23 replies to this topic

[tylerbrown]

Entry numbers are down from last year (37 entries), looks like a lot of the Ohio boys are not coming out this year.

 

Current Entry List - 21 Entries

17 Brown, Tom - Spec Miata - Muskego, WI

07 Brown, Tyler - Spec Miata - Muskego, WI

41 Burdzy, Voytek - Spec Miata - Shiller Park, IL

10 Cabe, Jerry - Spec Miata - Loveland, OH

19 Elder, Justin - Spec Miata - Lakeville, MN

83 Fornetti, Tony - Spec Miata - Kentwood, MI

13 Gagliardo, Michael -Spec Miata - Chicago, IL

44 Gilbert, Paul - Spec Miata - Davenport, IA

16 Goff, Dan - Spec Miata - Warrenville, IL

48 Iwata, John - Spec Miata - Oshkosh, WI

05 Knuteson, Jason - Spec Miata - Danville, IN

73 MacDonald, Robert - Spec Miata - Strongsville, OH

87 Mellen, Keith - Spec Miata - Downers Grove, IL

71 Naumburg, Peter - Spec Miata - Beloit, WI

62 O'Shea, Fergal - Spec Miata - Washington, IL

21 Pecore, Evan - Spec Miata - Manitowoc, WI

12 Pogorzelski, Roger - Spec Miata - Mount Prospect, IL

63 Roberts, Thomas - Spec Miata - Naperville, IL

94 Sager, Thomas -Spec Miata - Naperville, IL

78 Stagl, Michael - Spec Miata - Waukesha, WI

93 Van Bendegom, Jeff - Spec Miata - Middleton, WI

 

 

Schedule for Spec Miata (Group 2) is as follows:

 

Saturday May 6th

8:10 – 8:30 AM 20 min Practice Groups 1 & 2

10:15 AM 20 min Qualifying Group 2

2:10 PM 20 min timed race, Group 2

 

Sunday May 7th

8:10 – 8:30 AM 20 min Qualifying Group 1 & 2

10:35 AM 24 laps, or 35 min race Group 2

 

Weather:

Saturday May 6th: Showers in the morning, then partly cloudy in the afternoon. High 62F. Winds NNW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 50%

Sunday May 7th: Mainly sunny. High 63F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.

 

My Picks for the Top 5 (In no particular order)

Voytek

Tom Brown

Evan Pecore

Tyler Brown

Justin Elder

 

Voytek will be very hard to beat here, he has proven that he is the master of this track time and time again, hopefully we can give him a run for his money!

 

 

[Bench Racer]

Tyler, your leaving some choices on the table.

 

In alpha order:

 

Gagliardo

Sager    

[mellen]

Voytek

Brown Sr

Sager

 

old guys take it this weekend

[tylerbrown]

Tyler, your leaving some choices on the table.

 

In alpha order:

 

Gagliardo

Sager    

 

David,

 

You're*

 

And those guys will definitely be up there too, what are your picks?

[davew]

Danny Bender makes his return to club racing in an Advanced Autosports built car. He finished 2nd at last years June Sprints on both days. And has victories at Blackhawk.

[MotoFusi]

T. Brown

T. Brown

V. Burdzy

[Tom Sager]

Danny Bender makes his return to club racing in an Advanced Autosports built car. He finished 2nd at last years June Sprints on both days. And has victories at Blackhawk.

.....and he's a T4 National champ.  Not bad.  He'll be tough.

 

There should be an announcement coming tonight regarding a meeting to discuss contact rules and for those that haven't read the supps, here's a rule that is in place for the weekend.

 

GENERAL RULES: A competitor involved in contact, or who has violated flag rules (yellow, black, red, or
checker), must report directly to impound in the racecar, and report to the steward.
All on track body contact (including contact during drafting) that causes a car to act erratically and results
in a change of position or a car leaving the course will be investigated.

 

Apparently this rule was in place last year as well for Cendiv events but not enforced or announced outside of the supplemental regulations. 

[tylerbrown]

Danny Bender makes his return to club racing in an Advanced Autosports built car. He finished 2nd at last years June Sprints on both days. And has victories at Blackhawk.

 

My New Top 5 is 

Voytek 

Tom Brown

Danny Bender

Evan Pecore

Tyler Brown

 

Sorry Justin (:

 

There should be an announcement coming tonight regarding a meeting to discuss contact rules and for those that haven't read the supps, here's a rule that is in place for the weekend.

 

GENERAL RULES: A competitor involved in contact, or who has violated flag rules (yellow, black, red, or
checker), must report directly to impound in the racecar, and report to the steward.
All on track body contact (including contact during drafting) that causes a car to act erratically and results
in a change of position or a car leaving the course will be investigated.

