Jaygo Racing

Sunday morning dawned clear, hot, and muggy for Round 2 of the championship. In pre-qualifying preparation on Sunday morning Jim was able to diagnose two issues with the car that had plagued me in Saturday afternoon's race. First, he diagnosed and fixed a gear selection issue that was causing me to miss over half of my downshifts into 3rd gear on Saturday. He also corrected a second issue with the throttle that was costing the engine 300-400 revs down Grattan's long front straightaway.

I gridded for Sunday morning's qualifying session with the car feeling the best that it had the whole weekend. After watching the qualifying for the other open wheel run groups I had also discovered some different lines to take through some of the turns. The improvements to the car and line/braking point discoveries I had made prompted me to set a goal for myself to get into the 1:32's in the morning session.

The car felt good in the morning session and I did not have any off-track excursions. I did have one significant moment when a missed downshift after "the jump" caused the car to jump sideways quite a bit. Thankfully I caught the car and continued the session.

I brought the car back to the pits after completing 11 laps in the morning session. I checked my time to see that I had run a 1:31.8, an improvement of 4.8 seconds from my Saturday qualifying time. That was only 3.5 seconds off the pole and within a second or two of some very experienced First/Vee drivers. Needless to say, I was quite happy and looking forward to the afternoon's race. I qualified fifth in class (kudos to Jared Smith on taking the pole) and seventh overall.

The afternoon's race did not go quite as I had planned, but I was able to bring home a fourth place finish in class thanks to no off-track excursions and Jared Smith's unfortunate failure while leading the race (very tough luck -- he was having a great run). I got a decent start and was able to beat the eighth place qualifier into turn 1 on the first lap. However, I took it too easy on my tires through the next section of the course and was passed by two cars at "the jump". I was able to keep the red car (I believe it was Chris Satterley) in my sights but I was not able to reel him in and came home a decent 7th overall and fourth in class. My best lap was a 1:33.5 (about 1.7 seconds off my morning time). I learned a lot during the race, specifically that I need to race the racetrack rather than the cars around me. When you're concentrating on things other than proper braking, shifting, and turn-in points it will slow you down. Of course, they told us this in racing school but sometimes you have to learn things yourself!

All in all, it was a reasonably successful weekend. Two fourths puts me in a decent points position to start the season and I learned a tremendous amount about the car and the brakes. Hopefully everything I learned this weekend will help me get closer and closer to the sharp end of the field as the season goes on.

Thanks to Rob Howden for his coverage and sponsorship of our series (check out FormulaCar Magazine and www.eformulacarnews.com) and thanks again to Grand Rapids Auto Auction for making this weekend possible for me. I'm proud to have Progressive Basics on the car for the next three events this season and I'm looking forward to bringing them some strong results!