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924RACR

Weekend's not over yet, but a quick update... PUB Racing's back on top in ITB!

Chris and Merritt both had an excellent qualifying session yesterday; Chris easily took pole by a tenth over a resurgent Mustang of Tom Forst, who led the championship by one point over the defending Marsh going into the weekend.

Merritt, coming off a post-Mid-Ohio high, surged far ahead of her previous qualifying efforts, putting all that Mid-O experience to good use. Previously her best lap had only been a 1:25.1; after putting in a solid string of 1:24's, she closed off with a 1:23.9 before spinning out with a rather loose car. This was good to put her at around 7th in a large ITB field, as I recall.

The race was exciting; Chris had a decent start, but Tom had an even better start and put his Mustang in front halfway through the first lap. Merritt also had a good start, hanging on to a faster group of cars and maintaining the excellent pace of 1:24's she'd posted in qualifying.

Chris was readily able to chase down and pass Tom at his leisure, showing the confidence of the past champion and spearing past on the legendary Porsche brakes at the end of the back straight, regaining the lead on the second or third lap. Chris then proceeded to check out and build an unassailable lead, winning with a substantial margin of victory.

Merritt continued to push hard to stay with her group, and was nearly managing to, till the considerable heat got to her; sweat started to blind her as her CoolShirt weakened, and she eventually spun out with a couple of laps to go, finishing near the back after being unable to see clearly for some time to reenter the track.

Today promises to be even hotter; we'll be going through lots of ice as the temps clear 90 degrees. I think we'll be stopping for more gatorade too, on the way to the track!

Meanwhile, I'm off to play with the DSR...
_________________
Vaughan Scott
Webmeister
'79 924 #77 SCCA H Prod racecar
'82 931 Plat. Silver
#25 Hidari Firefly P2 sports prototype

924RACR · Posted: Mon Aug 30, 2010 10:26 pm Post subject:

Well, Sunday sure was exciting!

Spent a little time in the AM trying to get the DSR started, but no dice; current theory is the alarm system - which is not supposed to be in the US bikes, but apparently is anyway - still needs to be bypassed.

Sunday opened up hot as hell, clear sunny and little breeze. Our crew took the green just after lunch. Chris had a rough start, getting passed by two Mustangs and falling back to third; Merritt also had a poor start, due to idiots in front of her apparently confusing the green flag with a red flag and hitting the brakes at the worst time, coming nearly to a stop.

Chris proceeded to pace the Mustangs... the two Mustangs traded places, putting former champ Dave Cordier in the lead, and Tom Forst, who led the points coming into the weekend, falling back to second. On around the 3rd or 4th lap, Chris made a bold move to the inside of Tom going into Turn 3, but wasn't quite able to clear, and they worked side-by-side up over and down Hilltop towards Big Bend; Chris was finally able to pull in front of Tom getting to Big Bend and was able to motor down the back straight to clear out.

He then stalked down Cordier, who'd pulled a little bit of a lead while Tom and Chris were fighting. With only a couple of laps to go, Chris got a big run into 6 (at the end of the back straight) and passed Cordier's Mustang on the brakes, retaking the lead.

Merritt meanwhile was struggling to regain some positions, after the poor start; while she wasn't able to make much ground, and eventually spun in Turn 3 while pushing hard, she did continue to turn excellent lap times, solid 1:24's while not held up by slower drivers. Even after the spin, she was able to get back on pace, but of course the competition was out of reach by then, and she was unable to continue to challenge for position.

Thankfully, some improvements we'd made to the car that morning helped a lot; we added a blower fan (like NASCAR uses for brake blowers/cooling) inside the cockpit, blowing right in her face, and she had no further problems with sweat in the eyes - though it was still very hot!

However, back up at the front, the battle between the Mustangs for Best of the Rest continued. Tom evidently saw the braking move Chris pulled off, and wanted to emulate it; however, when he tried to do so on the last lap or so, everything went wrong in a big way.

Either locking up the brakes or losing them - saw a cloud of blue smoke, could've been either tires or brake fluid - Tom went sailing in and did a bank shot off the inside of Dave's Mustang, sending Dave off into the kitty litter at the end of the back straight, with substantial damage to the right front corner.