 

Apparently this rule was in place last year as well for Cendiv events but not enforced or announced outside of the supplemental regulations. 

 

I think a meeting to discuss this would be good, also should be noted that there has been a history going into T1 at the start of the race too deep and causing a lot of bumping, Two years ago it cause like 6 or 7 cars to be pushed off T1, last year it happened again on Sunday but not as bad, I know I got sandwiched between soms bumps, and it looked like it cause some people to go wide at the exit of T1 and lose some speed in the outside row.

 

Video of the start last year:  

- from another angle: https://youtu.be/Dfn2wTPv3lA

Two years ago:

[Justin Elder]

Voytek 

Tom Brown

Bender

Pecore

Elder 

[JRHille]

Shooting for the in order picks

Voytek
Bender
Gagliardo
Elder
Tyler brown
Evan Pecore

[Bench Racer]

My dark horse pick within top 3, Gagliardo along with Voytek and Bender. 4th and 5th, fight it out.  

[Tom Sager]

Voytek

Brown Sr

Sager

 

old guys take it this weekend

 

Keith I have you winning Saturday by a close margin over Tom Roberts with a gaggle of cars fighting for 3rd, but Roberts beats you on Sunday. 

[mellen]

Keith I have you winning Saturday by a close margin over Tom Roberts with a gaggle of cars fighting for 3rd, but Roberts beats you on Sunday. 

  thanks but i have no track time and car just finished Wednesday night with no shake down. Just looking to stay out of the way this weekend

[Tom Sager]

For any attending this event there will be an optional meeting on Saturday from 12:30-1:00 at the base of the tower (inside) to discuss some ideas for future on-track contact rules and procedures.  Kevin Coulter who is the Executive Steward for the Central Division of SCCA has offered to host the meeting.  Should be a good opportunity to hear from both drivers and officials.  It's open to all classes.

[evan.pecore]

After Saturday's race....

Voytek
Bender
Older Brown
Pecore
Gagliardo
Younger Brown

Bender had fast lap at 21.8.

Great clean race with plenty of side by side action. Tyler Brown got shafted by double lapped traffic who decided to race through t7 on the second last lap. Dropped him from a secured 3rd to 6th.

[tylerbrown]

Fun day today! Qualified P3 and did my fastest time at the track ever, to go with my best Majors qualifying too. Turn 1 of the race I got a little too much apex curb which ultimately landed me in 5th for turn 3. Stayed in line until Tom Sager had a mechanical and dropped out, and then was able to get around Gagliardo as well. Ran the rest of the race in P3 and was starting to pull away from Evan and my Dad, and gaining on Bender and Voytek. Coming to the last turn on the second last lap, we caught a lapper that we were lapping for the second time in a 20 min race.. I tried to time it right to get a good run out of the corner, but miscalculated how slow he actually was, had to check up at about turn in as the lapper was at the apex, car got a little loose and I dropped two wheels exiting the corner. Evan, Dad, and Gagliardo were then able to get by.

Disappointed in the P6 result as I had P3 locked in till the lapper. Felt very comfortable in the car and it is really hooked up. Was very happy as I ran a mistake free race up until that point, but will take this as a learning experience and do better next time.

Race 2 should be fun tomorrow!

[Bench Racer]

^ Great young man in spite of his father.   Tyler is  learning the whole game in short order. Top 6-8 cars had fun.

[davew]

Fantastic weekend for the Advanced Autosports drivers.

 

Saturdays race was the way every SM race should be. Good, clean, hard racing. A couple local yellows for driver induced, single car spins. But no dents that I am aware of. Voytek passed Sagar just before his mechanical issue. Bender came from 6th on the grid to finish second. With Tom Brown in an Advanced car (with help from Tyler) coming home a very patient 3rd. And Tom is not known for his patience.

 

How would you like to qualify 0.1 seconds off the pole.   You would start 8th on the grid.   7 cars within  a tenth of a second for qualifying. Bender had the pole with Voytek on the outside, for an Advanced front row on Sunday. Danny led Voytek around for the first half of the race. This created a nice gap to the group battling for 3rd place. Once Danny and Voytek started battling, the 3rd place group caught up. The top 3, Voytek, Bender and Gags (in a former Voytek car), stayed close and in line for the last few laps, getting a small gap to 3rd place at the end. Voytek set a new track record of 1:21.471. Eclipsing Mike Novak's record set last year.

 

The STL/STU/T2/T3/T4 alphabet soup had Ken Kannard (STL), Paul Kwiecinski (T3) and Thomas Bernacki (T4) coming home with wins in Advanced preped cars. Bruce Banister finished 2nd in STU in his new Advanced car. These results where duplicated on Sunday. These where Bernacki's first Majors wins.

