CART Autox returns to Bristol by Liam Dwyer

On Sunday September 20, 2009 the Connecticut Autocross and Rally Team descended on Rowley Springs in Bristol, CT for yet another auto-x. Beautiful weather was bestowed upon us, bright sunny skies with no clouds in site. Joe Rathbun was the event chair and he helped lay out a course that was both fast and challenging. The course started on the right side of lot, with a straight shot that went into a double gate offset. The offset exited into a 180 deg left hander that brought you down through an intersection box and to the bottom of the lot. This lead to difficult decreasing radius, double apex, off camber exit left hand corner. You were able to push the entry here a bit, but you had to be tight and on the inside cone at the exit. This lead to the fastest part of the course, a long straight through the intersection box and out to the top of the lot. You were greeted with another left hander that brought you around 270degrees and over to two steeply set apart offset gates. A wide entry with lots of braking got you set up for a tight exit to the second offset and with a tight line through here allowed you to be full throttle to a right hand bend into the finish. The finish on Sunday was set up so it pointed out to the paddock, with this, we required all competitors to make a COMPLETE stop before continuing no. There was also a center cone placed at the end of the stop box. If you hit this you were off course. This rule and cone wiped away many runs throughout the day.

A stock Japanese AWD technology reigned superior to German Autobahn Engineering as Jim Armstrong earned his first win this year beating fellow Subaru driver John Williamson by almost four tenths of a second. In B stock, Tom Mak once again lead the way. Charlie Aucoin was bumped from C stock and put up a good fight be fell one tenth short of taking the class win. E-stock was a bump class, being combined with G stock. Matt Cummings was on top once again in his v-dub.

B Street Prepared saw Liam Dwyer fit r compounds to his 350z and try to take the fight to the AWD contingents in the class . Jim Velgot reminded Dwyer that AWD will be superior and drove his BSP Sti to a four tenths win over the B Stock z. Brian Elzin was the fastest Corvette in class beating Joe Solury and John Jankura for third in the very large class. Paul Omichinski debuted his new engine and promptly took the CSP class win. Chris Difiore was second about a half second back. Joe Rathbun man handled FSP once again, while Joe Skibisky finished second beating his son Matt by two tenths.

This writer is curious if the senior citizens that run in X-prepared were offered a discount on their Metamucil if they beat the younger drivers. You had ‘old’ drivers with ‘old’ cars beating up on the younger, more technologied drivers/cars of the class. John Santos lead the AARP charge in his Cobra followed by Joerg Bode and Dennis Polio. If you ask either of the three, they could probably tell you what exact tool Moses used to carve the ten commandments.

In A mod, the Beast was driven to the class win by Eric Gebhardt. Gebhardt had FTD until the very end of the day when Justin Lau, running his STU prepared Sti put together an Ungodly run to take it away. Lau took the class win edging Char (Kumar) Perera and winning FTD by .006 seconds. That’s the closest margin in FTD since Dwyer lost it last year by .001 seconds. In SMA, the absence of Nick Fandacone allowed Justin Beltrucki to drive Wendy (the car name not his girlfriends) to the class win.

In X-novice Ted Dalenta earned the class win when Tyler Matta decided not to show up for his work assignment. Tyler will now have to work at least two work assignments before he is allowed to run. Dalenta drove his Mazda 3 to the class win and will be in his regular class at the next event. Ken Labadie beat fellow focus driver, Kevin Westerfield, for the Y novice win.

Thank you all for coming out. Our next event is Sept 28th at Pocono, Circuits Maximus. Our next autocross is October 4th again in Bristol. Points are being tabulated as we speak.