NASA-AZ Bondurant West: April 2014
NASA Arizona returned to the Bondurant West Track for the first time in 2014 on this perfect Spring Weekend. The West track is a short elbow shaped track of about 1.1 miles including one long straight with a sharp left at the end and a fun sweeping right hand turn just in front of the crowd with lots of pavement to play with. West track also has a pretty darn good paddock setup with excellent view of all the action and a relatively efficient track-on and track-off setup.
Like most of our local events we are treated to some great food by Lulu’s Taco Truck serving breakfast and lunch all day long. It’s a great place to come out with the family and experience some of NASA’s finest drivers. The weather was about as good as could be expected although the afternoons warmed up a little and the dust-devils are a good indication of the convective activity in the atmosphere… summer is upon us.
Tage Evanson and the entire NASA crew was setup early and the paddock began to fill Friday afternoon and by the morning briefing it was clear… we had a race!
Just a reminder, the Spring Mountain Event is right around the corner! Management is trying to get a good head count and verify event details, plus there is discounted pricing. Please register early and often: https://www.drivenasa.com/event/1840
HPDE
The NASA High Performance Drivers Education is the breeding ground for all new racers and NASAAZ would like to congratulate the following HPDE-1 participants for taking the time to come out and get involved. DE1 is something many of us fondly remember as the beginning of many new friendships, new skills and a bunch of fun driving.
Wyatt Bledsoe, Tammer El Habiby, Dorian Hollingworth, Michael Kasdorf, Robert LaCoste, Lisa Kavanagh, Aaron Looft, Joshua Mcguigan, Colton Stoks and KellyeTurben. It’s worth noting that 70% of these drivers returned for more action on Sunday also. A nice mix of cars in the DE1 including the now obligatory FRS/BRZ, Lexus, S2000, Mustang, BMW, Nissan and Mazda. Come back for more, please! And give some thought to making the trek up to Vegas with us for the Spring Mountain event. It is 10x more fun at an “Away Track”.
DE3 and DE4 ran combined sessions both days and while no drivers promoted to Time Trial at this event there are a number who are very close. The DE3 drivers under the watchful eye of Ravi Tomerlin did an excellent job helping control the faster traffic with pointbys and keeping the pace moving. It can sometimes be hard to know exactly who is who in the combined DE3/DE4 sessions so this was a great indication of “Situation Awareness” in all the groups.
UMS Tuning Time Attack
The Time Attack series (http://www.umstuningtimeattackseries.com/) was held as usual on Sunday with 2 groups. Within the 2 groups there were 6 TA-A cars, 6 TA-B cars and Russ Whelan running is right hand drive Nissan as the sole TA-C car. In the first session Philip Robles posted the fastest time, just to be outrun by his son moments later. Similarly the ubiquitous Aaron Hiar ran a good full second quicker in the first group, than his Father Todd in the second session. Be nice to your elders!!
The rest of the first session was a pretty tight group of Jeff Abrams, Robert Smithson, Harold Dun and Jason Griepnetrog. In session 2 Jake Casto, Brenden Garvey, Jeremy Nosko and Jon Via posted their times in the 15 minute long session.
Official Results: http://www.mylaps.com/en/classification/3010505
Saturday & Sunday Combined Race Group
Saturday’s race was a thirty-minute combined sprint race with 26 cars starting on the tight 1.1-mile Bondurant West track. There was roughly an 11-second difference in lap times between Big Bore and Small Bore groups meaning that all classes would have to stay alert and drive clean. Small bore had epic battles in the back half of the field: Team LBR + Team Snail + Eric Dayton all swapped positions as if they were playing a game of 3 card monte. Stay tuned for an in car video showing all the action with those three cars mixing it up. In the end, the Saturday Small Bore podium looked like this: First Place: Team KIT, Second Place: Leland Forbes, Third Place: Eric Dayton. Big Bore and overall First Place: Michael Pinholster, Second Place Drew Wadolny, Third Place Greg Dalgarn.
