Why did Rare Bear pull out of Sundays Gold Race?

[BellCobraIV]

John would be the better one to respond to this but I truly feel that Lyle was, indeed, fearless... at least when it came to racing the Bear. I'm pretty sure that even if there was some "fear" in Lyle when he raced, his extreme competitive nature pushed that emotion so far back into his being that you could, truly, call him a fearless racer. Skip Holm, Tiger D, and now "the kid", might well have that same nature. In Stephen's case, I think exposure to flight from just after conception and pure genetics, make him such a natural aviator, there is probably little about the process that actually induces "fear" for him..

Back on topic with this slightly branch of the original topic .. John, would you agree about Lyle? Some things might well have scared him but I'd bet flying the Bear on a race course wasn't one of them.

Wayne,
Lyle had a healthy respect for the fact that the Bearcat could kill him. BUT he did not fear it. The only time in all the years I ever saw him even crack a little bit was when he pulled out of a Saturday heat race after the flame panel ripped loose (bolts had been left out, then exhaust and airflow from the cowling exit put exhaust straight into the accessorie section.) Lyle called a Mayday, gained altitude, lined up to get her down rolled out shut down. All while the exhaust was still blasting heat at the firewall. During the debrief in the pit transport after a slug of Gatoraid he just calmly looked at the crew and said, "man for about fifteen seconds I thought I was going to have to jump out of that thing. Nope I'd say no fear from Lyle, but then again how many other Gold race pilots have you ever seen takinv a nap under the wing before Sundays Gold using the parachute for pillow? The man was a monster of a competitor. The, likes of which may never come this way again end of story..Like I have said before many times, Lyle, Tiger, Skip, Darryl, and Bob Love. That is my all time top 5. With Stevo getting thrown into that mix as well.

[BellCobraIV]

BTW we won on Sundays Gold the next day. We thrashed for hours, and metal master from Wichita " Bam Bam" Graham straightened the exhaust panel like it never had an issue. While Gotdon Symone and Carl Schuute replaced the burnt wiring. In addition to everything else that was "typical post, race " maintenance from the rest of the guys.

[BellCobraIV]

I stand morally, against your point sir; Lyle Shelton lived to a ripe old age, and he was indeed BOLD, for so many steps, all in a row, in his way.

Well said, and thank you for that.

[John H]

BTW we won on Sundays Gold the next day. We thrashed for hours, and metal master from Wichita " Bam Bam" Graham straightened the exhaust panel like it never had an issue. While Gotdon Symone and Carl Schuute replaced the burnt wiring. In addition to everything else that was "typical post, race " maintenance from the rest of the guys.

That sounds like 1988? I remember the Sat mayday on the 17th was hairy . Lyle hadn't won Reno since 1975 so 1988 was huge.

[John H]

Pretty sure it was 1988, Lyle on Skyfire says the crew was working all night. It was a hairy mayday on Saturday, which was filled with maydays (including ground loops of David Price and Jimmy Leeward). Other than Texas 1990 Sat's heat race was one Tsunami's only wins too, 470 average speed, just thought for sure Steve sr was going to demolish everyone the next day, but the Adi failed during the Gold. I picked a great day to see my first ever Reno race (first airrace was Hamilton in May, 1988.)

[Leo]

As I remember it all bur a couple of them maydayed out. I have video of LARS heading into the dirt in front of us and remember swinging the camera to and fro trying to catch everything. They ran out of runways to put them on.

[CWTECH]

Rare Bear is one high maintenance bird. I couldn't help notice September Fury parked next to the bear sound asleep as the entire crew worked on #77 Saturday night. Funny where they placed in the race! You have to wonder how long this effort is going to last. What's the definition of insanity? They replaced the sensor and it looks although not confirmed, they did not solve the over heating problem. Could it have been a bad head gasket? Do you do a leak down test on every cylinder? Do other teams lend their brain power? The Bear unable to reach max. power for the last several years is getting old.

Head gasket????????????? Nooooooo.

[CWTECH]

Hahaha, imagine having to change 18 headgaskets Thanks, I'll pass. In some respects, air cooled radials are much more simple, but with lots more moving parts. I'm not sure if there is a gasket/seal between each cylinder and the case or not. To solve the cylinder head temp issues on an air cooled motor there aren't a lot of options, more air flow at the cost of frontal drag (smaller spinner) a spray bar that blows water backward over the motor (It might already have this, I'm not sure) or perhaps running a richer mixture with a possible loss of some power. There might be others, but they all have trade offs.

Will

Not a air cooled electric (motor) either............ Aircooled engine, yes!

[CWTECH]

The engineer in me would sincerely love to know exactly why they were (apparently- do we REALLY know?) having high cylinder head temps this year when (again- apparently) the cowl cooling air flow hasn't changed radically since the boil-off oil cooling was added.

I know that unless I went and worked for Mr. Lewis, I'll probably never get to know those specifics.

As for speculation from the outside, I think too much of it is just going to be talking out of wrong body orifices since we don't have direct access to the facts. We can guess all we want, but the team has smart guys with direct access to the hardware who can figure out what happened and why. For WHATEVER reason we may or may not know, the bird was limited in power this year and it was pretty obvious. But that's about as specific as it gets from "out here."

You know there IS such a thing as a long run of bad luck... which all the smarts, money, and skill in the world and a pilot with cojones of spent uranium can't change.

The Strega team REALLY have brought an "A" game the last 3 years that IMO hasn't been seen since the Dago Red / Kerch years. Did you hear Steven talking about what they do after every race? Pull the cam racks, re-torque the head nuts, and completely re-adjust the valve train in addition to screens and plugs and all the routine stuff? I mean... wow. Don't call the Bear a "high maintenance beast" compared to that! Compared to Dreadnought where they check the screens and change the plugs- yeah. But Strega is a high-maintenance beast in the extreme, definitely comparable to the Bear. The difference is that, through a combination of preparedness, not NEEDING to use the whole wick to win, (and yes... good luck the last few years), they won again and did it with style. But in the back of my mind I can't help but think that one electrical glitch taking out the ADI, one snapped valve finger, one backfire, and Strega could have been on the ground early too. Tiger has been there and done that quite a few times in the past, lest we forget. There's a LOT that can go wrong in any of these machines, even the "stockers!"

Very nice! Some realism.....................

[Leo]

Strega has paid it's dues over the years. The joke used to be that the reason 14-32 was in such good condition was that Tiger oiled it good every year...