[Skypalace]

Thanks, sorry for the length, I get carried away sometimes :-)

Re engine hours, I had a factory Porsche Motorsports rebuild on my 996 Cup with ~125 hours on it, had 3% max leakdown. Didn't think I needed it, but I was getting nervous about potential damage if something let go. PMNA said they'd never seen a cleaner high-miles engine, and told me that whatever I was doing, keep doing it.

My tips for long happy life of a Cup engine - always fully warm it up before high load or revs (hard on lots of things to not have both oil film, and various metal parts at operating temp and thus appropriate dimensions (expansion/contraction of various metals differ, the car is designed to run at temp, not cold)). Cool it down at the end of a session. Change fluids regularly, and don't scrimshank on the fluids (I use full synthetic only for all fluids etc.).

And #1: Don't miss shifts. I've had zero overrevs on that motor, in 7 years. I missed an upshift in an RSR from 4th to 5th at Daytona once (luckily into neutral and not into 3rd where it could overrev) because of the banking/loading, and the team mechanic suggested turning my wrist on upshifts so that my thumb is down, and pushing outwards to keep outward pressure on the shift knob. It feels strange at first, but I've been doing it always since then, and it prevents missed upshifts (and I use it from 6th into 5th also to prevent an accidential downshift into 3rd).

For other downshifts, I'm slow and deliberate, and 100% sure I'm in the right gear before releasing the clutch. Since I'm braking on the downshifts anyways, there' no need to rush horribly. If you want engine braking, just do the shift earlier, but release the clutch when you'll be at the appropriate rpm in the lower gear(after your blip of course).

I'm also very careful on upshifts to ensure the right gear is selected, with modified hand and slight rightward pressure preventing any leftward motion, the worst case from 2nd to 3rd is that you catch 5th instead (hurts your time but not your gearbox). It's 3rd to 4th that you need to be very careful to not get 2nd, esp. on a banked track, but again using the modified hand motion, worst case is the occasional 3rd to 6th until you've got it fully sorted.

I've missed more shifts with the sequential in my 997 Cup in my first session (I found you really need to be forceful on the downshifts, or it occasionally pops back into the previous gear) than I ever did in the 996.