SCCA Runoffs, Laguna Seca
#1
10-13-2014, 08:02 PM
SCCA Runoffs, Laguna Seca
People may not be aware of the SCCA's Runoffs. These are the SCCA's national championships for the road racing division. They've usually been held at some awful place like Mid-Ohio, but this year they were held at Laguna Seca, this past weekend. That's pretty close to us, so we went down to watch the action.
There were 8 races a day to decide champions in around 27 classes (some classes were doubled up so ran in the same race as a different class). There were a few MINIs and Minis running, so we made a point of seeing those classes. We also knew some of the competitors so we made a point of seeing those races as well.
It was an amusing weekend, but 24 races in three days is a lot of action to take in. At the end of it I was thinking "another formula class, yawn". The formula classes, open wheel cars to made to some formula, are the purest form of racing cars, but I prefer the ones which are more like cars you might drive. Of cars which are recognizable, there are "Touring" (and "Super Touring" it seems), "Production" (which I think "they were production cars once") and "GT". GT Cars may just look like a car, and may never have been a real car. There are also "Prototype" cars which are closed wheel cars which are purpose designed as racing cars.
I'll post some impressions and photos.
Next year the Runoffs are going to be at Daytona. That also might be an amusing place to visit. They're happening on the weekend of the 27th September.
There were 8 races a day to decide champions in around 27 classes (some classes were doubled up so ran in the same race as a different class). There were a few MINIs and Minis running, so we made a point of seeing those classes. We also knew some of the competitors so we made a point of seeing those races as well.
It was an amusing weekend, but 24 races in three days is a lot of action to take in. At the end of it I was thinking "another formula class, yawn". The formula classes, open wheel cars to made to some formula, are the purest form of racing cars, but I prefer the ones which are more like cars you might drive. Of cars which are recognizable, there are "Touring" (and "Super Touring" it seems), "Production" (which I think "they were production cars once") and "GT". GT Cars may just look like a car, and may never have been a real car. There are also "Prototype" cars which are closed wheel cars which are purpose designed as racing cars.
I'll post some impressions and photos.
Next year the Runoffs are going to be at Daytona. That also might be an amusing place to visit. They're happening on the weekend of the 27th September.
#2
10-13-2014, 08:44 PM
Day 1, Friday.
The first race was T1, Touring 1, T1 is the fastest Touring cars. There were several Corvettes, some Mustangs, a couple of Vipers, an M3 and surprisingly an NSX. Things got off to a bad start when one of the cars crashed into the wall before it even got to the green flag. We saw it carry on up the track leaving a cloud of smoke, then it and two others came off at turn 2 (we saw that on the TV monitors).
We later talked to the driver, he said he made a move up the inside, only to find the car not leaving him any room. The natural line at this point gets close to the wall, so if you're sneaking up the inside, this is a distinct possibility. Even if the car beside you tries to leave room, the car beside him probably doesn't know the extra car is there and only leaves room for one car.
The next race was GT-Lite, lower end GT cars. These look like road cars, but are really tube frame racing cars just with a skin which looks like the road car. The attraction here was three classic Minis were running. One of them even got the pole. However at the end of the pace lap just as the track was going green, he seemed to be a bit far ahead of the field, and then suddenly dropped back and got swamped by three other cars. I was wondering if he'd let up a bit so as not to be too far ahead, which seemed like a bad idea. He quickly made up two of the positions he'd lost, and then had a long battle to regain the lead, which he eventually did. The other two Minis had mixed fortune, they made a few passes, but seemed to lose the positions when they were out of sight. The yellow one seemed to develop a problem on lap 17 (of 20) and droped to the back of the field.
Here's the interior of the black Mini, you can see that the driver is sitting in the back seat.
The next race was Formula Ford (mid range open wheel cars), but we decided to go look around the paddock, so we didn't see the race. We did talk to several drivers in other classes and located the people we knew who were competing. That's one of the good things about the SCCA events, the drivers don't mind if you just walk up to them and have a chat, some of them are quite chatty. We got some interesting insights into what happened, like the guy who hit the wall.
The last race before lunch was Spec Miata, which is Mazda Miatas all almost identically prepared, so its the drivers skill which makes the difference. This is the largest entry of any class, they had 45 cars, so the track is crowded. The cars have about the lowest power-weight ratio of any cars competing (I worked out only slightly more than a MINI Cooper), so they like to keep their speed up as it takes them a while to regain any lost speed. They also have a reputation for being totally mental drivers. They lived up to their reputation, cars would go off, but just carry on driving, amid a cloud of dust.
There was one incident right in front of us, unfortunately I was looking at other action up the front straight, two of the cars did something and went off at turn 11. One started heading for the wall on the inside, dragging on big piles of gravel as it came back on track. It managed to not hit the wall and carried on, leaving the pile of gravel behind him. The other went the other way further into the gravel trap, we though it was going to get beached, which might bring out the safety car, but he just managed to keep it going turned 360 degrees and got back on track, leaving even more gravel behind him. We were surprised that this didn't bring out the "surface" flag (the yellow and red striped one to warn of stuff on the track). However the cars didn't seem phased by the gravel when they came back around.
On that next lap there were several of the cars which locked up coming into turn 11, i.e. right in front of us. One of them managed to punt another car of the track and he continued his merry way leaving the other car in the gravel (not stuck luckily). Another time three were coming up to turn 11, the one at the back bumped into the one in the middle. This seemed to propel both of the cars forward so they both passed the lead car. It looked really weird. Turn 11 was a good place to be, its one of the prime overtaking spots, being the slowest turn on the track, and approached at high speed. As the cars were so evenly matched, the driver's maneuvering has to make the difference and you can see the different lines the cars taking making the difference. (Like this one, the yellow car tried too hard to keep ahead and goes off so the red car sails on past.)
The racing went all the way to the checkered flag, I'm sure I saw 4 changes of position up the straight after the last corner. After the race it seems there was some controversy, the top six drivers were protested over engine preparation. It seems there's a grey area in the rules and some rules are contradictory. The stewards ruled that the cars were in violation, so demoted them to the back of the finishers.
In the afternoon the first race was F Production. I'm sure I saw the same pair of cars overtaking each other almost every lap. Eventually one of them managed to make it stick and pulled away. The leader pulled out quite a big lead (20 sec or so), then with 6 laps to go he started smoking. It was reported to smell like gear oil. He managed to keep going to the end at reduced speed, but not slow enough that he was caught. The real battle of the race was behind him, we watched the pair of cars go at it lap after lap, it was very entertaining. Eventually the guy in second locked up going into the corkscrew, which let the other one take the position with a pass on the inside of the corkscrew, a very brave pass that.
