While many of you were enjoying some fun at Rich's this weekend, some of us were racing in Garrison with IIRA. There were some highs and lows for the MNSOC teams this week. One high point was that MNSOC teams swept the top three spots on the grid for the endurance race. The track was very wide and fast with sections that were approaching 100 mph. Ziptie was there again and a few more lessons about who you should race with were learned. There is fresh damage on the driver's side doors from two different cars (non-subarus, jealousy) Overall, they had a good weekend but it ended on a sour note. They had an issue losing the charge air tube and coasting to a stop. The last time was right in front of the pits with Dan driving. He demostrated his frustration by beating the steering wheel into submission while he waited to be towed to the pits. Car 25 had a new driver this week, David Steen Jr. David does not have his driver's license yet and has driven a manual transmission once before, at a rallycross. He ran his rookie race, spun twice but still finished. He is improving fast but still has a long ways to go. Brent and Kevin had good results including second in the Enduro despite breaking first and second gear. Car 83 had another good weekend with three wins, a second and a third in five races. Jay was sick on Saturday so it was just Dave and Mark driving. In the first race, Dave got hit twice by an overly optimistic Rabbit driver. A short talk with the steward followed those incidents. Dave took third and second in the first two sprint races. Mark had a clean race in sprint three, winning from the outside pole after a 6 lap battle with Bill Nelson in his hot rod Rabbit. Bill's engine went sour just after Mark made a dramatic pass by carrying a bunch of momentum on the tightest corner of the track, swinging wide for the outside pass. Jay was feeling better on Sunday and came up to drive the endurance race. Mark and Jay won from the pole with a three lap margin at the end. As always, in-car can be seen at Mark's youtube channel, 29mustang. [YOUTUBE]<object width="853" height="505"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/EJBnBu4Zkcc&hl=en_US&fs=1&hd=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/EJBnBu4Zkcc&hl=en_US&fs=1&hd=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="853" height="505"></embed></object>[/YOUTUBE] At about 6:30 you can see Grampa Dave screw up and biff the bank. The next race will be Jan 30-31 at Lindstrom. It will be a skeleton crew as Mark and Brent will be at the SCCA convention and Carl and Dave will be at SnoDrift.
that was a great time. Hopefully Dan will get my Sprint race up from Saturday...that battle was tough and it was definitely a photo finish
It was a fun weekend even though ziptie #13 had a bad day sunday. The ghetto intake Dan had rigged up finally decided it had enough and would not stay on the turbo outlet. Once Dan gets the proper sized hose we won't have that problem anymore. Dan also had a bit of a scare saturday when one of the rear tires began to de-laminate (the tires are re-tread passenger tires. The re-tread section began to peel off from the the tire). I drove pretty poorly saturday but did ok sunday. Dave and Dan were on top of it all weekend and had some very good races. Dave had a photo finish on his sprint race - it was very exciting! I had contact twice saturday. The first time happened after the car lost power exiting a corner (We have some intermittent problem where the car will cut all power until the ecu is reset) leaving me stuck right on the line. The second time was passing on the long straight, I was neck and neck with the other car right where the straight made a slight kink - at about 90mph both cars bounced together. I think we hit a little heave in the ice and he bounced out and I bounced in. I also took out a big pylon trying to make an inside pass on that funny hacked up subaru wagon/truck - I was told to give them a wide berth which is why I turned in a bit early. I also managed to flat two tires with a combination of late turn-in/power hiccup - I think Kevin had a more extreme way of getting flat tires - I hope he posts that picture up! The only other scare I had was nearly t-boning Dave Jr coming around a corner before the yellow flag was out and then nearly getting taken out by the car behind me.
