Jaygo Racing

Sunday morning's weather was vastly different from Saturday morning's pea soup, so everybody was looking for a good session. I was especially looking forward to that morning's session because I had only made three dry laps on the track on Saturday (and that was with a wicked handling race car). I rolled off the grid to begin the session and attempted my first hard braking at Canada Corner (turn 12). The car immediately darted to the left and, owing to the fact that there is a concrete wall to driver's left heading into Canada Corner, I jerked the wheel back to the right and spun into the front edge of the gravel trap outside of Canada Corner. I thought that I had hit a large bump in the track but when I hit the brakes hard again for Turn 1 on my second lap the car darted to the left again. I realized that this was going to keep happening so I adjusted my lines accordingly. However, between fighting the unsure handling under braking and being mired in heavy traffic for most of the session (largely because I was not fast enough to escape from slower cars) I qualified sixth in FST with a time nearly four seconds off the pole lap (set by Greg Rice).

After I brought the car back to the truck I told Jim (owner of SR Racing) that the car was darting to the left under braking and that downshifts were very difficult as the car warmed up. They adjusted the toe (toeing the car in a bit) and made some other minor adjustments to correct the braking issues. The clutch issue proved to be more difficult (encompassing the starter, some loose bolts near the flywheel, and other fun stuff) but Jim and Brandon worked hard to correct the issues and the car was ready to race by 1PM that afternoon.

I actually started fifth in FST (owing to Doug Dale's engine giving up the ghost in Sunday morning's qualifying) for Sunday's race. Doug qualified ahead of me but he was not able to make the race due to the aforementioned engine issues. I got my best start of the year during Sunday's race and was able to hang with the lead draft of Formula Firsts (and one very fast National Vee -- thanks again for the advice, Bruce, and congrats on the win) for the first few laps. Unfortunately, Jared Smith dropped out on Lap 1 due to mechanical gremlins. That was a real shame after he turned the fast lap on Saturday. A few laps later Doug Seim dropped out due to engine issues. My psychic abilities determined that this was likely to happen after Doug oiled down my helmet for a couple laps that I was following him (just kidding, Doug -- sorry about the tough luck again). He pulled off outside Turn 3 and has to win the award for best flagger of the weekend for waving us to the outside of the track to avoid his car pulled off to the inside of T3.

After all of that activity I was running fourth on the race track and third in class. The order at that point in time was Rice, Mark Kelly (in the SR Racing Evolution), Bruce Livermore (National FV driver), and me. I hung with this pack for the first five laps and really began to believe I was going to be a factor in this race. I passed Bruce heading down to turn 5 and began to set after Greg and Mark in first and second. About a lap after that Greg began to experience engine problems and that left Mark and I to battle for the win. I believe I made my first passing attempt during lap 7 as we headed down on Turn 1. However, there was a white flag out from the corner stand and, from my vantage point, it looked like there was a yellow flag behind it. I decided that I didn't want to penalized for passing under yellow, so I dropped back into line. I was able to complete the pass on the next lap and I was in the lead of an SCCA race for the first time in my life. Mark raced me hard and we traded the lead a couple more times before I took it from him again with a couple laps to go.

I knew that he was not done trying to pass me, and he got an excellent run heading down to Canada Corner on the last lap. I moved to the middle of the road to make his passing attempt as difficult as possible and I braked as late as I had the entire weekend. At that point, I had decided that I was going to win the race or spin out trying to defend the lead. Thankfully, I did not spin out and was able to thwart Mark's passing attempt. I headed to Turn 14 and was just a tiny bit too careful in the braking zone there. It slowed me up enough for Mark to get a draft off me heading to the flag and, despite my maneuver to only leave him one clear lane of racetrack for the pass, he nipped me at the line by .098 seconds - the second closest FST race of the year.

When I rolled into impound everybody was very congratulatory of the show that we had put on out on the racetrack and lots of people said very kind things to me about my race. Despite the fact that I lost by the thinnest of margins, it was a very successful day. My 2nd place finish kept me in the points chase and I was very, very pleased that I was able to race my way to the front. In addition, I found out that I turned the fastest lap of the race by .7 seconds, so at least I was #1 in something. :-)

Thankfully, my wife and my dad were there to see both races and they greatly enjoyed Sunday's race. My dad was thrilled with the result and it never hurts to show your wife that you can actually go fast once in a while. She noted that it's more fun to watch me run 2nd than 6th, and I agreed that it's more fun to run 2nd.

All in all, I learned a tremendous amount this weekend. Thanks to Doug and Robert for the tips and advice, thanks to Jim, Brandon, and B.J. for working on the car, thanks to Bill for coordinating everything (and Rob for sponsoring the series). It's been a great year and it's not over yet.

I'll blog once again from Ohio in a few weeks (either Mid-Ohio or Nelson Ledges).