After that was American Sedan, which is just what it sounds like, big V8 cars. We went off to look around the paddock and get a bite to eat. We caught up with our friend Dave who's competing in the P2 race tomorrow. He said the car was going great, it was his driving which needed the improvement. He's only qualified 6th, but hopes he can make that up in the race. I was told that the AS race we missed was actually quite thrilling.
Next was P1 (P as in "prototype"). P1 is the fastest, in fact it may be the fastest class of all, even faster than the formula cars. The P1 field was quite small, twelve cars and once they sorted themselves out they were widely spaced, so not a lot happened. There was a crunchy somewhere else on course which brought out the safety car, at the restart one car managed to spin out in front of us. As is typical, I wasn't looking in that direction, I just saw the aftermath (as below). Also during the race, a car died on the front straight, I didn't see that, but for a few laps they had out yellow flags while they got a tow vehicle out there.
The last race of the day had Super Touring-Under (STU) and Touring 3(T3). STU had been promising a 2003 Cooper-S, but it never showed up, I don't know what happened there. There was a crash on lap 1, which immediatly brought out the safety car for several laps, not a good start. All through the STU race there was an S2000 chasing a Golf GTI (as below), they were at it for just about all of the 20 laps. The S2000, just after the final corner made a lunge to pass the GTI, but something went wrong and it spun. Unfortunatly I was looking else where so I missed that, what I did see was the STU Chevy Cobalt which was immediately behind it crash into its front wheel. The S2000 was left in pieces on the front straight, while the Cobalt when on to take 4th place, the GTI took third.
The T3 race was also pretty entertaining, with a Mustang continually battling a 370Z.
All in all, it was a very entertaining day.
The first race was T1, Touring 1, T1 is the fastest Touring cars. There were several Corvettes, some Mustangs, a couple of Vipers, an M3 and surprisingly an NSX. Things got off to a bad start when one of the cars crashed into the wall before it even got to the green flag. We saw it carry on up the track leaving a cloud of smoke, then it and two others came off at turn 2 (we saw that on the TV monitors).
We later talked to the driver, he said he made a move up the inside, only to find the car not leaving him any room. The natural line at this point gets close to the wall, so if you're sneaking up the inside, this is a distinct possibility. Even if the car beside you tries to leave room, the car beside him probably doesn't know the extra car is there and only leaves room for one car.
The next race was GT-Lite, lower end GT cars. These look like road cars, but are really tube frame racing cars just with a skin which looks like the road car. The attraction here was three classic Minis were running. One of them even got the pole. However at the end of the pace lap just as the track was going green, he seemed to be a bit far ahead of the field, and then suddenly dropped back and got swamped by three other cars. I was wondering if he'd let up a bit so as not to be too far ahead, which seemed like a bad idea. He quickly made up two of the positions he'd lost, and then had a long battle to regain the lead, which he eventually did. The other two Minis had mixed fortune, they made a few passes, but seemed to lose the positions when they were out of sight. The yellow one seemed to develop a problem on lap 17 (of 20) and droped to the back of the field.
Here's the interior of the black Mini, you can see that the driver is sitting in the back seat.
The next race was Formula Ford (mid range open wheel cars), but we decided to go look around the paddock, so we didn't see the race. We did talk to several drivers in other classes and located the people we knew who were competing. That's one of the good things about the SCCA events, the drivers don't mind if you just walk up to them and have a chat, some of them are quite chatty. We got some interesting insights into what happened, like the guy who hit the wall.
The last race before lunch was Spec Miata, which is Mazda Miatas all almost identically prepared, so its the drivers skill which makes the difference. This is the largest entry of any class, they had 45 cars, so the track is crowded. The cars have about the lowest power-weight ratio of any cars competing (I worked out only slightly more than a MINI Cooper), so they like to keep their speed up as it takes them a while to regain any lost speed. They also have a reputation for being totally mental drivers. They lived up to their reputation, cars would go off, but just carry on driving, amid a cloud of dust.
There was one incident right in front of us, unfortunately I was looking at other action up the front straight, two of the cars did something and went off at turn 11. One started heading for the wall on the inside, dragging on big piles of gravel as it came back on track. It managed to not hit the wall and carried on, leaving the pile of gravel behind him. The other went the other way further into the gravel trap, we though it was going to get beached, which might bring out the safety car, but he just managed to keep it going turned 360 degrees and got back on track, leaving even more gravel behind him. We were surprised that this didn't bring out the "surface" flag (the yellow and red striped one to warn of stuff on the track). However the cars didn't seem phased by the gravel when they came back around.
On that next lap there were several of the cars which locked up coming into turn 11, i.e. right in front of us. One of them managed to punt another car of the track and he continued his merry way leaving the other car in the gravel (not stuck luckily). Another time three were coming up to turn 11, the one at the back bumped into the one in the middle. This seemed to propel both of the cars forward so they both passed the lead car. It looked really weird. Turn 11 was a good place to be, its one of the prime overtaking spots, being the slowest turn on the track, and approached at high speed. As the cars were so evenly matched, the driver's maneuvering has to make the difference and you can see the different lines the cars taking making the difference. (Like this one, the yellow car tried too hard to keep ahead and goes off so the red car sails on past.)
The racing went all the way to the checkered flag, I'm sure I saw 4 changes of position up the straight after the last corner. After the race it seems there was some controversy, the top six drivers were protested over engine preparation. It seems there's a grey area in the rules and some rules are contradictory. The stewards ruled that the cars were in violation, so demoted them to the back of the finishers.
In the afternoon the first race was F Production. I'm sure I saw the same pair of cars overtaking each other almost every lap. Eventually one of them managed to make it stick and pulled away. The leader pulled out quite a big lead (20 sec or so), then with 6 laps to go he started smoking. It was reported to smell like gear oil. He managed to keep going to the end at reduced speed, but not slow enough that he was caught. The real battle of the race was behind him, we watched the pair of cars go at it lap after lap, it was very entertaining. Eventually the guy in second locked up going into the corkscrew, which let the other one take the position with a pass on the inside of the corkscrew, a very brave pass that.
After that was American Sedan, which is just what it sounds like, big V8 cars. We went off to look around the paddock and get a bite to eat. We caught up with our friend Dave who's competing in the P2 race tomorrow. He said the car was going great, it was his driving which needed the improvement. He's only qualified 6th, but hopes he can make that up in the race. I was told that the AS race we missed was actually quite thrilling.
Next was P1 (P as in "prototype"). P1 is the fastest, in fact it may be the fastest class of all, even faster than the formula cars. The P1 field was quite small, twelve cars and once they sorted themselves out they were widely spaced, so not a lot happened. There was a crunchy somewhere else on course which brought out the safety car, at the restart one car managed to spin out in front of us. As is typical, I wasn't looking in that direction, I just saw the aftermath (as below). Also during the race, a car died on the front straight, I didn't see that, but for a few laps they had out yellow flags while they got a tow vehicle out there.
