Go on down there and race, don't change gears until you get there. We raced there many times back in the 60's with the big old 12" recaps and ran like a 14/27 what we called a 1 under gear.
The longer you race the easier the gear thing gets, and all those other little go fast things.
Best I can remember the people down there are super nice, they arranged tours of all the space stuff and we just had a ball.
Go race and have fun, find somebody who is really hooked up and ask them some questions, more than 1/2 of them will tell you right, those that are really fast don't see this as secret info.
Honest Dad himself

