Unfortunately, as I looked ahead at the schedule, there was only one more racing weekend for Miatas. As I dug deeper into the schedule, the October weekend (which I had been counting on for two races) was limited to Porsches only (for races – HPDE was still being run, but that wouldn’t count for me).
So, I looked at the schedule and decided there were two options: 1) I could “double dip” – race in two different classes on the same day, each day (which would give me four races in one weekend), or 2) do two races at Sonoma at the end of September, and then go down to Buttonwillow (where SoCal NASA was racing the following weekend) and do two races there. The risk of #1 was that if I had any mechanical issues (and I didn’t have a good track record here, honestly), I wouldn’t be able to finish my 8 races before the end of the season. But, I didn’t know Buttonwillow – I’d never been on that track before, and racing for the first time on a track you’ve never been on was, well, in my opinion – risky.
However, the day before the race weekend, Buttonwillow had an “open test day” – pay $200, and you get to come use the track – for testing modifications to your car, or for just driving around. Perfect. I could learn the track and be ready for the race the next day. But, if anything happened, I still wouldn’t finish, with #2.
So, I decided to do both.