The last race of the day had Super Touring-Under (STU) and Touring 3(T3). STU had been promising a 2003 Cooper-S, but it never showed up, I don't know what happened there. There was a crash on lap 1, which immediatly brought out the safety car for several laps, not a good start. All through the STU race there was an S2000 chasing a Golf GTI (as below), they were at it for just about all of the 20 laps. The S2000, just after the final corner made a lunge to pass the GTI, but something went wrong and it spun. Unfortunatly I was looking else where so I missed that, what I did see was the STU Chevy Cobalt which was immediately behind it crash into its front wheel. The S2000 was left in pieces on the front straight, while the Cobalt when on to take 4th place, the GTI took third.
The T3 race was also pretty entertaining, with a Mustang continually battling a 370Z.
All in all, it was a very entertaining day.
#3
10-13-2014, 09:04 PM
Day 2, Saturday.
It started off foggy, or rather didn't start. There was about 100 minute delay. This was the view of the front straight at the time things were supposed to start:
Finally, the Super Touring - Lite cars took the track. There were a lot of Miatas and RX-7 with the odd Civic Celica and Integra. On the TV you could see the fog was still lingering on the run up to 7, the top of the hill. The fun started sooner than usual, it didn't even make it to turn 2, it looked like one of the cars hit the wall before the flag, and then parked nose into the wall on the inside. I don't know how it managed that. That brought out a yellow for a few laps. About then the sky cleared.
On Lap 9 a CRX looked like it had brake trouble coming up to turn 11, it went straight off the end and got beached. That brought out a local yellow, they didn't look like they were going to recover the car, just leave it there, which seemed like a bad idea. I expected this was going to mean there was no more overtaking for the rest of the race at turn 11, but the yellow was withdrawn after three laps. Near the end of the race, the leader started smoking, it smelled like oil. You can see the smoke in the picture below. We wondered if it would make it to the end of the race, but it did manage it.
The second race was the one we were looking forward to. Our friend Dave was racing in P2. He'd qualified a somewhat disappointing 6th, but that was mainly because his best lap had been compromised by traffic. He was hoping for better luck in the race. He got off to a good start holding back and then jumping the guy in front as they crossed the start line, he was now in 5th approaching turn 2. Like many races this weekend, it came unglued at turn 2 on lap 1. There was a bad crunch, the picture on the TV was bad enough we couldnt make out who crunched. It looked like the 6th place car ran into the disabled one and lost its wing, we feared that was Dave until he came round in 5th.
That brought out a safety car for a few laps. When the race restarted, the leader lost several positions and Dave was up to 4th. On TV we saw a car challenge for second place at turn 7 going into the Corkscrew, there were distinct flames coming out of the back of the car. I'm not sure if that was the same car that when it got around to turn 5 drove off the track and the driver jumped out of a flaming car, obviously in pain. The car flambé brought out another safety car. Dave was in third now.
On the restart the guy behind dave tried to sneak by, but he was having none of it. Then going into turn 2, one of the leaders tried too hard and ran wide, Dave sneaked by and was now in second. Dave was pushing the leader for several laps. At one point I'm sure I heard a squeal of brakes as the leader entered turn 11 (not something you usually hear), and Dave almost overtook. Then in several unrelated incidents, a car spun in front of us at turn 11. Another car expired running up the straight in front of us. This brought out another full course yellow, but the next time Dave came round he was in first, we missed what happened in all the excitement. Dave then pulled out a steady lead, eventually coming home 15.9s in the lead, with is best lap 2 s faster than his qualifying time, a new lap record. When the cars were coming back to the pits, one of the marshals obviously had a radio message, he laughed and then got his fire extinguisher ready. One car came into the pits, they waved it over and immediately started spraying he extinguisher at it, there was a big cloud of steam or smoke.
We then headed down to the podium to see the podium ceremony, Dave was a little late getting to that, being held up by other interviews etc. There was the usual things you expect, a short interview, the driver gets to thanks everyone (especially sponsors), then they wear half a dozen different caps to get publicity photos, tires, engine supplier, fuel supplier and probably some others. For some reason they then hae to take an official selfie and then they finally get around to the champaign spraying. After all that we congratulated him briefly as he was shepherded towards the media centre.
Next up was E Production, it looked a lot like yesterday's F Productions, but these cars are supposed to be the fastest "Production" cars. There was bunch of RX-7s, several Caterham 7s, and a smattering of others including a Jensen Healey. I wasn't paying too much attention to the race. Near the beginning a Caterham drove off into the gravel trap, then conveniently drove around the concrete barrier so it was no longer a hazard. Half a minute later, the workers directed him back onto the track and he rejoined the race.
I did notice there was one pair of Caterhams, one blue with a yellow roll bar, one red with a white roll bar. They seemed very evenly matched and they followed each other around lap after lap. I'm not sure if they were swapping position or not, I wasn't paying that much attention. Once I started paying attention, the red one was in the lead until one lap when the blue one lead, then the next lap the blue one ran wide at turn 11 and the red one got the position back. At the very end, the Jensen made a very loud backfire (it had had a habit of backfiring) and it darted to smoke.
Next up was GT2. A guy on a Porsche forum I'm on was running a 928 in this one, so I looked out for him. He dropped out after a couple of laps, I don't yet know what happened to him. The rest of the class was mainly Corvettes and Porsche GT3's, a Corvette and a GT3 were battling it out all through the race, the GT3 was harrying the Corvette sticking to his bumper. On the very last corner, right in front of is, he finally managed to pull of the pass and win the race.
To catch up on time, they skipped lunch and went straight to the first race of the after noon, making it only 20mins late now. The first afternoon race was Formula Enterprises and Formula Mazda. These are two formula classes, Enterprises is promoted by the SCCA itself (SCCA Enterpises) with a 2.3l Mazda engine making 170hp, intended to be a low cost formula. The Formula Mazda is powered by a Mazda rotary engine like the on from the RX-8, making 250hp. FE was the first group and the lead guy immediately ran wide at turn 2 and lost the position, but at least the class made it through, FM couldn't manage to emulate that, and there was some familiar carnage at turn 2. There wasn't much which happened in the race until lap 15, when recovery truck was dispatched to deal with an incident. I should have been more ready on the restart as there were some passes made the next time through turn 11, but I didn't have the camera ready. All in all, I didn't keep track of what was going on, the two different classes made it difficult to keep up, and the turkey for lunch was making me sleepy.
I did notice that some of the FM cars were black flagged due to sound violations. I'd noticed in several races that some of the cars had tail pipes that looked designed to beat Laguna's notorious sound meters. I was expecting the weekend was unlimited sound so I was surprised by this. I looked it up, and the weekend was actually running under the 103db limit that the SCCA's rules apply generally.
