Originally Posted by
Ed Funk
Looooong story! Started a year ago spring race at NHMS. I had a radiator problem...small hole from debris, new radiator, no spare with me. Another in my class, drives a yellow Golf, graciously offered his expertise at field fixing the problem. Solved, went on to race with him at least two races that weekend...good close racing, with him squeaking out a win over our grossly underpowered Honda, mostly because he was learning the track for the first time. Had a few times when I felt he was being a bit crowding, chopping....but I let it go because he obviously had the faster car and had helped out and saved our weekend for us.
Fast forward to LRP. His protege in a black Golf qualified next row back and right behind me, again obviously a stronger car, not as much corner speed. He got a much better start and got up beside me to my right, I had a car to my left and couldn't move over. He ran out of room to the right....grass. Suffice to say we got together his left rear and my right front touched, he spun in front of me, I hit him in the drivers side rear door. My car went dead stick, and I parked at station 2 (Big Bend). He continued and finished the race with lots of negative camber. Don't know why my car died...should have tried to re-start it, because it fired up and I drove back to the paddock. Well, given my natural calm personality, I went to his paddock area and WENT OFF on the roughly 10 people who were there...he wasn't. Later, he and 2-3 friends came to our paddock area to "discuss" the situation, needless to say it was a "he said, I said" deal and nothing was resolved. Unfortunately, our camera went to "rest" mode before the race and we had nothing on video. I queried here after the event to see if anyone behind us had video to see who moved over on whom....no takers.
Jump ahead to this year at Pocono, they were garaged just down and across from us. I went down, stuck out my hand and apologized for my behavior in his paddock area the year before....we shook hands, and agreed to disagree on the etiology of the incident at LRP.
This past weekend at NHMS, the yellow Golf and the black Golf qualified 1st, 2nd to my third in the rain. Our Honda was handling evilly....a suspension problem that was not discovered until Sun. am, was causing sudden intermittent infinitely stiff rear roll stiffness....my stupidity! I made a pass attempt into 6 on the first lap, immediately got into a real tank slapper in traffic! The black Golf tried to go under me...we got together, I went for a ride through the gravel and left 7 DFL. Managed to climb back up to 3rd. Went to contact impound after the race, took full blame for the incident, apologized profusely and shook his hand.
Sunday am race, started 3rd, got up to 2nd, then back to 3rd when Nat came ripping through. Raced ahead of black Golf for most of race, he had waaaay more power but I was much faster in the oval, so was able to stay ahead of him, until he tried a late braking move inside into 3, I stayed out and executed a beautiful (even if I do say so myself) crossover on him. No contact. Video shows that I was well ahead before moving to the exit of the track, even though they claimed after that I forced him off!
Finished 3rd, started the last race of the day, just like all the others, right behind the yellow Golf. I anticipated the green and got a jump on him, and went to his left, at which point I got squeezed to the wall, even though our video shows no traffic to his right. I don't take intimidation well, and kept my foot in it....we got to the end of the wall, there was traffic to his right at that point...he lifted, I didn't. He beat me to 3 and drove away. Black Golf beat me to 3 also, but I managed to take my little Honda with double digit HP and get back by him and barely held on for the 3rd 3rd of the weekend.
After the race, I had just changed and was getting ready to load up and go home, Steph was off being Trophy Girl, black Golf driver and yellow Golf driver stopped by to explain to me how I was the most dangerous driver in IT. Well, in my opinion, driving to intimidate and then getting pissed because someone doesn't fold is not real gentlemanly. But then, my suggesting they go take turns butt f¥€king each other may not have been too civilized either.
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