29 replies to this topic

[Kyle Keenan]

Curious as to how the cancellation effects the Pacific Northwest Challenge series?

[Randy Thieme]

IIRC one of the emails said the September race at PIR might take it's place.

[Derrick Ambrose]

Regret the disappointing news of the late cancellation (of the August PIR 2X Regional). Based on a "normal" race weekend ramp-up of entrants, we would have had a sufficient number of cars showing up to have been OK. But, given the pull of the new track at the Ridge -- it was anything but a normal race weekend. The financial risk to the club, should we have ended up with no additional cars from Monday's count, would have been substantial.

The Ridge is awesome, new, and exciting track ... and our co-sanctioned 2X Regional race with NW Region on July 28-29 was a big success. I predict you'll see The Ridge featured a couple of times in the 2013 Oregon Region schedule. We're by no means backing away from PIR ... we just want to offer our Region members another challenging, accessible place to race.

We still have one more race at PIR, on September 8-9th, to close out the year strong for the Oregon Region SCCA. The past few SCCA races at PIR have been our "big" races: SCCA Super Tour and Rose Cup. Anyone there can tell you the racing was terrific, the competition tough, but clean, and SCCA support -- from food, music, trophies, and contingencies -- outstanding. For September, we'll have shorter qualifying sessions, with longer races for SM and SRF. I was considering proposing a mini-enduro (60 -90 minutes with a mandatory 5 minutes pit stop/break) to close out September's Sunday afternoon race, but it would require a good deal of cooperation and positive feedback from all fendered classes (i.e., Touring, IT, GT, Production, and SM) to pull it off. I'm all for mixing things up to have a fun race weekend ... just don't want to go down the path of gimmicks.

Again, I regret the inconvenience to those of you signed up and ready to race this weekend at PIR. I hope to see you in September. Good luck and Have Fun to anyone racing at the Ridge this coming weekend.

Jim

I like the Enduro idea! I would be in the slowest group of cars (Mazda 2) running on the track though and I am not sure how the faster cars feel about that.

-Derrick

[Jim Graffy]

I too am very disappointed in the race being cancelled. Sad when I was over 4% of the entries. I had a bit of a tear in my eye this evening as I took the car out of the trailer to put in the shop for THE WINTER . We will miss the September race as we will be on the road heading for the Runoffs with our race officials hats on.

[Michael Colangelo]

Jim, you can race your Spec Miata this weekend at The Ridge. Group 2 already has over 20 SM/CSM Miatas signed up.

[Kyle Keenan]

We still have one more race at PIR, on September 8-9th, to close out the year strong for the Oregon Region SCCA. The past few SCCA races at PIR have been our "big" races: SCCA Super Tour and Rose Cup. Anyone there can tell you the racing was terrific, the competition tough, but clean, and SCCA support -- from food, music, trophies, and contingencies -- outstanding. For September, we'll have shorter qualifying sessions, with longer races for SM and SRF. I was considering proposing a mini-enduro (60 -90 minutes with a mandatory 5 minutes pit stop/break) to close out September's Sunday afternoon race, but it would require a good deal of cooperation and positive feedback from all fendered classes (i.e., Touring, IT, GT, Production, and SM) to pull it off. I'm all for mixing things up to have a fun race weekend ... just don't want to go down the path of gimmicks.

Assuming the enduro itself isnt a pacific northwest challenge event it might be interesting. Don't want to pay the cost of 2 classes to run 1 race. Did one of the cascade enduros earlier this year and has a blast!

[Terrell Garrett]

Why not just make the Sunday SM race one hour with a mandatory mid-race pit stop? We might even get a few Conference people to show up.

[BrianPDX]

Terrell, Are you going to run the Conference race next weekend at PIR? (I'm in) It's the Doernbecher event.

[Kyle Keenan]

Or do what they did at Terrel's 35th birthday party and when you make your mandatory pit stop, spin around a baseball bat 10 times, pin the tail on the donkey, and then continue on.

[Terrell Garrett]

At least I can proudly say I had a 35th birthday youngster! No pin the tail on the donkey but maybe a piece of tail was involved at the after-party. As far as the baseball bat, I'm not one to brag so let's just leave that one alone (wishful thinking).

Brian, I am doing the Friday test day at Conference and then leaving for a family trip to the coast Friday night. My parents will be in town from New Mexico and as much as I would like to run Doernbecher it's not in the cards this year. You will have to wait until September to beat me. That is if you stay on track!