Atlanta Motorsports Park

Atlanta Motorsports Park Car Championship Series race, July 8 2018: Back and ready for battle!

/ Ann Morey

I was really excited to get back to Atlanta Motorsports Park (AMP) now that I had my front springs in the front and my rear springs in the rear. I’d spent a whole test day practicing at AMP before I got my springs fixed, and I was hoping that the proper springs plus my previous practice would lead to some big gains in pace.

But, as my coach reminded me, progress doesn’t work like that. I only went a little bit faster. But it worked out, because that little bit was all I needed to be exactly as fast as two other drivers. Literally, I was only one thousandth of a second slower than the car ahead of me in qualifying! There were several cars that were running a similar pace, which made for some really fun racing for everyone. I finally got to experience close racing, which is what Spec Miata is supposed to be all about.

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Atlanta Motorsports Park test day and Car Championship Series race, June 8 & 10 2018: The big plot twist

/ Ann Morey
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I oversteered into the tire wall, but more importantly, I learned WHY I oversteered into the tire wall.

What would you do if you had a whole race track and a professional driving coach to yourself for a day? I’ll can tell you what I did; I worked my ass off. As part of our business-consulting-for-driver-coaching deal, my coach made a stop in Atlanta to coach me for the weekend. Racing Analytics got us on track at Atlanta Motorsports Park (AMP) (where their shop is located). I worked so hard and I saw so much progress! And I learned a lot, too.

The biggest thing I learned was that my car had something wrong with the suspension all along. In my first session on track, as I was warming up and gradually picking up my pace, the car snapped oversteered on me faster than I could catch it. I shot right myself into the tire wall.  (Lucky for me, the damage minimal, so we quickly pulled the fenders back out and got an alignment from Racing Analytics, and I was back on track.) Towards the end of the day, my coach talked Brad into driving my car. Brad assumed it would feel just like his, since they are, after all, spec cars. My coach seemed to have a hunch that might not be the case. When Brad came in, he said, “Now I see why you hit the tire wall. Your car is twitchy and really lose. I think something is wrong with it.” There was no time to dig deeper before our race on Sunday, but my curiosity was piqued. What did that mean for me if there was something wrong with my car? (It turns out a lot. More on that in a minute.)

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Atlanta Motorsports Park Winter Car Tune Up Race, February 18 2018: Sunshine and glimmers of greatness

/ Ann Morey
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Hanging out with the cool cars at AMP.

Because I’m either crazy or a total badass (or both), I decided to run this race at Atlanta Motorsports Park (AMP) the very next weekend after my race at CMP. To tip the scales a bit to the crazy side, this event was on a Sunday and I had hardwood flooring installers scheduled to by at my house at 8:00 am the next day to start installing new floors in my whole second floor. This meant I spent the day before the race moving three bedrooms’ worth of stuff downstairs to clear the way for the new floors. But Brad and I needed to make a trip to AMP that weekend anyway, because we needed to drop Brad’s race car off at Racing Analytics (whose shop is at the track) to diagnose the mysterious misfire that developed at our last event. Why not get a few races in while there?

Fortunately, this one-day event was pretty easy to squeeze into my schedule. AMP organizes this really handy race series for Spec Miatas and other momentum cars with a manageable schedule and lots of track time. The day starts at 9:00 a.m., (which is super late compared to most amateur race series) and includes a practice session, two qualifying practice sessions and two races and is all wrapped up by 3:00 p.m. I’m planning to squeeze in as many of these AMP races as I can manage this year.

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July 23, 2017 AMP Car Championship: My first Spec Miata race ever!

/ Ann Morey

I knew on my very first track day that I wanted to be a race car driver. In pursuit of that goal, I’ve climbed the ranks of NASA’s (National Auto Sport Association, not  the space NASA) HPDE program and got approved to attend “comp school” to get my NASA pro racing competition license  and run my first wheel to wheel races in September.

However, as luck would have it, my racing debut came a little earlier than expected! My friends at Racing Analytics invited Brad and I to participate in the Atlanta Motorsports Park (AMP) Car Championship series. Even though I don’t quite have my license yet, Racing Analytics offered to write a letter of recommendation to the race director which would allow me to participate as a rookie!  I signed up for the two race event on Sunday, July 23rd.

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