GT3 was next, this was less powerful GT cars more RX7 and 240SX, with a few others. It started off at 5 mins to go with call for Larry Hensen #99 to get to grid immediately, he never did turn up and was eventually listed as did not start. I've no idea what the story is there. This one started off almost immediately with a sound violation, this time the commentators commented on it when we could here it. There's a steady commentary for all the races, and they're televised, but if the cars are going by at that point you just can't hear it. There seemed to be a lot of cars coming into the pits, I assumed for sound violations, though after one of them the marshal was laying down speed dry on a trail of oil, so I'm guessing he was called in for spilling oil on the track. This one had a 240sx and a 350z which ran away from the rest of the pack, the 350z never quite managing to catch the 240sx.
I noticed something weird about the 350z, its fornt wheels looked like the driver was correcting oversteer, but the body never betrayed any upset, it may have been a trick of the light, the sun was now shining directly down the front straight, or may have just been the way this guy drove. Just before the end another 240sx expired exiting turn 11 and the driver parked it along the pit wall on the straight, bringing out a yellow. He did manage to get the car restarted and drive off so didn't effect the race much.
Next up was Formula Continental, a mid range formula. I went off to find Dave, he told me the bad news that he was being protested. The guy he overtook for the lead protested him for passing under yellow, he did come round in the lead just as a full course yellow was out because of some antics right in front of us at turn 11, however Dave's pass was into the corkscrew the other end of the course, but it was a full course yellow. Dave didn't see the flag, but though the pass was suspiciously easy, the other guy's high def video clearly shows the flag, Dave's lower def video does show the flag if you squint, which was just about Dave's view. So basically Dave has admitted to the offense, it wasn't deliberate now the stewards have to asses a penalty. Dave helpfully suggested a 15 second penalty, as his margin of victory was 15.9s. The way Dave was driving, if he hadn't passed there he was going to pass somewhere, he had over 10 laps to do it and was clearly faster than the other guy (by a second a lap or more). The stewards eventually decided to demote Dave one position, they also did the same for the second place guy, so the protestor who came in third was promoted to winner.
I also wondered over to turn 3-turn 4 area and got a few pictures of the FC cars going by. One angle was at the turn 3 apex with the cars coming dirtily towards me, you could see the tires really were skinny as the commentators had mentioned. Though not as skinny as the formula V cars we'd seen around the paddock.
The final race was another one we were looking out for, we knew two of the drivers concerned. David Ray is the guy who founded Hooked on Driving, our preferred track day organisation, we see him around at most of the events, so we're pretty familiar with him and we recognise each other to talk to. There was also Nicole who I knew from the Autoclub at my previous job, the first time I met her I over took her at a track day at Laguna. Since then she'd been vying for the most track days attended by an auto club member and then took up racing. Both were driving Mustangs, they were also "Spec Mustang" a series that runs out here on the West coast. The idea of a "spec" series is to give the competitors identical cars, so the driver is what matters. The cars would otherwise run in T2, and sometimes Nicole would run both Spec Mustang (SMG) and T2 on a weekend for extra practice. Both Mustangs were prepared by the same people, Borelli Motorsports, and both were Black.
David had qualified only 12th, but was hoping for better things in the race, he'd had several lap records locally, but some of the out of towners were ahead by 6 seconds. Nicole had qualified last. As the race started there was the now Familiar turn 2 Carnage, one car looking like David's (difficult to tell on the TV), didn't hit anything, but got caught behind several stopped cars, so had to wait until all the rest of the field went by before he could safely reverse and get out of the bind. Sure enough when the safety car came around, David was dead last, of about 16 cars now. After the restart he worked his way through the field, every time I looked at the live timing he seemed to have gained another position. He quickly got up to 9th. Now things got a little more difficult, one car passed the 7th placed car in front of him, then it took him a few laps to pass that one for 8th. By that time the car in front was 5 seconds ahead of him, and then David couldn't make up any more ground. He finished 8th. Nicole did manage to overtake one car and finished second last of the runners.
It started off foggy, or rather didn't start. There was about 100 minute delay. This was the view of the front straight at the time things were supposed to start:
Finally, the Super Touring - Lite cars took the track. There were a lot of Miatas and RX-7 with the odd Civic Celica and Integra. On the TV you could see the fog was still lingering on the run up to 7, the top of the hill. The fun started sooner than usual, it didn't even make it to turn 2, it looked like one of the cars hit the wall before the flag, and then parked nose into the wall on the inside. I don't know how it managed that. That brought out a yellow for a few laps. About then the sky cleared.
On Lap 9 a CRX looked like it had brake trouble coming up to turn 11, it went straight off the end and got beached. That brought out a local yellow, they didn't look like they were going to recover the car, just leave it there, which seemed like a bad idea. I expected this was going to mean there was no more overtaking for the rest of the race at turn 11, but the yellow was withdrawn after three laps. Near the end of the race, the leader started smoking, it smelled like oil. You can see the smoke in the picture below. We wondered if it would make it to the end of the race, but it did manage it.
The second race was the one we were looking forward to. Our friend Dave was racing in P2. He'd qualified a somewhat disappointing 6th, but that was mainly because his best lap had been compromised by traffic. He was hoping for better luck in the race. He got off to a good start holding back and then jumping the guy in front as they crossed the start line, he was now in 5th approaching turn 2. Like many races this weekend, it came unglued at turn 2 on lap 1. There was a bad crunch, the picture on the TV was bad enough we couldnt make out who crunched. It looked like the 6th place car ran into the disabled one and lost its wing, we feared that was Dave until he came round in 5th.
That brought out a safety car for a few laps. When the race restarted, the leader lost several positions and Dave was up to 4th. On TV we saw a car challenge for second place at turn 7 going into the Corkscrew, there were distinct flames coming out of the back of the car. I'm not sure if that was the same car that when it got around to turn 5 drove off the track and the driver jumped out of a flaming car, obviously in pain. The car flambé brought out another safety car. Dave was in third now.
On the restart the guy behind dave tried to sneak by, but he was having none of it. Then going into turn 2, one of the leaders tried too hard and ran wide, Dave sneaked by and was now in second. Dave was pushing the leader for several laps. At one point I'm sure I heard a squeal of brakes as the leader entered turn 11 (not something you usually hear), and Dave almost overtook. Then in several unrelated incidents, a car spun in front of us at turn 11. Another car expired running up the straight in front of us. This brought out another full course yellow, but the next time Dave came round he was in first, we missed what happened in all the excitement. Dave then pulled out a steady lead, eventually coming home 15.9s in the lead, with is best lap 2 s faster than his qualifying time, a new lap record. When the cars were coming back to the pits, one of the marshals obviously had a radio message, he laughed and then got his fire extinguisher ready. One car came into the pits, they waved it over and immediately started spraying he extinguisher at it, there was a big cloud of steam or smoke.
