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race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 7:39 am
by Joel Hershoren
That was one for the ages.

First off, before we go into the good stuff. Hope Kimi is o.k. this morning. Wheel center failure causing the car to hit the wall going in to paddock turn. I could tell from turn six that the car is done. Cars are replaceable. Guessing she is sore and a bit rattled. Chin up lass.

Shout outs :
Ralph Provitz. New overall track record. Guess the track surface is not THAT bad eh ?

Paul Burke , Keeps lowering the F-B record of his, car is now right in the mix of things .

Ryan Kristoff. First win in style. F-prod Spitfire wins the long race, overall, with Garrett Dunn keeping him honest. Great Drive ! ( and he is a novice )

Curtis Easterling : Novice changes from I.T.B. Fwd Corolla to a CFC from the Jim Dopriak stable. Not only was he clean, but drove very well. Followed Jim Lamb around Saturday and kept him honest and maybe learned a thing or two, only to get his first win. Due to attrition, he started on the pole Sunday Morning. Clean and full weekend.

Micheal Ofiara : he has run the table in I.T.B. this year. Has not put a wheel wrong, or a mark on his car, and has showed quiet resolve to get faster each weekend. The total package. Sad to find out he cannot be here the final weekend. Friend's wedding.( Sad for me, i was really looking forward to him being Number one driver at the end of the season.)
Great season Mike !

The crew of Corey Collins. Wind killed the new canopy in turn six on Sunday Morning. It was flapping beyond belief hanging on one of four rails. While i was thinking of finding a few other bodies to help, his crew just walked right up ( as if they had it on a to-do list ) with a "we got this" attitude and secured the failed tarp. Quality.

The best race i have seen in years was right out of the gate. Group 1 Specs,, in the rain,,,,Miata, Neon, and Focus. Clean and clear the whole race. GREAT RACING, no known contact, i do not even recall a local yellow. Well done guys.

There was so much positive this weekend. Not perfect, but VERY POSITIVE. Least amount of incident reports ever for a weekend. ( less than some weekends for just the first race )
No jinx. Lets's see if we can make Championship Weekend the best ever.

There is lots of other stuff. Chime in folks.

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 7:58 am
by Joel Hershoren
As is sit here, i just recalled a few more.

Chris Marsh. First overall in things with wings. No small feat regardless of car count in that race.
Phil Mather. He and Sean Grogan where covered by a blanked most all weekend long. AND CLEAN. Nice.

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 8:21 am
by CG-Lock Racer
Thanks, Joel! That was a TON of fun racing Sean this weekend. Traffic was a huge factor in the rain race. I'd get caught, then he'd get caught, back and forth. One more lap... Unfortunately the video camera didn't work....

Yesterday's feature race was also some great racing! Wrong tire choice and the LR tire was corded pretty early in the race. I'm surprised there weren't sparks from all the steel showing! I was making the car as wide as possible, but still leaving an inch if Sean got a nose in. Video did work this time and I'll try and post a link soon.

Thanks to all of the volunteers, corner workers, and everyone who makes these races possible!

Phil

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 10:05 am
by 924RACR
+1 on an impressive SN race - putting on a great show guys!

Kudos again to Ralph for letting it all hang out there to go fast! ;)

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 11:13 am
by TealTuna
I agree with all of the above Joel. Was a weekend to remember for so many people... some worse than others.
Thanks for the shout out again I appreciate it.

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 11:23 am
by Chris Marsh
I thought I made a post but can't find it. Sorry if this is duplicate.

Thanks, Joel. Sorry I had to miss Sunday.

I too was amazed at the rain racing. I was watching the rain on the radar and thought surely our group would have some extra time due to the clean-ups but surprisingly there weren't any. Cleanest racing I've seen wet or dry. Congrats!

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 11:39 am
by MichaelOfiara
Thanks for the shout out Joel. A dream season to be sure for me personally, especially when my goal to start the year was to win just one race since I had never won before! Simply amazing. I'm currently planning on flying home from Denver Sunday morning in time to run the Sunday feature for Race 6, I'm not quite ready to hang the gear up for the season. :mrgreen:

Congrats to Ryan, much deserved first win, and not the last for him IMO. Congrats to all my competitors on a tricky weekend (talking to you groups 1 & 2). The Neon/wave runner battle was great to watch, and on RA1s no less, and Sean taking first overall. FWD represent! :)

Thanks to all the volunteers and workers who make this possible, weekend in and out all season long, this club is such a hidden gem of talent, dedication and respect. I don't post online much, but I am proud to be a member of this club and spend my summer weekends with such great people.

Hope to see y'all on the grid for the feature in a few weeks! And if not, I'll be tapping the keg at the banquet! :mrgreen:

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 12:21 pm
by 38Bfast
I was very excited to see how close and clean the racing was this weekend. There was some very very hard battles fought out there and all without carnage to one another. Very impressive and exciting to watch. I sure hope this will be the trend of future races to come. It was racing as it should be done. My hat is off to all that made it happen.

Joel, the lap I made was absolutely brutal and painful. I will post the video when I figure out how to edit it down to just one lap. There are 3 places on the track that just kick my butt. Kink into 3, out of the esses and first apex in swamp. Other than that it is not all that bad. After I ran the fast lap I had to back it down to take a break. I think a ran a 1:08 that lap. At that pace I could run the car for a hour + no problem. I will try and put both laps in the video so you can see the difference.