Meanwhile Tom rode the contact out on the outside of the corner, running wide, but didn't have any room, and ended up climbing the tire wall and flipping over slowly, coming to rest on his lid.

They were both uninjured, but the cars have suffered, and now need some repairs to return. Tom said his brakes failed, and it's certainly possible - there definitely didn't seem to be much in the way of braking before he hit Dave.

Chris, thankfully, was clear of this, though still close enough to see it in his rearview mirror! He sailed on to a clean win, though the checker was I believe thrown a lap early due to the crash.

Sunday afternoon, therefore, had a slightly reduced ITB grid - though with 13 ITB cars starting in the first race, and only a few out, it was still a very full field!

Chris had a decent start, though again had some hangups with leading cars; however, with the two primary condenders for the win out already with damage, there wasn't much threat. He was able to cruise to a win, holding off some cars from the ITS class to maintain track position - yet still make it look easy! The MC at the trophy presentation was joking that he never even breaks a sweat while winning!

Merritt had a good solid race, but being back in the pack, was held up badly by a lap 1, turn 2 incident that forced her to come to a complete stop to avoid contact. As a result, she again lost contact with the group she was trying to run with, and was again forced to just circulate turning laps mostly by herself. However, again she proved a diligent student, maintaining her newfound faster pace, despite crushing heat, and brought the car home cleanly and in one piece despite being on the verge of heat exhaustion when she had to almost be helped out of the car!

Great job by PUB Racing, and excellent work by our crew and drivers despite some of the hottest weather we've had to work in!
_________________
Vaughan Scott
Webmeister
'79 924 #77 SCCA H Prod racecar
'82 931 Plat. Silver
#25 Hidari Firefly P2 sports prototype

924RACR · Posted: Mon Aug 30, 2010 10:55 pm Post subject:

Forgot to mention; by my calculations, I think this should lock up another ITB Championship for Chris Marsh!!
_________________
Vaughan Scott
Webmeister
'79 924 #77 SCCA H Prod racecar
'82 931 Plat. Silver
#25 Hidari Firefly P2 sports prototype

ideola · Joined: 01 Oct 2004 Posts: 15550 Location: Spring Lake MI

Excellent write up as usual, congrats to Chris! Respect to Merritt for toughing it out while us couch potatoes were inside in the A/C.

_________________
erstwhile owner of just about every 924 variant ever made

Fifty50Plus · Posted: Tue Aug 31, 2010 12:50 am Post subject:

Vaughan,
Thanks for the great write up again. Pass my congratulations to Chris and Merritt for another exciting race weekend.
Chuck
_________________
1979 924 NA race car H-Prod SCCA
1982 924 NA race car - Sold
1981 924 Turbo sold
1982 924 Turbo sold
1972 911 E race car - traded for Cayenne Diesel
1975 914 1.8 Building for H-Prod SCCA

Fifty50Plus · Posted: Thu Sep 02, 2010 2:25 am Post subject:

See Tom's for sale add in IT-Com.

http://www.improvedtouring.com/forums/showthread.php?t=28253

And the local write up didn't give Chris or Merritt any recognition????

http://de.theoaklandpress.com/Reposi...sh-skin-custom

Porsche = Good Brakes!

Chuck
_________________
1979 924 NA race car H-Prod SCCA
1982 924 NA race car - Sold
1981 924 Turbo sold
1982 924 Turbo sold
1972 911 E race car - traded for Cayenne Diesel
1975 914 1.8 Building for H-Prod SCCA

924RACR · Posted: Thu Sep 02, 2010 4:40 am Post subject:

Wow, good eye!

Yeah, the local coverage isn't entirely complete - they tend to focus on overall winners, not every class... but at least we're getting some coverage, which is better than we've been getting - aka none!

Yeah, Tom listed his cars, but he wasn't entirely serious, mainly just seriously pissed-off at an incredibly harsh 6 race weekend suspension.

Really, over a year for a mechanical problem?
_________________
Vaughan Scott
Webmeister
'79 924 #77 SCCA H Prod racecar
'82 931 Plat. Silver
#25 Hidari Firefly P2 sports prototype