We then headed down to the podium to see the podium ceremony, Dave was a little late getting to that, being held up by other interviews etc. There was the usual things you expect, a short interview, the driver gets to thanks everyone (especially sponsors), then they wear half a dozen different caps to get publicity photos, tires, engine supplier, fuel supplier and probably some others. For some reason they then hae to take an official selfie and then they finally get around to the champaign spraying. After all that we congratulated him briefly as he was shepherded towards the media centre.
Next up was E Production, it looked a lot like yesterday's F Productions, but these cars are supposed to be the fastest "Production" cars. There was bunch of RX-7s, several Caterham 7s, and a smattering of others including a Jensen Healey. I wasn't paying too much attention to the race. Near the beginning a Caterham drove off into the gravel trap, then conveniently drove around the concrete barrier so it was no longer a hazard. Half a minute later, the workers directed him back onto the track and he rejoined the race.
I did notice there was one pair of Caterhams, one blue with a yellow roll bar, one red with a white roll bar. They seemed very evenly matched and they followed each other around lap after lap. I'm not sure if they were swapping position or not, I wasn't paying that much attention. Once I started paying attention, the red one was in the lead until one lap when the blue one lead, then the next lap the blue one ran wide at turn 11 and the red one got the position back. At the very end, the Jensen made a very loud backfire (it had had a habit of backfiring) and it darted to smoke.
Next up was GT2. A guy on a Porsche forum I'm on was running a 928 in this one, so I looked out for him. He dropped out after a couple of laps, I don't yet know what happened to him. The rest of the class was mainly Corvettes and Porsche GT3's, a Corvette and a GT3 were battling it out all through the race, the GT3 was harrying the Corvette sticking to his bumper. On the very last corner, right in front of is, he finally managed to pull of the pass and win the race.
To catch up on time, they skipped lunch and went straight to the first race of the after noon, making it only 20mins late now. The first afternoon race was Formula Enterprises and Formula Mazda. These are two formula classes, Enterprises is promoted by the SCCA itself (SCCA Enterpises) with a 2.3l Mazda engine making 170hp, intended to be a low cost formula. The Formula Mazda is powered by a Mazda rotary engine like the on from the RX-8, making 250hp. FE was the first group and the lead guy immediately ran wide at turn 2 and lost the position, but at least the class made it through, FM couldn't manage to emulate that, and there was some familiar carnage at turn 2. There wasn't much which happened in the race until lap 15, when recovery truck was dispatched to deal with an incident. I should have been more ready on the restart as there were some passes made the next time through turn 11, but I didn't have the camera ready. All in all, I didn't keep track of what was going on, the two different classes made it difficult to keep up, and the turkey for lunch was making me sleepy.
I did notice that some of the FM cars were black flagged due to sound violations. I'd noticed in several races that some of the cars had tail pipes that looked designed to beat Laguna's notorious sound meters. I was expecting the weekend was unlimited sound so I was surprised by this. I looked it up, and the weekend was actually running under the 103db limit that the SCCA's rules apply generally.
GT3 was next, this was less powerful GT cars more RX7 and 240SX, with a few others. It started off at 5 mins to go with call for Larry Hensen #99 to get to grid immediately, he never did turn up and was eventually listed as did not start. I've no idea what the story is there. This one started off almost immediately with a sound violation, this time the commentators commented on it when we could here it. There's a steady commentary for all the races, and they're televised, but if the cars are going by at that point you just can't hear it. There seemed to be a lot of cars coming into the pits, I assumed for sound violations, though after one of them the marshal was laying down speed dry on a trail of oil, so I'm guessing he was called in for spilling oil on the track. This one had a 240sx and a 350z which ran away from the rest of the pack, the 350z never quite managing to catch the 240sx.
I noticed something weird about the 350z, its fornt wheels looked like the driver was correcting oversteer, but the body never betrayed any upset, it may have been a trick of the light, the sun was now shining directly down the front straight, or may have just been the way this guy drove. Just before the end another 240sx expired exiting turn 11 and the driver parked it along the pit wall on the straight, bringing out a yellow. He did manage to get the car restarted and drive off so didn't effect the race much.
Next up was Formula Continental, a mid range formula. I went off to find Dave, he told me the bad news that he was being protested. The guy he overtook for the lead protested him for passing under yellow, he did come round in the lead just as a full course yellow was out because of some antics right in front of us at turn 11, however Dave's pass was into the corkscrew the other end of the course, but it was a full course yellow. Dave didn't see the flag, but though the pass was suspiciously easy, the other guy's high def video clearly shows the flag, Dave's lower def video does show the flag if you squint, which was just about Dave's view. So basically Dave has admitted to the offense, it wasn't deliberate now the stewards have to asses a penalty. Dave helpfully suggested a 15 second penalty, as his margin of victory was 15.9s. The way Dave was driving, if he hadn't passed there he was going to pass somewhere, he had over 10 laps to do it and was clearly faster than the other guy (by a second a lap or more). The stewards eventually decided to demote Dave one position, they also did the same for the second place guy, so the protestor who came in third was promoted to winner.
I also wondered over to turn 3-turn 4 area and got a few pictures of the FC cars going by. One angle was at the turn 3 apex with the cars coming dirtily towards me, you could see the tires really were skinny as the commentators had mentioned. Though not as skinny as the formula V cars we'd seen around the paddock.
The final race was another one we were looking out for, we knew two of the drivers concerned. David Ray is the guy who founded Hooked on Driving, our preferred track day organisation, we see him around at most of the events, so we're pretty familiar with him and we recognise each other to talk to. There was also Nicole who I knew from the Autoclub at my previous job, the first time I met her I over took her at a track day at Laguna. Since then she'd been vying for the most track days attended by an auto club member and then took up racing. Both were driving Mustangs, they were also "Spec Mustang" a series that runs out here on the West coast. The idea of a "spec" series is to give the competitors identical cars, so the driver is what matters. The cars would otherwise run in T2, and sometimes Nicole would run both Spec Mustang (SMG) and T2 on a weekend for extra practice. Both Mustangs were prepared by the same people, Borelli Motorsports, and both were Black.
