Putnam Park Road Course

Our last race weekend of the season will be October 8th and 9th at Putnam Park Roard Course which is near Greencastle, IN. This will be a four race weekend, with two races on Saturday and two races on Sunday. This is being billed as the Midwest Region vs. OH/IN Region. This should be a great way to end the season.

Race 5

The weather on Sunday was much like Saturday, but slightly cooler. The old hoosiers were holding up well and we elected to keep them on for the morning practice session. The session went fine, I hooked up with several GTS drivers and we had a good session. Best lap time was 1:26.372. I dropped 2 seconds on lap times that session so we elected to put on the new hoosiers for qualifying. I went out and ran about half the session, a little off the pace, to slowly brake in the tires. On lap 8 I posted a 1:24.688, which was my best time thus far and decided to come in. I qualified 3rd in class and 19th overall.

My starting position was on the drivers right which would set me up for the inside of turn 1, but on the start, the outside lane opened up and I missed a golden opportunity to make several passes, but I elected to stay inside (rookie mistake) and in turn one the pack checked up and I had to take evasive action to stop from hitting the car ahead of me. After turn one, the field started to spread out and I was setting in fifth place in GTS1. The #21 of Dan Davis was in fourth place, the #35 of Greg Steen was in third, the #12 of Greg Coward was in second and the #43 of Christian Cook was in first. I raced hard for several laps with Dan and I spent time looking for a place to get around him. We were so equally matched that it would take a mistake on his part or some aggressive driving on my part if I was going to get by him. After a few more laps of watching his line, I saw that I could get a run on him on the entry to the back straight and I would have to try to out brake him. So when I had the next opportunity to get a run on him, I did just that, I broke late and moved to the inside and passed him. We spent several laps nose to tail. At about mid way thought the race, the #35 GTS1 car of Greg Steen spun in turn two and I passed him for position. Now I was ruining third and Dan Davis was running fourth. As we would enter the Swamp Turn, I would have to brake slightly to set the car up for the turn and he didn’t have to, so he would get a run on me, but I was able to exit the turn better that he could, so the run that he would get on me he could not hold and we did that for the last few laps until he spun in the middle of the Swamp Turn. I ran a few laps in third place and then Greg was right behind me for position. We battled for several laps and he passed me on the back straight. I could get a run on him entering the back straight but just could not get around him. On the last lap, I moved to his inside in the swamp turn, but could not get by him and we finished side by side with him in the lead. So I finished in fourth place with a best lap time of 1:23.798 and I finished 16th in overall.

Race 4

Race four found the ASR Racing team at the Waterford Hills Race Course in Waterford Hills, Michigan on August 13th. This was the first time that we have driven at this track and as such, we had much to learn. The track wraps around the paddock almost completely, there is little room for parking the big rigs, but what area they do have is very nice with electricity and paved sidewalks. The weather was overcast and threatening rain, the temperature was in the 70’s. During the first practice session we elected to run on an old set of Hoosier S03’s just to get familiar with the track. The track lived up to it’s hype, it was short (1.5 mile) and very narrow in places and aggressive driving would prove to keep most drivers quite busy at all times, only allowing for a quick glimpse of the gauges on the back straightway. The session was over quickly and I posted a best lap of 1:28.689, which is nothing to write home about, but it was a start.

With the weather still threatening rain, we elected to leave the old Hoosiers on for qualifying. They still had a few heat cycles left in them and if the weather was going to get bad, I would rather be on these as opposed to the new sticker Hoosiers S04’s I had in the trailer. The budget has not allowed for rain tries yet.

Qualifying was dry for the first few laps and then we had a few raindrops. The session was uneventful, with the exception of a close encounter with a Mustang that got sideways under hard braking at the end of he back straight and I and to do some agricultural driving to avoid contact. We qualified third in class with a 1:26.721 and 16th overall out of 19 drivers. The start of the race was fast and everyone got into turn one cleanly and without any major incidents. I was running behind a CMC Camaro for many laps. He would pull several car lengths on me on the back stretch and I would real him back in thought the esses, but I just did not have the HP’s to get by him. At about the halfway point of the race, I got a run on him coming onto the backstretch and was able to out brake him at the end of the back straight and executed a pass. It was short lived because he passed me on the back straight on the next lap. I was running third in class at this point and with all of this battling with the Camaro, the fourth place #21 of Dan Davis was able to real me in and was challenging me for position. On the second to last lap of the race, a GTS3 Porsche 944 driven by Joseph Fawsitt was on my tale in the short chute between the back straight and the paddock turn and he stuck a nose in on me at the beginning of the paddock turn and I had to let him go, Dan moved right in behind the GTS3 car and we found ourselves side by side as we exited the paddock turn but as we entered the esses, I was on the inside of the track and the 21 had to back off. On the white flag lap, he got a run on me just entering the Swamp turn and we exited side by side and I had just a little more momentum and held position for a third place finish. Best lap time was 1:24.734 in lap 2 and finished 14th overall.

This was my fourth race and I finished it clean, so that officially ended my “rookie probation”. Yea!!! I need to complete three more races to remove the “rookie” signs on the car.