SCCA Autocross at the Fernandina Beach airport.

I missed the last Autocross as it was on the same day I was riding home from New Orleans after the Cannonball and Amerivespa.  So I was looking forward to running the one held yesterday.

But I had corded a tire at the last one and needed to replace all four.  So in the middle of the week, I ordered tires through a friend, Buck Clayton, and he had them delivered to the Tire Kingdom in Kingsland, Georgia.  I thought I would just ride up there Friday at lunch time, get them installed and be back in the office by 3:00.  It turned out that they were busy and couldn't get to them until almost 4:00.  And I had told Buck that I would gladly buy him lunch.  We had lunch and a beer.  When I paid it felt like a lot for lunch and I glanced at the bill and saw that they charged twice for one of the beers.  The guy handed me four dollars for that, then I left.  I was still troubled by the amount and while back at the tire store, looked at the bill again.  It turned out that they had double charged for everything.  So I went back to get it resolved, but it was 3:10 and they were closed between 3:00 and 5:00.  I left them a message on the answering machine that I had tried to get it fixed but they were closed.  I figured I would go back at 5:00.  But as I was talking to another customer at the waiting area, Buck walked in and handed me $20.  He said that the owner figured it out just after we left and, since he didn't know me but knew Buck, tracked him down to give him the difference.  It was a nice gesture that shows that there is still honesty in some places.

The day was going to be the hottest day of the year, but I wanted to run anyway.  My class was running second of the two run groups and I was assigned to be starter for the first group.  That involved standing on the hot asphalt for an hour and a half.  Luckily I brought an umbrella to use to keep the sun off.  They got through with only a few hitches.

I lined up first among the second group and had a slow run on my first.  It got better on the second and again on the third.  The fourth run was slower than the third but the fifth and last was fastest of all.  I usually like that but it was still only good for third in the class of nine and seventh out of fifty overall using the PAX handicap system.  We had a good class that made it a fun day.