David had qualified only 12th, but was hoping for better things in the race, he'd had several lap records locally, but some of the out of towners were ahead by 6 seconds. Nicole had qualified last. As the race started there was the now Familiar turn 2 Carnage, one car looking like David's (difficult to tell on the TV), didn't hit anything, but got caught behind several stopped cars, so had to wait until all the rest of the field went by before he could safely reverse and get out of the bind. Sure enough when the safety car came around, David was dead last, of about 16 cars now. After the restart he worked his way through the field, every time I looked at the live timing he seemed to have gained another position. He quickly got up to 9th. Now things got a little more difficult, one car passed the 7th placed car in front of him, then it took him a few laps to pass that one for 8th. By that time the car in front was 5 seconds ahead of him, and then David couldn't make up any more ground. He finished 8th. Nicole did manage to overtake one car and finished second last of the runners.
#4
10-13-2014, 09:32 PM
Day 3, Sunday.
There was no weather delay and first up was B-Spec and Touring-4. These are the cars that most people might recognise as normal cars. B-Spec is the slowest and cheapest, MINI Coopers run here (two of them in this race, one had qualified third), along with Kia Rio, Honda FIt and Mazda 2. This year they also had Nissan Versa, Toyota Yaris and Chevy Sonic. All eligible cars were represented. I like B-Spec a lot as a class, this was one of my must see races. The Chevy in the field had actually got the pole, with a time about 2s ahead of everyone else and about 2s faster than I thought possible. I was quite impressed. T4 had several Civic, a few MX-5, RX-8, a couple of Mustangs, as well as an Acura RSX and a Chevy Cobalt. One of the MX-5 was driven by a guy from work. He'd sent a note to a mailing list saying he was driving, we'd looked for him in the paddock, but hadn't found him.
As the B-Spec cars were lining up behind T4, behind the pace car, one of them managed to slide sideways up the front straight. One of the marshals called after them "we haven't even started yet". For once the entire field made it through turn 2, and around the lap. By lap 2 the field was pretty much spread out. Then the Yaris came off at turn 10 and got stuck. This brought out the pace car and the recovery trucks. As I was watching the recovery, there as race control guy watching the action who radioed to the corner workers to signal debris at turn 11. As the race was just about to go green the leader, the Chevy, came into the pits, and stayed there for nearly a lap, getting out just ahead of the lead B-Spec cars. It looked like his race was done, which was a pity as he was turning the fastest laps. After the restart a Miata bumped an RX-8 the first time through turn 11.
Then there was an off over at turn 4, this brought out the safety car, I thought this might give the Sonic a chance to catch up, but the sonic caught the T4 cars trailing the safety car and the main pack of B-Spec cars almost caught up with the T4 pack, so it looked like he wouldn't get the chance. Just in front of the Sonic was were two Mustangs, he managed to over take one of them and then set off in pursuit of the other. He never did catch the other Mustang, but it didn't managed to pull away any. At the front of B-Spec the Black MINI was battling with the Kia Rio. For one lap the MINI managed to pull ahead, but the Rio took the position back, the MINI pressed it till the end but never managed to pass. At the very end the Rio pulled away, and the Nissan Versa made a lunge to the line, but the MINI held on to second. Very late in the race, an MX-5 lost it on the front straight just in front of us, he backed into the wall. He managed to get restarted, only losing two positions. Looking at the photos, that was the guy from work.
Next up was formula Vee (FV), these are small, cheap formula cars constructed from a lot of components (engine, suspension and more) from a pre-1963 VW Beetle. Things didn't get off to a good start, one came off behind the pace car on the pace lap, so the recovery trucks went out and there was another pace lap. When the race actually started, the cars went three and four wide into turn 2, everyone was expecting carnage, there was some tire smoke and some dust kicked up from wheels off, but no crunchies. There was a cheer from the audience in the suite. Then at turn 5 one car got punted and another one ran into it, this took out the two leading cars, it also brought out the safety car again. When things got started again it ran to lap 7, and then the leader drove straight off the bottom of the corkscrew. I've never seen a car do that before. That car managed to rejoin the race in 5th, but then another car did the same thing and got stuck bringing out another safety car.
All through the race so far, #20 had been noticeably slower than the other cars and was lagging badly. I looked at the live scoring and saw his best lap was a 2:00, I could race him in Bertie, that was 13s behind the time of the front runners. I'm not sure if there's more of a story there, but the guy had come all the way from Florida to be 13s a lap slower. The crowd around me started cheering for the guy. The safety car allowed him to catch up to the back of the pack, but as soon as the race restarted, he fell behind again. He was now managing 1:56 laps, I'd need the Cooper-S to beat him. Sometime later he appeared in second to last position, we don't know what happened to the guy behind him, probably came off somewhere. We saw one of the cars bobble coming around turn 11 in front of us, so lost a position. On the last lap, one of the leaders managed to spin in front of us, losing several positions before getting going again. We cheered #20 when he came into the pits after the race.
The next race was GT-1. These are the fastest GT cars, and the same cars may have been seen at TransAm races. There was no turn 2 carnage, but the sole Jaguar in the field expired approaching Turn 2, so steered off down the pit exit to get out of the way of the rest of the field. He managed to park it out of harms way, so didn't affect the race. Some wag's comment was "Well, it was a Jag." There were several cars which were having sound trouble. One of the leaders was observed taking an unusual line exiting turn 5, it sounded like the way to be furthest from the sound meter. He was eventually disqualified because of the sound issues. One strange incident was one of the cars was seen carrying a cone in its wheel well. That's the sort of thing we're used to seeing in autocross, not road racing. He deposited the cone in the middle of the track just past start/finish. That brought out the surface flag for a few laps, everyone managed to miss the cone. Late in the race, the second place car was seen to spin at T4 and we could see flames coming from it. Finally the winner wiggled going up to the finish line and gave a loud backfire, a really loud boom. This was considered as a deliberate celebration.
Next up was formula 500 (F5), another small cheap formula, this time powered by small (under 500cc) two stroke engines, like those from a snowmobile. These ones sounded like the archetypal swarm of angry bees. It was an amusing race, and clean no safety cars. It was capped off with a pass for the win on the last corner right in front of us.
The afternoon started with Spec Racer Ford (SRF). This was also a race I was looking forward to. SRF is an entry level class of purpose designed cars like the Protoypes with a tube frame, a fiberglass body and a Ford Focus engine in the back. It should probably be called a "Protoype" class, all the other sports racers classes were rolled into P1 and P2 recently. Its one of the most popular class, and the entry was 44 cars, second only to Spec Miata. I'd almost got around to hiring an SRF for a track day to ry something different (but we got the JCW instead). The race seemed to start early, it was a few minutes before the scheduled race time and the grid was empty, I'd missed them going out for their pace lap. Then when the pace car came around it stayed out, I don't know why that was. When the race proper started, all the cars seemed to make it through turn 2 successfully, then half way to turn 3 the carnage happened, not sure how but several cars crunched and a rear wing was bouncing down the track with other assorted bodywork. This brought out the safety car again.
