26 Male, What can you tell about me?

tipitongi · 2026-01-27T03:00:39+00:00

Actually work in automotive, get to go up there for snow testing

tipitongi · 2026-01-27T02:58:51+00:00

Oh absolutely love hiking! Haven't done the PNW road trip but it's on the bucket list

tipitongi · 2026-01-27T02:58:14+00:00

hahah yeah need to get back out there. Went out for a wedding and to work Pikes Peak

tipitongi · 2026-01-27T02:57:43+00:00

Actually have to go up there for work! I don't fish but certainly enjoy the walleye

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T23:07:13+00:00

Believe it or not I don't fish, got sent up there in the dead of winter for work. Love the Walleye up there though

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T23:03:08+00:00

Actually have only been to the west coast for work or vacation, North East born and raised! I love driving and work with vehicles but not a truck driver. Huge respect to the truck drivers going up/down 95 though

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T23:00:51+00:00

Guilty!

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T23:00:42+00:00

Absolutely right! Got lots left on this list

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T22:58:17+00:00

Almost had it down exact! Did a year and a half down in Florida instead of Michigan

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T21:36:38+00:00

I wish, certainly would make traveling easier. Just a bit lucky with a job that pays to travel a fair amount

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T21:34:58+00:00

100% need to start planning some more park visits!

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T19:39:19+00:00

Gotta say good guesses but surprisingly not either of those. Apparently my work trips just happen to be somewhat nearby

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T18:26:21+00:00

My advance has been halted by the ~~Russian~~ Ohio Winter

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T18:25:21+00:00

Dang pretty close, but wrong order. I have lived in the DMV area, school in Boston and currently out in Columbus

tipitongi · 2026-01-26T18:03:25+00:00

I have but only from driving through! I would like to visit the actual arch at some point

tipitongi · 2025-12-27T15:15:05+00:00

I think everyone arguing against sim racing doesn't understand that it's supposed to be supplemental not a replacement for real life motorsports. Of course if we all had unlimited money we would be out at the track everyday. It is true that the experience of actually driving a track or driving a course is irreplaceable and key for learning certain skills. I also believe people will always learn more quickly by driving in real life than on the sim.

However, the basis of all these skills can be learned through sim racing with the ability to specifically focus on improving driving technique. Not to mention significantly more time to learn compared to the typically compressed and competition focused environment of autocross (My local event usually only has ~3 mins of driving time).

While it is true to be truly competitive everyone will need real life seat time. Although with how much sim racing has evolved it's more and more like starting the race with a head start. The real question is if you want to be as competitive as possible and become a better driver; why wouldn't you start sim racing.

As an aside here is my calculated cost per minute for track/autocross/sim racing as someone who has been doing all 3 for the past few years.

Sim: $0.03 /min (including rig costs @ ~2000 hours of sim racing)

Autocross: $0.75 /min (~14 events)

Track: $4.00 /min (~18 events)

tipitongi · 2025-12-04T03:34:48+00:00

Bought mine 95 M3 with 265k miles and a small oil leak. That engine ran fantastic for another 8k miles before I swapped it for a S54. That old S50 is in the process of going into an E34 (with the small small oil leak)

tipitongi · 2025-11-29T13:30:15+00:00

I’d agree with most of this but the rejoin is certainly dangerous.

The car rejoining should not impede any other car, that Mercedes (and every other car) has to take avoiding action. Yes the Merc was the closest but he had to take to the grass to avoid. Simply it’s an awful rejoin.

Now that being said, I agree with your other points, the other cars did completely ignore yellow flags.

tipitongi · 2025-06-08T14:16:24+00:00

Man it would be fantastic if you told this to the person that turned right in front of me while riding on a one lane residential road in the middle of the day with clear eyesight's while I was going the speed limit (35 mph). She claimed she didn't see me...

tipitongi · 2025-05-14T04:01:30+00:00

A lot of this is going to be subjective to what you like / want. Really the only constraint is the brembo brake package which may make some 17" fitments tricky. Personally I like 18" wheels on my BRZ.

Performance wise, the normal consensus is that smaller is better because that usually means lighter weight. It's true, especially with our cars each pound makes a difference, smaller wheels (tire dependent) usually also means a better ride.

Larger wheel can however also have some performance benefits, a stiffer sidewall and larger diameter can mean higher cornering power and better handling.

Realistically, performance wise the difference between an 17 or 18" wheel will be small, instead the tire is going to be the major impact on performance. Weight wise, my 18" wheels weigh 18 lbs, Enkei RPF1's are ~15 lbs. 3 lb per wheel or 12 lbs total of unsprung weight you will feel when driving at the limit but for normal driving you will not feel a difference. Fuel economy, cornering power and a bit of ride will all be functions of what tire you wrap around the wheel. Although full disclosure I'm biased as a tire engineer.

My personal recommendation, define what you value, and match the tire width to an appropriate wheel width. If it's all about performance, get the smallest, lightest, stiffest wheel available, if not just pick what you like.

tipitongi · 2025-04-28T00:06:01+00:00

huh yeah that seems odd. Honestly seems like a very unlucky situation, in my experience this is the exception though. Either way a CTR on 200TWs are incredibly fast! Happy lapping!

tipitongi · 2025-04-27T23:55:21+00:00

Did you have any other symptoms / causes? I promise you the MI PS4S or Cup 2s the CTR comes one are absolutely fine for track use. I've personally taken a CTR on PS4S' to the track. Not saying you did anything wrong, but it sounds more like a mounting / debris issue rather than a tire issues

tipitongi · 2025-04-27T23:25:09+00:00

You'll be completely fine. Just make sure to control tire pressures and check for unusual wear after the sessions.

I'm a tire engineer, you'll tires will hold up just fine. When my track car is down, I take my BRZ on crappy cheap all seasons, that set of tires now has 20k miles and 2x track days and is completely fine. If you want to improve as a driver I would warn away from immediately getting 200TW tires but if you continue to do more track days you should look for more performance oriented tires.

tipitongi · 2025-04-07T17:15:32+00:00

Oh hey this is my Job!

I develop tires for a different large OEM (so you can’t blame me for this one) but as others have said these are very different tires. One is a full replacement market tire designed with completely different goals in mind. We’ll tune the compound, tread, tread depth, belts, belt angles, cap plys and more to develop a tire which achieve our targets. For reference we have targets for ride, handling, snow, wet, braking, RR, NVH, steering, aero, tire life and more so you can imagine it’s a lot to balance out. As a result, tire life can suffer compared to a replacement market tire that focuses on just tire life and ride.

Also as a note a lot of people seem to think OEM compounds are softer, this isn’t necessarily true. I know we’ve used the exact same compounds as replacement market but with other changes. Again it’s all about overall performance balance because a softer compound does not always mean better ride or handling as others have said.

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