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With a bit of planning, a bit of effort, and a bit of luck, I was able to clinch the NASA AZ Regional Championship for Super Touring 2 this weekend, despite being at a disadvantage for Sunday's endurance race (due to having to fill around 10 gallons vs. everyone else's 5).
As mentioned in a prior post, I had a strategy to stay ahead in the points, and I was able to execute. I put the car on the pole for Saturday's race, and led that race flag to flag, while my competitor started 6th overall and got mired in traffic. That gave me enough breathing room where I could finish second in class in both the qualifying race and 100-minute "endurance" race on Sunday and still take the Championship, and that's exactly what happened.
2016 was a season-long battle with one other local competitor after our class basically imploded at the end of 2015/early 2016, but the number of pole positions and overall race wins I was able to put down backed up the ST2 performance.
I am looking forward to a renewed battle in 2017 with a bunch of fresh blood reinvigorating the class locally, while continuing to both learn more and drive harder to be able to really compete at a National level.
Special thanks to my wife and my friends at RT Motorsports for excellent support both on and off-track, not to mention all of the friends, family, and fellow racers that have followed and supported me.
Here are some photos from the final event of this year for NASA AZ:
Follow-the-leader onto the main straight during Saturday's race:
Passing lap traffic:
Using up gratuitous amounts of curbing:
Headed into the hairpin onto the main straight:
Podium for Saturday's race (I'm only 5'9", lol):
Being refueled during Sunday's 100-minute race:
I don't get my trophy and jacket for the year until December, but it's a done deal. Additionally, I will be taking on the role of NASA AZ Region Super Touring Series Director for 2017, so I will be able to help integrate new racers in my class, as well as 4 other classes (Super Unlimited, ST1, ST3, and ST4) and ensure everyone has a clean and fun season.
Thanks to all that have followed me here, and stay tuned for more updates in 2017!
We are headed out with ProAutosports this weekend to a combined Wild Horse Pass + Bondurant Track weekend, which is a no-pressure event for me. We will have some good racing and I hear that @captdistraction is going to make his race group debut! @Tucson302 should be there ripping it up as well!
Ausgeseichnet......zehr gute zat das funkeee Blue Bimmer ist behinden yur kiester! Zo he gotzzz to zee deinen kiester ast du winnen von das kar racezzz.
Wunderbar and vay to go Amerikan Muscell ! Champee-on fur NASA , you are meinen Hero.
Drew uber alles!!!
Way to kick ass Drew, good to see that red Stang whipping up on the those boyzzz. Really you are a hero to us all, hard to win those NASA Championships and this in a car we all watched being built from scratch.
It was back-to-back track weekends for me out here in Arizona. While the rest of the nation cools, we still enjoy "comfortable" 60-70* weather, which is perfect for racing.
This time wasn't for points or for a championship, just for fun, on Wild Horse Pass Main + Bondurant Racing School's course, affectionately known as "MONDO" when combined. The wife and I participated in a stress-free Thanksgiving pot-luck at the track with the crew from ProAutosports, and also enjoyed a few nights of camping/campfire/partying on-site in her Scamp travel trailer.
On Friday we started out with a practice day, where I was disappointed to find the Hoosier R7s I ran in the previous week's enduro were destroyed on the passenger front inside. Expectations too high, I suppose.
I had ordered a set of Hoosier S80 slicks to test out this weekend, but had hoped to hold off on using those until Sunday; that wasn't the case, but I was able to heat cycle them on Friday before running them on Saturday and Sunday. I'm not yet convinced they are worth the extra money over A7s but I'm also not certain I've found the right tire pressures for this car yet w/ these tires.
I put down some decent times on Friday and managed to pick up almost a full second by Saturday's qualifying. I thought this would be good enough for Pole Position, but a good friend in a BMW managed to out-qualify me by almost two full seconds! I was shocked! The BMW in question is an E36 that weighs 2800lbs, does 390hp to the wheels, and runs 285mm Hoosier A7s. VERY fast.
I was even more shocked (and pleased) when that driver forgot to show up to grid on-time to start Saturday's qualifying race , which meant I was starting on Pole after all. I managed to lead the qualifying race flag-to-flag despite being pursued by another friend's LS3 260Z shown below, and I also managed to turn in my fastest lap time of the weekend, shown in the video below. I was told by the Datsun driver that the Boss was fully 4" completely in the air at the spot 1:02 in the video.
Due to my first-place finish in the qualifying race, I was also starting the weekend's "Championship Race" on pole as well. But this time my BMW competitor was starting 3rd or 4th in the row behind me. We battled fiercely for a handful of laps, side-by-side through a number of turns before catching a full-course-caution.
After a number of laps under caution, I restarted in first and managed to hold the BMW off (just barely) to take the second overall win for the day. Video from the restart and remaining few laps of the race below!
Unfortunately on Saturday @captdistraction had some issues with the car dying during one of the runs and we tried to troubleshoot; I was hoping for some burned-up wires to be the culprit, but it turns out the issues were fatal. You can read more about that in his thread here: https://trackmustangsonline.com/index.php?topic=9220.0 We decided to get some dinner w/ our track friends, along with a couple margaritas to help mentally.
On Sunday we had a 60-minute "Enduro" consisting of three 20-minute races with re-starts planned between each. I was on-track for a top-3 finish overall before I blew the brake zone on the main straight and decided to call it a day. You can't beat physics, no matter how good your brakes are
Next up is a little refresher maintenance on the car (new front hubs, oil change, etc) and getting set up to install a passenger seat for my wife to ride along (or drive?!) from time to time.
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