Roebling
Road PCA Club Race
December
3-5, 2004
The Roebling Road Club Race is the
last on the PCA calendar. That combined with being our home track,
we typically have a large customer base. This year, we had 9 cars
entered into the race and even more for the test days prior.
In
the Red run group, Mike Branning topped the time sheets every session,
won the fun race and started the Sprint on pole. Mike lead the
entire race, and was only challenged during the last few laps by Kerry
Singley. But Mike held on to take his first F Class win as well as
overall honors for the group. Slightly behind them was Jim Strowd,
who started at the back of the 27 car field and fought his way onto the
F class podium and 6th overall.
Bill Martin
ran as strong as he did in his first Club Race at CMP. His D class
964 Cup was one of the weaker cars in the Yellow run group, but Bill was
consistently one of the top cars in the group and was the fastest of the
Stock class cars. In the sprint, Martin was running 4th overall
and well ahead of other cars in his class. An unfortunate restart
dissolved his lead and put him behind a C class car. Bill finished
5th overall and has won his class in all three of his races so
far. Bob Hahn easily won E class.
The
Green run group featured some amazing hardware, including a GTP 911,
Twin-turbo 935, World Challenge Cup car, and a GT3 RSR that regularly
competes in the ALMS. Leh Keen in his new 2002 GT3 RS was consistently
at the top of the charts, and Cory Friedman turned some impressive laps,
typically right next to Leh on the grid. Steve Johnson lead the
GTC3 class the whole weekend with the exception of the first session,
where Anthony Jernigan was the fastest in his brand new 2005 GT3 Cup.
In
qualifying, Leh set the fastest time, but he and Steve were forced to
start at the back of the pack due to technicalities. Cory started
third behind the 935 and GT3 RSR. Leh and Steve were on a charge
to regain positions in the 30 car field. After the first lap they
had picked up 14 and 12 positions, respectively. Johnson battled
his way past all the other GTC3 cars, but used up most of his tires in the
process. He had a tough back-and-forth battle with Tim Rosengrant
but ended up on top at the end of the 29 lap event. Keen chased
down the race leading RSR, but traffic was a huge hindrance and he was
not able to overtake in the allotted time. Another 3 laps, and Leh
likely would have made the run from last to first. Cory's race was
fairly uneventful and he brought home 5th overall, 3rd in class.
Mac McGehee and Anthony Jernigan had a pretty good run going, with Mac
edging out Anthony in the end.
Of the nine
cars, we supported this weekend, we had 4 class wins and 7
podiums. We are very proud of all of our drivers who continually
impress us and make us look good with their excellent results. It
is no small feat to manage nine cars, and we cannot give enough credit
to our crew, who worked long and hard to make sure all cars looked good
and ran fast. Our 2004 season ended with two great Pro Races and
two equally successful Club Races. We hope to continue this trend
in 2005 starting off with the Rolex 24-hours at Daytona, then the PCA
Club Race at Sebring the following weekend. |
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