http://www.sfrscca.org/Results/20020630/
Hi all,
Well things could have been better and could have been worse this weekend. I
turned in one of my better race times, 1:59.8, but ended up totaling the car do
to an incident exiting turn 6. I had to cut my practice short on Saturday do to
a failing front hub. We replaced it with one of the spares and went for
qualifying. Qualifying was only 12 minutes long and I only got one lap in that
was worth anything. It was a time of 2:00.8 which qualified my at 5th in ITA
and 11th overall.
The race started okay but I was not able to keep the momentum through turn 2
because Tachi had to back off and that let an ITS and an ITB car get by. I
spent a couple of laps getting by Tachi and the two other cars. I then caught
up with Chuck Canepa who was 3rd in points. I was all over him but didn't get
by during my first attempt. I new I could pass him and on the next lap set him
up for a pass in to turn 6, the carousel, I wanted the inside but ended up with
the outside of the turn. I was able to brake late and hold the outside all the
way to the very end of the exit where you go down the straight to turn 7.
Unfortunately Chuck didn't give me racing room and at the very end he made
contact which sent me sideways in to the wall at about 80 miles an hour. It's
hard to explain where I hit but suffice it to say it wasn't an ideal wall
situation. It was like being t-boned instead of hitting the typical contact you
have on course. I ended up 3/4 of the way across the track with a destroyed
left side of a car. Emergency picked me up and I waited to get back to the
paddock. Chuck seemed to also be missing from the cars coming by over the next
few minutes. My guess was he was blacked flagged. It turns out he felt so
bad about hitting me he DNFed himself and left his car
in tech (where you go if there is a problem).
The Fiero was lifted by the tow truck, yes lifted, and dropped at the corner to
be later dropped off at tech. I talked to Chuck were I found out why he was in
Tech. He didn't race for the rest of the day. I didn't protest him since I
certainly took responsibility and clearly felt pretty bad about the situation.
I think what added to his concern is that the accident looked very bad, but the
Fiero and protective equipment did there job and I was not seriously injured,
harness burn/bruising only.
I mentioned the times I turned was 1:59.8 Chuck had a time of 2:00.7 so I was
really hooked up. I felt very comfortable no concerns I was fighting the car
and was really excited about putting Chuck behind me to synch up 2nd place and
maybe have a good race with Steve B. I'll post the results when they're
available online. I don't feel like providing the detail tonight I hope you
understand. :-)
Almost forgot, I have a plan to make the PCRRC (Pacific Coast Road Racing
Championship). How you may ask. While I was wondering around, thinking about
what I could to do, I called my roll cage builder to see if he could put a cage
in my Fiero roller. I had to leave a couple of messages and didn't think I
would hear back until Monday. I was surprised when he called back and said he would
do it. He'll be ordering the tubing Monday hopefully to have it in by Tuesday.
I'll have to really work hard to have the old car torn apart and ready to take
up with the spare car on Wednesday or Thursday. He says if he has the old cage
and car he can work faster. I think the tranny is damaged and several other
components as well. So I'll have my work cut out to get to the subframes and drivetrain back in running order. I'll update
you during the rest of the week on how things go and also how sore I really am
tomorrow. I'm attaching some dark pictures that I took with cheap digital
camera to give you a small sense of the damage.
l8r