 

Now the bad part of the weekend. And it goes to the mid to rear of the pack on the Sunday race. My view is from over 100 yards back, so I can not say what caused the incedent. I have not seen any videos to place blame on anyone. The officials reviewed several videos and concluded it was a racing incedent. The green flag was thrown earlier than I have ever seen it at Blackhawk. The pack looked clean and in line. The pole cars where not even to the pit entrance. I am not saying this created or was even a part of what happened. The early green is just a fact. About 18th place, just before the bridge, got crazy. Tim Richmond, in his first Major, got spun, airborn and rolled over the tire wall drivers left, just before the starters stand. He got out of the car and was unhurt. Not so much the car.

 

Now the real problems started. The "corner" with control of the situation was the starters station. They did not call in a MAYDAY nor did they ever state they had a car upside down over the tire wall. Safety truck was dispatched "to the tower", then sat at pit out for a lap, before being told to go to the incedent. For those of you not familiar with Blackhawk, pit exit would be directly accross the track from the upside down car. The Stewards went full course caution, properly, when the leaders where half way around the track. No issue there. But still did not dispatch the rescue truck to the car for another full lap. By this time the driver was out of the car. I monitor race control on a scanner, so I heard the control person say that they did not know the car was upside down. But it was literally 30 feet from them. The issue begins with the starters not making the correct call, and continues with the Stewards not stopping the session and then not dispatching safety to the scene. Fortunately the driver is fine, all the safety gear did its job. The car will be fixable, but expensive. A couple other cars got dents, and Bruce Bannister broke a diff housing in his new car. With the current discussions about drivers making bad judgement calls (at 100 mph in split seconds) I feel the need has come to address bad judgement calls by our race officials.

 

Except for the Richmond problem, it was a great weekend with great results for the Advanced crew. Thanks to all our drivers and the crew; Ann , Ben, Bob, Kyle, Maureen, Michelle, Miles, (new guy) Tim and Bentley.

 

Remember, Racing is supposed to be FUN

Dave

[tylerbrown]

Short day for me yesterday. In the 10 minute qualifying I was just getting set in the car and got a good lap in, then the checkered flew, one more lap and I think I would have been able to improve on my Saturday's best time, but I did not, and a few cars did go quicker.  The top 9 cars were within 0.150 seconds for qualifying, tight group! I started P6 for the race, but I only got 7 laps of green flag racing.

 

For the race, we made it to the brake zone of turn one before on the radio I heard our spotter say "CAR UPSIDE DOWN, RED FLAG, RED FLAG", and I made the rookie mistake of getting off before you see the flag, and as it didn't actually go red, or double yellow for another 4 corners. I checked up when I heard the call on the radio, and my Dad and Fornetti went by on the inside, and I didn't go back to full throttle until I hear Dad say "GO TYLER" over the radio... So I lost two positions on that.

 

We ended up not going to red flag, went double yellow for five laps. Tim Richmond was the car that ended up upside down, I do not know what happened, but I know that he was out of the car and standing when we came around the next lap, with the car still on its top. I heard that he was okay so I am glad to hear that, always scary when you see people upside down. 

 

Was a little surprised that we did not go to red flag though, IMO if a car is upside down a red should be flown. 

 

The first restart there was some of the checking up and bumping, and it was waived off. The second restart had a little bit more checking up and bumping but the green flew. I was able to get around Fornetti after a couple laps, but then only got two more laps. I was starting to close on my dad, when I must have hit some debris on the track, as I got a flat tire in the right rear, and had to pull off the track. The hole in the tire was pretty big, and it was sad to have to retire the car. My dad and I have still not driven wheel to wheel and raced each other, we've been very close but never raced against each other for a single position, and this race it was shaping up that we were going to, but then I got the flat  .

 

I have to give a big thank you to Advanced Autosports for aligning my car during the week before the race, I had run the previous weekend with all new suspension, and I wanted to make sure nothing changed after it settled after the initial race weekend. With being a full time college student and needing to finish up a couple things on my Dad's car, I just didn't have the time, but Dave was able to make it happen, and my car was on rails this weekend, I have never felt so comfortable and smooth with my car before, so thank you to them for aligning it, and making it that way. Also have to say thanks to East Street Racing, as both our cars run their engines now, and they are both running strong. My car has also never had as much power as it currently does so thank you to Jim!

 

Overall I had a good weekend racing with everyone, it was very clean up at the front, and I was very happy with my pace on the weekend. Learned a lot of things to do and what not to do in different situations as well. Congrats to Voytek on the double win, as well as Bender, Gags, and my Dad on the podiums!

 

Video from Saturday's Race: 

 

Video from Sunday's Race: 

[davew]

Pay attention to mike Fornetti in the white 1.6 car. When he gets a few more races under his belt, he will be a force to reconned with.

 

Looks like the best drag race motor at the start was Sagar.

 

Dave