After the restart, I was watching for pass attempts at turn 11 again, its a good passing opportunity and after the field gets bunched up the time is ripe for passes. What was strange is that several passes were made, but the passed cars didn't seem to react. The classic pass is to dive bomb down the inside, leaving your braking late. This puts you off line going too fast, so it compromises your exit. The classic reaction to such a pass is to hold your line, make an even later apex than normal so you get a much better exit off turn 11 than the attempted passer, the passed car then blows by the passer down the front straight. These guy were getting passed, then not making a dent on the passer. This looked really weird, as I'd been seeing the pass and repass maneuver all weekend. My theory is that as SRF is such an entry level class there are a bunch of very inexperienced racers in the class. Though if they're so inexperienced, I don't know how they qualified for the runoffs.
As a result of the earlier crunchy, the #57 car was running around without the rear body work, the engine was exposed. I was wondering if this was an advantage or not, its lost the rear wing aero assistance, but its lost quite a bit of weight. Then the speculation was if it would make weight at the end of the race. If it managed to come near the front it would probably be protested. There was another safety car on Lap 9, I don't know what for.
The next race was "yet another formula race", this time it was Formula 1000 (for some reason listed as "FB"). These are fast formula cars with 1000cc motor cycle engines in the back. They turned out to be the second fastest class at Laguna, faster than the prototypes, they were turning 1:25 laps. The race was largely uneventful, no safety cars, not much overtaking, they sorted themselves out and ran in order. On lap 16 one of the cars expired on the front straight, but managed to get going again. The winner managed a 1:24 lap and for his victory celebration he ran really close to the wall up to the finish, this seemed to be for a photo op, he was close enough to the wall to kick up dust. The second place guy looked really unhappy as he came into the pits after the race.
Next we had another race I was looking forward to, H Production (HP), which are the slowest "Production" class cars. Its a curious mixture of older sports cars, and modern economy cars. There was a classic Mini, and several Autin-Healy Sprites, a Triumph Spitfire, a couple of MG Midgets and a Fiat X-1/9. There were also some Civics, a BMW 1600 a Golf GTI and a Toyota Yaris. It was an entertaining race with the Yaris battling one of the CRXs. The Yaris managed to pass on lap two, but the CRX managed to get the position back, then the Yaris harried it for the rest of the race, usually they were separated by less than a car length. Unfortunately the Mini disappeared on lap 6.
Finally we had yet another formula race. There really are a lot of formula classes, like 8, I think they could do with pruning them down a bit, like they did to the prototypes. They used to be several different classes like Sports-2000, Super-Sports-2000, D-Sports-Racer, C-Sports-Racer, and they all got squished into P1 and P2. maybe 4 formulas would do. This one was the fastest formula, Formula Atlantic, these have a 300hp 2.3l engine. The race started off clean, and was somewhat exciting for a few laps as the 6th place qualifier proved to be the fastest and rapidly worked his way up through the field. Something had gone wrong with his qualifying so he didn't set a representative time. After he took the lead on lap 7 the race was pretty unexciting, the cars had sorted themselves out and there was no passing. Until lap 14, when a pass was attempted at turn 11, while I was watching, there was rubber to rubber contact and one car skip into the gravel trap and the other also expired on the edge of the track. This bought out a safety car for three laps to clear up the mess and the leader lost the 13s lead he'd built up. Nothing much happened on the restart as everyone was already in the right order. The best lap was a 1:22.6, so this was the fastest class.
There was no weather delay and first up was B-Spec and Touring-4. These are the cars that most people might recognise as normal cars. B-Spec is the slowest and cheapest, MINI Coopers run here (two of them in this race, one had qualified third), along with Kia Rio, Honda FIt and Mazda 2. This year they also had Nissan Versa, Toyota Yaris and Chevy Sonic. All eligible cars were represented. I like B-Spec a lot as a class, this was one of my must see races. The Chevy in the field had actually got the pole, with a time about 2s ahead of everyone else and about 2s faster than I thought possible. I was quite impressed. T4 had several Civic, a few MX-5, RX-8, a couple of Mustangs, as well as an Acura RSX and a Chevy Cobalt. One of the MX-5 was driven by a guy from work. He'd sent a note to a mailing list saying he was driving, we'd looked for him in the paddock, but hadn't found him.
As the B-Spec cars were lining up behind T4, behind the pace car, one of them managed to slide sideways up the front straight. One of the marshals called after them "we haven't even started yet". For once the entire field made it through turn 2, and around the lap. By lap 2 the field was pretty much spread out. Then the Yaris came off at turn 10 and got stuck. This brought out the pace car and the recovery trucks. As I was watching the recovery, there as race control guy watching the action who radioed to the corner workers to signal debris at turn 11. As the race was just about to go green the leader, the Chevy, came into the pits, and stayed there for nearly a lap, getting out just ahead of the lead B-Spec cars. It looked like his race was done, which was a pity as he was turning the fastest laps. After the restart a Miata bumped an RX-8 the first time through turn 11.
Then there was an off over at turn 4, this brought out the safety car, I thought this might give the Sonic a chance to catch up, but the sonic caught the T4 cars trailing the safety car and the main pack of B-Spec cars almost caught up with the T4 pack, so it looked like he wouldn't get the chance. Just in front of the Sonic was were two Mustangs, he managed to over take one of them and then set off in pursuit of the other. He never did catch the other Mustang, but it didn't managed to pull away any. At the front of B-Spec the Black MINI was battling with the Kia Rio. For one lap the MINI managed to pull ahead, but the Rio took the position back, the MINI pressed it till the end but never managed to pass. At the very end the Rio pulled away, and the Nissan Versa made a lunge to the line, but the MINI held on to second. Very late in the race, an MX-5 lost it on the front straight just in front of us, he backed into the wall. He managed to get restarted, only losing two positions. Looking at the photos, that was the guy from work.
Next up was formula Vee (FV), these are small, cheap formula cars constructed from a lot of components (engine, suspension and more) from a pre-1963 VW Beetle. Things didn't get off to a good start, one came off behind the pace car on the pace lap, so the recovery trucks went out and there was another pace lap. When the race actually started, the cars went three and four wide into turn 2, everyone was expecting carnage, there was some tire smoke and some dust kicked up from wheels off, but no crunchies. There was a cheer from the audience in the suite. Then at turn 5 one car got punted and another one ran into it, this took out the two leading cars, it also brought out the safety car again. When things got started again it ran to lap 7, and then the leader drove straight off the bottom of the corkscrew. I've never seen a car do that before. That car managed to rejoin the race in 5th, but then another car did the same thing and got stuck bringing out another safety car.
