ROAD ATLANTA RACE NOTES 2010

[V8Stockcar]

Many V8 teams took part in Friday's open test day with mixed results. Kurt Roehrig and Dave Machavern both had offs with minor damage and are now repaired and ready to go for Saturday morning qualifying. Charles Wicht V8GT1 Monte Carlo with its new SP2 power plant sounded real good and laid down some nice lap times.

[V8Stockcar]

RACE DAY IS HERE!!!

V8 cars are on the grid for qualifying and will rollout at 8:20 am.
Sunny and 79 deg.

[V8Stockcar]

Larry Hoopaugh on overall pole!!
Class poles:
V8GT1 Charles Wicht
V8GT2 Ed Lewis
V8SPO Larry Hoopaugh
V8GTA Bob Stretch

[V8Stockcar]

Race 11 had plenty of action starting with V8GT1 Charles Wicht's return as a successful one picking up the win over Dave Machavern.
In V8GT2 Ed Lewis had a great run picking up a class win in his black C6 corvette.
V8SPO Larry Hoopaugh kicked off the weekend with picking up the overall pole and capping it off with a class win. In a series first, Larry got down on one knee on the victory podium and asked his fiancee to marry him. She said YES! Congratulations to both.
IN the V8GTA class, the flying Texan, Bob Stretch, held off Kurt Roehrig for a class win.

[V8Stockcar]

V8GTA fast guys Bob Stretch and Kurt Roehrig each pick up a class win

WTG Charles Wicht and Ed Lewis each picking up two V8GT class wins

V8SPO Hoopaugh and Breehne each with a Big W for the weekend

[V8Stockcar]

Casey Carden picked up long time south Fl racer Ed Griesmyer V8SPO car and with a little more work looks to be back on track soon!

[BK Racing]

I'll have some thoughts about the weekend eventually, but right now I'm just too tuckered out to organize them completely. We had some really good racing from the V8SC bunch and Larry's proposal to his girlfriend (in the Winners' Circle on Saturday) was classic. We certainly hope to have as big a crowd at the ARRC by GRM the weekend of November 5-7.

BTW - Tim Suddard of GRM drove Cuervo for two sessions on Friday. He enjoyed the experience and we could/should get some exposure for V8SC in general and V8GTA specifically out of the deal. I'll let you know when links to their stories are available.

A couple of folks were disgruntled by the Stewards' decision to impound the V8GTA cars after Sunday qualifying. We (SCCA) can't check all the cars for compliance with every rule at every event, but we/they CAN check select items (and you don't know which ones they'll be looking for) at select events. If you don't want to follow the rules, either pick a class that has no rules or be prepared to be found non-compliant.

[V8Stockcar]

Congratulations to both

[V8Stockcar]

She said YES!

[KRoehrig]

Road Atlanta What a Race weekend.
I would like to thank Dave Price for being my crew at Atlanta.
At the Friday test day I was completely consistent, I went out twice and ripped the nose off twice.
Without Dave I would have never got it back together. I think we bought all the yellow duct tape at the track.
Saturday things got better. Bob Stretch out qualified us for pole by .2 seconds. We thought we might have a shot in the race.
But Bob Stretch got an early lead and we could not match his pace, and finished second.
Worked on the front valence (still dmaged from Friday) and went out to Sunday qualifying.
Went .4 second quicker than Saturday, but Bob Stretch went quicker yet. I think I see a pattern developing.
Start of race on Sunday Larry Hoopaugh and I got together in turn 2, he didnt know I was there. All I know is
the sky was blue, I know because that is all I could see. I landed in the dirt outside turn 3 and got rolling again. The car was
shaking like crazy. But it got better (dirt/clay in wheels?). As I came down the hill to 12 Dave Price told me on the
radio that Bob Stretch was right behind me. For the next 14 laps I had the best race I have had for 28 years (yes I was racing 28 years ago).
It seemed I had an edge in T12, T1, and the exit of T7. Bob Stretch was killing me in the downhill esses and T5.
Bob Strtech and I got together a couple of times. For my part I thought it was good hard racing. I got the win this time. Bob Stretch is a hell of a good race car driver,
and I look forward to racing him again. That is after I figure out a quicker line in T5.

[fixrim]

Well that wasn't the best race I had in 28 years!

Of course everyone knew I ran on GoodYears, after all, Kut you came to me on Saturday looking to buy some! Whata coincidence that on Sunday I was DQ'd for "illegal tires" (which we last years tires).

On Sunday after staring dead last and catching up, it was clear that getting by Kurt wasn't going to be easy without contact. I hadn't seen such moves since my Spec Miata days. And I sure wasn't expecting to be turned around in 6 after getting by.

And lapped traffic... I didn't know pushing those guys out of the way was okay!

Well, congrats to Kurt for winning.

My preference would have been for a lot less contact, less spins, and a lot cleaner race. Ask the GTA guys in the Midwest how many guys I have turned around since I got a GTA car 3 years ago...

And PS it wasn't the Goodyears that made me fast on Saturday.. hopefully that was apparent after I elected to run Hoosiers on Sunday.