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 12:37 pm
by Joel Hershoren
Ralph, i have no doubts. You did not think i would let your new record go without some comment did you ?
Well done. Funny to think as a 1:08 as a "relaxing lap" even if it 9 seconds up from the previous lap.

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 1:08 pm
by Dave Lewis
Ralph, post the whole video, I for one would like to see it. PLEASE.

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 8:18 pm
by Brian
Dave Lewis wrote:Ralph, post the whole video, I for one would like to see it. PLEASE.
Yes, yes, yes please!

Chris Marsh's flag-to-flag win was even more notable since as an experiment he had the Mid-O gearing on the car (which to say the least, um WORKED ;-) but that the last lap was run with the motor on its last legs having given it's all.

So. Much. Win. this weekend....with a sad footnote to Kimi's LF wheel failing at a most inopportune time, and some rather bogus Armco jumping out in front of Jim Lamb's DSR!

Can't wait 'till Race 6,
Brian

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 10:06 pm
by badrocco16v
Jim did put up a hell of a fight in the slippery stuff.

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Tue Sep 10, 2013 9:38 pm
by CG-Lock Racer
Here is my race report and links to videos.

Ann Arbor, Michigan - September 8, 2013

So Close!

Race weekend #5 is in the record books for the Waterford Hills Road Racing season, and Phil Mather Racing is inching closer to another victory, but it was not to be this round. The three race weekend was full of excitement from start to finish.

(Feature race video links:
Part 1 - http://youtu.be/QiPalb6phzs;
Part 2 - http://youtu.be/_HwuS3Z9p9I)

Unfortunately, the weekend started out rough, with a broken half-shaft on the warm up lap for Friday's practice sessions. The rest of the day was spent rounding up parts which meant that Mather didn't get to test the changes made to the car since last race.

Friday started out better however, with the Phil Mather Racing/CG-Lock #06 SpecNeon qualifying on outside pole for the first race of the weekend. As race time approached, the weather wasn't looking so good and rain started to fall. It was light at first and Mather began to buckle in, ready to race. However, at the last second, the call was made to change to rain tires. Helping crew on Saturday was Josh Engstrom, who has lots of experience crewing for rally teams, so he is used to fast pace car changes. With his help, all four tires were changed and Mather was back in the car ready to race in less than five minutes. The race is self was quite a show. It was called "The best race I've seen in 10 years,", and "EPIC", by several people. For a little background, the SpecNeons race with other class cars on track at the same time, separated at the start by about half of a lap. They are typically the slower cars in the field. For the rain race, however, they were not. Mather and his usual competition #37, Sean Grogan, got an excellent start and were fighting nose to tail from the beginning. They quickly caught up to the slower of the SpecMiatas (many of whom chose to stay on slick dry tires instead of treaded rain tires). Mather got separated from #37 by traffic, but was never more than a couple seconds behind. They fought their way through the traffic and eventually it was #37's turn to get held up. Mather caught up and got a couple of lucky breaks being able to make faster passes than Grogan did. At the finish, Mather finished 0.327 seconds behind the #37 SpecNeon. Mather not only finished second in class, he finished second overall! There were also zero caution flags and no contact between Mather and the #37 throughout the race, even though they were at times separated by only a few inches on a very wet racetrack. "This was one of those races that I will remember for a long time, even though I didn't come away with the victory; it was just great, hard fought, and clean racing the entire way through," Phil said afterwards. "I only needed one more lap and I would have had him." Unfortunately the camera battery died while sitting on grid for the start of the 12 lap race.

Mather started in second place again for race two of the weekend. The weather had dried out for Sunday and Phil was able to evaluate the changes made to the car. Seven of the 8 laps were run within 0.5 seconds of each other, meaning the car was very consistent and Mather was running it as hard as possible. At the end of the race, he was 1.009 seconds behind the leader and knew a couple more changes were needed for the feature race.

Sunday afternoon's 15 lap Feature race was another one for the record books. Mather knew he had to push hard at the start for a chance for the win. And push he did. He again started on the outside pole, meaning he had the outside line through turns one and two. He knew if he could keep the nose of his car next to the #37 through turn two, he had a chance to get the lead. That is exactly what he did. By the entrance to the turn for Hill Top, he was in the lead. The #37 was right on his rear bumper though and wasn't going to let him get away easily. Throughout the race, you could have thrown a blanket over Mather and the #37. Once again, there was zero contact and the race was very clean. With four laps to go, Mather's rear tires were completely shot and he was sliding the rear of the car around almost every turn. The #37 finally got a nose inside of the Paddock Bend and was able to make a pass in the S-turns as Mather got a little sideways and put two wheels in the dirt on the exit of the turns. That was all that was needed. At the end of the 15 laps, Mather was 1.5 seconds behind, with absolutely no tires left.

Race weekend #6, and the last race weekend at Waterford Hills for the season will be September 28-29.

Re: race weekend 5 afterglow.

Posted: Wed Sep 11, 2013 10:24 am
by TealTuna
Awesome write-up and fight, Mr. Mathers.

I feel your pain in the video department - I forgot to start my camera too :-(