All through the race so far, #20 had been noticeably slower than the other cars and was lagging badly. I looked at the live scoring and saw his best lap was a 2:00, I could race him in Bertie, that was 13s behind the time of the front runners. I'm not sure if there's more of a story there, but the guy had come all the way from Florida to be 13s a lap slower. The crowd around me started cheering for the guy. The safety car allowed him to catch up to the back of the pack, but as soon as the race restarted, he fell behind again. He was now managing 1:56 laps, I'd need the Cooper-S to beat him. Sometime later he appeared in second to last position, we don't know what happened to the guy behind him, probably came off somewhere. We saw one of the cars bobble coming around turn 11 in front of us, so lost a position. On the last lap, one of the leaders managed to spin in front of us, losing several positions before getting going again. We cheered #20 when he came into the pits after the race.
The next race was GT-1. These are the fastest GT cars, and the same cars may have been seen at TransAm races. There was no turn 2 carnage, but the sole Jaguar in the field expired approaching Turn 2, so steered off down the pit exit to get out of the way of the rest of the field. He managed to park it out of harms way, so didn't affect the race. Some wag's comment was "Well, it was a Jag." There were several cars which were having sound trouble. One of the leaders was observed taking an unusual line exiting turn 5, it sounded like the way to be furthest from the sound meter. He was eventually disqualified because of the sound issues. One strange incident was one of the cars was seen carrying a cone in its wheel well. That's the sort of thing we're used to seeing in autocross, not road racing. He deposited the cone in the middle of the track just past start/finish. That brought out the surface flag for a few laps, everyone managed to miss the cone. Late in the race, the second place car was seen to spin at T4 and we could see flames coming from it. Finally the winner wiggled going up to the finish line and gave a loud backfire, a really loud boom. This was considered as a deliberate celebration.
Next up was formula 500 (F5), another small cheap formula, this time powered by small (under 500cc) two stroke engines, like those from a snowmobile. These ones sounded like the archetypal swarm of angry bees. It was an amusing race, and clean no safety cars. It was capped off with a pass for the win on the last corner right in front of us.
The afternoon started with Spec Racer Ford (SRF). This was also a race I was looking forward to. SRF is an entry level class of purpose designed cars like the Protoypes with a tube frame, a fiberglass body and a Ford Focus engine in the back. It should probably be called a "Protoype" class, all the other sports racers classes were rolled into P1 and P2 recently. Its one of the most popular class, and the entry was 44 cars, second only to Spec Miata. I'd almost got around to hiring an SRF for a track day to ry something different (but we got the JCW instead). The race seemed to start early, it was a few minutes before the scheduled race time and the grid was empty, I'd missed them going out for their pace lap. Then when the pace car came around it stayed out, I don't know why that was. When the race proper started, all the cars seemed to make it through turn 2 successfully, then half way to turn 3 the carnage happened, not sure how but several cars crunched and a rear wing was bouncing down the track with other assorted bodywork. This brought out the safety car again.
After the restart, I was watching for pass attempts at turn 11 again, its a good passing opportunity and after the field gets bunched up the time is ripe for passes. What was strange is that several passes were made, but the passed cars didn't seem to react. The classic pass is to dive bomb down the inside, leaving your braking late. This puts you off line going too fast, so it compromises your exit. The classic reaction to such a pass is to hold your line, make an even later apex than normal so you get a much better exit off turn 11 than the attempted passer, the passed car then blows by the passer down the front straight. These guy were getting passed, then not making a dent on the passer. This looked really weird, as I'd been seeing the pass and repass maneuver all weekend. My theory is that as SRF is such an entry level class there are a bunch of very inexperienced racers in the class. Though if they're so inexperienced, I don't know how they qualified for the runoffs.
As a result of the earlier crunchy, the #57 car was running around without the rear body work, the engine was exposed. I was wondering if this was an advantage or not, its lost the rear wing aero assistance, but its lost quite a bit of weight. Then the speculation was if it would make weight at the end of the race. If it managed to come near the front it would probably be protested. There was another safety car on Lap 9, I don't know what for.
The next race was "yet another formula race", this time it was Formula 1000 (for some reason listed as "FB"). These are fast formula cars with 1000cc motor cycle engines in the back. They turned out to be the second fastest class at Laguna, faster than the prototypes, they were turning 1:25 laps. The race was largely uneventful, no safety cars, not much overtaking, they sorted themselves out and ran in order. On lap 16 one of the cars expired on the front straight, but managed to get going again. The winner managed a 1:24 lap and for his victory celebration he ran really close to the wall up to the finish, this seemed to be for a photo op, he was close enough to the wall to kick up dust. The second place guy looked really unhappy as he came into the pits after the race.
Next we had another race I was looking forward to, H Production (HP), which are the slowest "Production" class cars. Its a curious mixture of older sports cars, and modern economy cars. There was a classic Mini, and several Autin-Healy Sprites, a Triumph Spitfire, a couple of MG Midgets and a Fiat X-1/9. There were also some Civics, a BMW 1600 a Golf GTI and a Toyota Yaris. It was an entertaining race with the Yaris battling one of the CRXs. The Yaris managed to pass on lap two, but the CRX managed to get the position back, then the Yaris harried it for the rest of the race, usually they were separated by less than a car length. Unfortunately the Mini disappeared on lap 6.
Finally we had yet another formula race. There really are a lot of formula classes, like 8, I think they could do with pruning them down a bit, like they did to the prototypes. They used to be several different classes like Sports-2000, Super-Sports-2000, D-Sports-Racer, C-Sports-Racer, and they all got squished into P1 and P2. maybe 4 formulas would do. This one was the fastest formula, Formula Atlantic, these have a 300hp 2.3l engine. The race started off clean, and was somewhat exciting for a few laps as the 6th place qualifier proved to be the fastest and rapidly worked his way up through the field. Something had gone wrong with his qualifying so he didn't set a representative time. After he took the lead on lap 7 the race was pretty unexciting, the cars had sorted themselves out and there was no passing. Until lap 14, when a pass was attempted at turn 11, while I was watching, there was rubber to rubber contact and one car skip into the gravel trap and the other also expired on the edge of the track. This bought out a safety car for three laps to clear up the mess and the leader lost the 13s lead he'd built up. Nothing much happened on the restart as everyone was already in the right order. The best lap was a 1:22.6, so this was the fastest class.
#6
10-19-2014, 04:35 PM
I wasn't commenting on the facilities, I was commenting on its position. Its about 2500 miles from here, about 36 hours of driving, not something I'd look forward to doing. Laguna is a lot more convenient to get to for anyone on this end of the country.
#7
10-19-2014, 05:40 PM
Any true attempt at a championship round would need to go back to somewhere more central to EVERYONE. Laguna was basically a west coast regional for all intensive purposes. Daytona next year will be no better as little west coast representation will be had - like this year measly east coast appearances.
Topeka??
Topeka??
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