Sunday’s race followed the same 30-minute, combined format, with 24 cars starting the race. Tires were a clear factor as the weekend progressed for Small and Big bore, with some of Saturday’s faster racers moving rearward on the starting grid. Sunday’s spectators were treated to a full thirty-minute battle with a tight finish. Sunday Small bore First Place: Eric Dayton, Second Place: Team KIT, Third Place: Team LBR. Big Bore and overall First Place: Michael Pinholster, Second Place Tim Rollins, Third Place Greg Dalgarn
Notable track records for Saturday:
- New Track Record (1:08.391) for GTS2 by Colin Elsberry.
- New Track Record (1:01.800) for Super Unlimited by Michael Pinholster.
- New Track Record (1:03.574) for Super Touring 2 by Drew Wadolny.
- New Track Record (1:06.709) for Honda Chal 2 by Team KIT.
- New Track Record (1:07.437) for 944 Spec by Pete Dimuzio.
Saturday Official Results: http://www.mylaps.com/en/classification/3010482
Notable track records for Sunday:
- New Track Record (1:06.455) for GTS5 by Ron Ballard.
- New Track Record (1:02.027) for Super Touring 1 by Tim Rollins.
- New Track Record (1:03.511) for Super Touring 2 by Adrian Little.
- New Track Record (1:07.896) for GTS2 by Colin Elsberry.
- New Track Record (1:05.101) for GTS5 by Frederick (Rick) Touton.
- New Track Record (1:01.412) for Super Unlimited by Michael Pinholster.
- New Track Record (1:01.987) for Super Touring 1 by Tim Rollins.
Sunday’s Official Results: http://www.mylaps.com/en/classification/3010486
Season Points: https://nasaaz.com/results/race-results/race-group-results/
Saturday Time Trial
Time Trial ran 3 Small Bore sessions and 3 Big Bore sessions along with a final afternoon Combined session on Saturday as the afternoon temperatures heated up.
In the Overall Small Bore results for all sessions Team Schotz Racing posted the top time of 1:04.652 followed by Robert Rose and Ricky Johnson. In the overall Big Bore results over all the sessions the top speed was earned by Tim Rollins nearly 1M flat, then Dan Maloney and Gary Felton who later suffered a clutch problem that sent him looking for his trailer early.
Full results of Saturdays TT race: http://www.mylaps.com/en/classification/3010501
Sunday Time Trial
Sunday’s Time Trial sessions were held in an identical format of 3 split and 1 combined. On Sunday there were even more competitors with a total of 34 cars posting times versus 32 on Saturday.
Team Schotz once again took the best of the Small Bore competitors beating his previous days time followed by Jeff Abrams and Harold Dunn. In Big Bore Dan Maloney, Sean Southland and Phil Robles posted the best times throughout all the sessions.
Results: http://www.mylaps.com/en/classification/3010502
US Drift
Drift group is packed with horsepower and smoke with a few new faces and lots of wrenching in the pits. There is no License for the Drift group, but participants do coordinate and avoid proximity without certain roll cage minimums and then work with other drivers to assure contact free action.
Always need to say an extra thanks to all the guys and gals that come out and work / volunteer to keep the events “on track” including all the safety crews and corner works.
Join us at Spring Mountain, Nevada in May: https://www.drivenasa.com/event/1840
Online Registration is discounted for early registration. Prices for the race groups will increase by $50 two weeks prior to the event (April 19). Fees are $100 higher than online price by entering at the track!
Details of Spring Mountain event: http://forums.nasaaz.com/showthread.php?t=6518
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NASAAZ
Author: Tom Johnson ([email protected] / 602-628-2701)
Pictures and content courtesy of
- Tage Evanson
- Gabe Ortega
- Robert Rose
- Drew Wadolny
- Amanda Aponte
Please send corrections, half-truths and legal notices to the author: [email protected]