One Lap of America: Day 4 | Thriving in the rain | Hyundai Elantra N | Project Car Updates

No more anticipation, no more worrying, no more forecasting. The local news playing over our lukewarm hotel breakfast said it all, displaying a viewer poll titled: “Are you excited for the spring snow storm?” The answer, with 60% of the vote, was “No.”

We walked out to a 32-degree day with something akin to wintery mix falling out of the sky. Perfect day for racing….

We’d finally made it to High Plains Raceway on day 4 of the Tire Rack One Lap of America Presented by Grassroots Motorsports, and we’d finally made it to the big scary forecast the paddock has been buzzing about: Freezing rain, followed by an actual snow storm in the afternoon.

So today’s mission was pretty simple: Stay warm enough and dry enough to avoid hypothermia, keep the car on track and make up some points over our higher-powered competition. Then, avoid the snowstorm on our 400-mile transit from Colorado to Nebraska. How hard could it be?

Our first problem was just keeping our stuff dry: High Plains is about as exposed as the surface of the moon, and we didn’t pay extra to rent a garage.

Not that it would have mattered–the garages are just carports open on all sides, so everything got soaked in them, too. Rather than throw our food, tools and clothing under a tarp or in a cheap tent (two common approaches), we took another approach and got to the track earlier than most of the field.

Then, we threw our stuff into an unused classroom building while nobody was looking. Legal or not, the classroom was soon filled with other teams copying our idea, meaning we’d solved the first problem of the day.

Time to solve the second problem: Actually racing on a cold, wet track on our tires chosen for warm, dry conditions. One Lap is a game of compromises, and our Bridgestone RE-71RZ tires just aren’t the right choice for these conditions.

We do have one thing that’s perfect for them, though: Tom. We’ve been splitting the driving duties perfectly evenly, with Andy driving morning sessions and Tom driving afternoons, but Andy’s not a huge fan of rain.

Tom, though, would rather drive on a sketchy wet track than on a dry one, so Andy made the call to put Tom in the car for both sessions today. Neither of us had ever driven the Hyundai in the rain, but we figured it couldn’t be too hard–it’s front-wheel-drive, after all.

So Tom went out, track-soaked and wipers on, to see what would happen. And after a miserable first lap while the stone-cold rear tires built some heat, the Hyundai was actually fun–no, it was actually fast!

Tom caught and passed the Lexus RC-F on wet-focused Continentals ahead of him, then despite a drying track for later groups, landed the Hyundai 23rd overall and second in class, bested only by the all-wheel-drive GR Corolla.

Wet weather threw a heavy dose of chaos into the leaderboard, as cars on conservative, wet-optimized tires jumped 5, 10, 20 spots higher than they normally would.

We parked the car, high-fived, then walked over to the concession stand to be one of the first teams in the inevitable hour-long lunch line. Which is where One Lap’s organizer, Brock Yates Jr., treated us to one of his signature Brock speeches.

The jist was simple: “Hey everyone, the weather is going to get worse, does anybody have a strong opinion about cancelling the second session? I’m open to your input.”

The input was milquetoast but clear: We should race in the afternoon. So we did.

Tom headed out for the second session, rain absolutely pouring, with a new trick up his sleeve: The rear tires wouldn’t heat up, but the Hyundai has a built-in tire warming feature cleverly labeled “stability control.”

By constantly sawing at the wheel and throwing the car into big, violent slides down every straight, the stability control was forced to constantly brake the rear wheels. All this energy had to go somewhere, and it meant the rear tires were warm–and working–before the Hyundai pulled up to the start line.

These antics paid off, as Tom climbed higher up the leaderboard in the afternoon session: 19th overall and second in class, again bested by the AWD Corolla.

Our biggest satisfaction, though, came from besting fellow automotive YouTuber Savagegeese driving a new Cadillac CT5-V Blackwing, also running Bridgestone RE-71RZ tires and competing in our same run group. We had a good laugh about that afterwards.

Despite the wet weather at High Plains, nobody had a major off or damage, and the One Lap field as a whole survived.

Some, though, managed to thrive: The aforementioned GR Corolla of Toyota PE Racing emerged as a mid-field winner, while Tom O’Gorman in a Porsche 911 GT3 RS laid down one of the most impressive wet laps we’ve ever seen to win the morning session.

In the afternoon, the Tesla Model S Plaid of Team PGR took top honors thanks to careful driving and all-wheel drive.

Track time complete, there were only two problems left to solve: The evening’s drag race at Julesberg Race Circuit, and the nearly 400-mile-long transit to Motorsport Park Hastings afterwards. Rain cancelled the drags, so we hit the road and headed due east, taking a longer route but mostly avoiding the oncoming storm.

Finally, we rolled into Hastings, Nebraska, just after 8 p.m and enjoyed a leisurely sit-down dinner at Kitty’s Roadhouse.

We’d survived the storm, taken advantage of the wet conditions, and kept our Hyundai in one piece for what was forecast to be our roughest transit yet. We felt pretty good about screaming “MISSION ACCOMPLISHED” as we walked into the hotel room.

So it’s probably a good time to mention we’re only halfway through One Lap. Hopefully, we get just as lucky tomorrow at Hastings.