313-445-4047
On my 54th year as an SCCA member
with a special thanks to every SCCA worker (NONE OF US WOULD RACE WITHOUT THE WORKERS)
You're always fun to watch, Mike, but Greg Ray was on a different planet in 1993...
I know it's not possible, but I never heard him slow down for T11...
Then, he couldn't get his car started on the grid for the race. Didn't matter.
Amazing performance.
On another note, tightest my sphincter has ever been was in a Fiat 850 Spider (?!?!?!) that hit the sheets of sudden water after black flag as I went down into the Dip.
The car became "unstuck," hydroplaning merrily away and I thought I was going to hit the wall FIVE times and get hurt, but it grabbed at the last minute...
Always taught that if you could reach out and touch the wall on the right under the bridge, you were on the RIGHT line...
-Peter Krause
1984 Tiga SC
www.peterkrause.net
"The Driver is the Greatest Performance Variable in the Racing Equation"
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
