Saturday's race was a blast. John Lindsey qualified first, me just a couple hundredths ahead of Rob Cadle for second, and Will Goo a not too distant 4th. On the start Rob was able to work up next to me going into 2, and stuck out a great pass on the outside of 2 which left him on the inside for 3. I pressed him as hard as I could to the outside, and made him hit the brakes in the marbles for turn 3, but he stuck the pass with his great control. It was such a beautiful pass that it put a tear in my eye when I got him right back going over turn 4
John Lindsey had gotten a couple cars between us in first, as there were a couple of 944s running between he and I. I worked my way past one, and one got by him, so I ended up behind him and the chase was on! As my luck would have it, he mis-shifted in turn 9 and I came along side him down the straight looking at him and gesturing with a "WTF?" motion. He resonded with a "WTF?" look also, and I knew he'd be all over me if his car was okay. John Lindsey didn't disappoint - he was all over me like back hair on Rob Cadle. Every time I looked, there was Lindsey fillimg my mirror. He really had my number in 9 and 1, I somehow could run through 2 a little better and would walk away a little coming out of 5. Eventually our fight brought an RX-7 into the mix, and she started to try to work her way by John, eventually capitalizing on her better brakes (who knew!) and running down the inside of him somewhere. I decided she must be faster and let he by rather than defend, only to have her hold me up in 8 and 9 for a couple laps, putting JWL right back on me. I passed her back and she continued to battle Lindsey after he got by her too, to the point of giving him a little love tap in 5 and putting him more than a little sideways (I noticed it in my mirror he was so askew!). This resulted in him getting a bad run out of 5 and I was able to gap him quite a bit, and stayed in the lead the last 2 laps.
Sunday Jim Hickerson drove my car, and did very well for only having driven the car for his second time (he missed warm up, qualified 3rd and finished 3rd). The story of the day was the fight between John Matthew and Phil Usher. John rented Will Goos car for the day, and was warned that while it should handle fine, it has no cams or ECU so it's down a more than a little on power, so he may be at the back of the SE-R pack so to speak. HA! John ran nose to tail the entire race with Phil who was in first place and even stuck his nose out a few times going into turn one. He looked to be bringing it to Phil in turn 9 pretty well, but on the second to last lap some H1 cars caught and passed him in turn 9 taking away precious momentum and giving Phil enough gap to not have to worry for the last lap. It was an awesomly entertaining battle to watch from the stands!
I look forward to seeing everyone at the Buttonwillow event!
