JLawton
08-14-2007, 12:19 PM
I wanted to give a quick update on how the North East guys did this weekend. Hopefully everyone else can chime in also.
We were lucky enough to have a huge area for all of us to set up in. Unfortunately, almost everyone ran into some sort of problem over the weekend :( . I think both Blethen’s had problems, along with Jason, Jake, Dave, Tim, Joe and Greg (Matt and Kevin Hart actually got Greg’s tranny installed in 50 minutes!). Jerry, Dick and I escaped, although I didn’t see Jerry after his last race. (In fact, my car ran flawlessly the whole weekend and with Lee Gimes’s help, had the car fairly hooked up as well) But despite all that, everyone seemed to be having a good time even though the problems took away from the socializing time. On top of that, we had the help of Lee Grimes for the weekend. Enough to make most pro teams jealous!!
Joe and I had the only incident in the PDX (what is it with the two of us??) I’ll let Joe try to defend himself…….. ;) I only wish I was running video at the time!! He had to get some welding done after but was ready to go for qualifying.
It’s a great track, very different than any other I’ve run. The back part is very difficult to pass in and managing lapped traffic is key to finishing well………And I didn’t do a very good job of it! None of the videos do the elevation changes and speed any justice. The track and hospitality were first rate! Although I can only talk to the ITA race, everyone on track was for the most part considerate, no silly dive bombs, no bumping to get cars out of the way and the lapped cars (except for one) did a great job of staying predictable and allowed us to race.
I managed an 11th place in Saturday’s PM race with a time of 1:46.06 and was very pleased with that! Sunday morning Joe and I ran nose to tail for the first half of the race and I was running 6th until the second to last lapped when I got balked by a lapped car and had Jeremy Lucas and a CRX pass me to finish 8th. For the previous two laps I had done everything I could to keep the two of them behind me, so maybe it was inevitable!!
The last race had an interesting start (see my video in the other thread) I was actually in 5th place…………for about ½ a second!! By the end, I was wiped out and just cruising and ended up 10th. 45 minutes in that heat is tough! I would like to know how much weight I lost during the race.
This is a race you must put on your schedule for next year!
We were lucky enough to have a huge area for all of us to set up in. Unfortunately, almost everyone ran into some sort of problem over the weekend :( . I think both Blethen’s had problems, along with Jason, Jake, Dave, Tim, Joe and Greg (Matt and Kevin Hart actually got Greg’s tranny installed in 50 minutes!). Jerry, Dick and I escaped, although I didn’t see Jerry after his last race. (In fact, my car ran flawlessly the whole weekend and with Lee Gimes’s help, had the car fairly hooked up as well) But despite all that, everyone seemed to be having a good time even though the problems took away from the socializing time. On top of that, we had the help of Lee Grimes for the weekend. Enough to make most pro teams jealous!!
Joe and I had the only incident in the PDX (what is it with the two of us??) I’ll let Joe try to defend himself…….. ;) I only wish I was running video at the time!! He had to get some welding done after but was ready to go for qualifying.
It’s a great track, very different than any other I’ve run. The back part is very difficult to pass in and managing lapped traffic is key to finishing well………And I didn’t do a very good job of it! None of the videos do the elevation changes and speed any justice. The track and hospitality were first rate! Although I can only talk to the ITA race, everyone on track was for the most part considerate, no silly dive bombs, no bumping to get cars out of the way and the lapped cars (except for one) did a great job of staying predictable and allowed us to race.
I managed an 11th place in Saturday’s PM race with a time of 1:46.06 and was very pleased with that! Sunday morning Joe and I ran nose to tail for the first half of the race and I was running 6th until the second to last lapped when I got balked by a lapped car and had Jeremy Lucas and a CRX pass me to finish 8th. For the previous two laps I had done everything I could to keep the two of them behind me, so maybe it was inevitable!!
The last race had an interesting start (see my video in the other thread) I was actually in 5th place…………for about ½ a second!! By the end, I was wiped out and just cruising and ended up 10th. 45 minutes in that heat is tough! I would like to know how much weight I lost during the race.
This is a race you must put on your schedule for next year!