CART 2008 Autox # 2 April 27, 2008: Get into the groove

 

The Connecticut Autocross and Rally Team held autocross #2 on the 2008 schedule on April 27 in Bristol Connecticut.  It was a grey, cloudy day with rain forecast for the afternoon.  I don’t know if it was the weather forecast, or the fact that the season has started and there were multiple events available for the past three weeks, but only ninety eight drivers registered for the event.  With Paul Omichinski M.I.A., Brad snow volunteered to take the ten novices on the novice walk thru.

Technical inspection had a new wrinkle.  An annual track event technical inspection was available at this event, for the vehicles entered in our track events for 2008.  After Dana Robbins studied past events, he found that a core group of club members attended multiple track events.  If we gave these cars a thorough inspection at the beginning of the year, we could do a briefer inspection at the track and concentrate on vehicles we don’t normally see.

Bill Evans laid out a low maintenance course.  An outer loop and inner loop, and finish, simple, right?  Wrong!  A few deftly laid out traps caught a majority of the participants, some of them more than once.  The start was easy enough with a gentle offset gate, drive to the end of the lot and turn left.  A couple of slightly offset gates led the unwary to trap number one.  A pivot cone and pointer stood well short of the turn back up the lot.  If you started turning at the pivot, you were way too early for the turn, and killed your speed entering the next straight.  However, if you just turned at the gate, it was acceleration time.  Too much acceleration got you at trap number two.  The left onto the interior portion of the course was placed just out of normal view, and car after car locked it up, hit cones and generally went off course trying to make the left with too much speed.  A slight diagonal straight brought you to a heavy braking zone and a tight right, more cones down, more smoke and drama.  Survive this, and it was straight to the finish.  Straight to the finish, and straight to an off course, because trap number three got you and you missed a gate at the extreme left of your vision.  Simple layout, major trap, chagrined drivers, we had it all.

Super Stock was brute force over sophistication, as Tom Cavuoto’s Corvette took the win over Douglas Shoemaker’s Lotus Elise.  A Stock was another win for American Iron, with Joe Solury’s Corvette won the class beating Joe Barbato’s smooth running Toyota MR2.  Stan Marcewiecz did the mean thing in D Stock, leaving car owner Erica Bonomi behind as he wheeled her Mazdaspeed 3 to beat Jim Reinle’s Civic.  Jim was lucky to run at all, as he was rebuilding his rear suspension in the parking lot during the event.  Jim Duphiney was loving his new / old Miata, as he won E Stock over Rob Carter’s 91 Miata by less than two tenths of a second.  G Stock was Mini’s at the front with Brad Snow beating John Westermann. 

Leo Ficks and the evil Evo smoked the field in BSP, beating Jeff Guerrera in an Evo by almost a second and a half.  Leo’s time was also good for FTD.  Chris DiFiore took advantage of Paul O’s absence, and won CSP, beating Adam Nogiec by six tenths of a second.  Todd Kean made the move from GS last year to DSP and won the class in his Subaru, beating Daniel Polak’ Saturn by less than half a second.  ESP, or the Mustang Coral, was won by Yaro Teager, beating last year’s champ, Mark Eastwood.  Finally, in Street Prepared, it was Chris Fuhrmann in a Mirage beating Kevin FitzMaurice in a Legacy by just over a second.

X Prepared saw some different people due to the wonders of bumping.  When the bump was done, it was Jay Bode, coming out of FP winning over John Santos coming out of AP.  B Prepared, or the Twilight Zone class, was won by Dennis Polio Jr. beating Dennis Polio Sr. by less than three tenths of a second in a shared 64 Corvette.  The other car in the class was a co-driven Merkur.  To celebrate second place, Dennis Sr. lost a wheel just after the finish of run # 5 as all the lug studs had sheared off the left rear wheel.

A Modified was won by a co-driven Legends car.  Sean Colsen finished first, and Andy Martenson came in second in the same car.  E Mod was MR2 vs. XJS vs. XJC but when the smoke cleared it was Chris Zelle’s Toyota over Dean Cusano’s Jag.  Street Mod was won by Liam Dwyer’s Evo, beating Bob Pielli’s Mini by less than seven tenths of a second.  Street Mod 2 saw last year’s runner up for Driver of the Year, Nick Fandacone win the Nissan battle, beating Agner Santiago by over a second. 

Y Novice was won by Nicholas Schriver in a Cavalier, and Stew Foley won Z Novice in at Nissan 350Z.  The FTD battle was Liam Dwyer third fastest, Nick Fandacone second fastest, and Leo Ficks winning the prize.  We’ll be back in Bristol on May 4^th and then it’s off to Pocono on May 9^th for our first track day of the 2008 season.