Henry: I'm really glad to hear that Randy Williams is doing well with the car I
built for Richard Hardison. A lot of time and $$$ went into building it, and we
had very little development/track time on it before Richard became bored with
it. Randy, I'm curious to know what sort of things you did to improve on it? I
know we were having some fuel starvation issues in long sweepers and it sounds
like that's history. Thanks - Ed
Henry Frye <henry@henryfrye.com> wrote:Looking at the results sheets for the
weekend it was a fantastic weekend
for Triumphs. VSCDA wisely has taken the approach at smaller gatherings to
group to the car/driver potential, as opposed to strictly by car class.
There were two open wheel groups, and two closed wheel groups. Four race
groups meant for the opportunity for tons of track time, and the chance to
race with cars you might not get to race with otherwise.
First the fast-but-not-as-fast closed wheel group. Triumphs swept the
podium! One of those insanely fast Spitfires snuck in and dominated. Wayne
Obry ran a blistering 1:49.7 and took the first in the feature. Randy
Williams has beaten down the curse, his first race weekend that he did not
DNF, and took second place while turning a 1:51.6 in his TR3A. Dale
Oesterle with his orange Spit rounded out the podium finishers. Everybody
had a great drive, congrats, guys!
The other closed wheel group had Mark Wheatley in his ex-Charlie Kates
TR4 and me battling it out with everything from the superfast Lotus 23b's
to the ground pounders to other neat vintage British iron. Two notables
were a '58 Allard Coupe on VSCCA tires with a 520 horsepower Chrysler Hemi
and the KIKI MK3, a Canadian built special that looks like a Lotus 7 with
big V8 power. Way cool.
During our Qualifying Race Saturday afternoon, Mark's TR4 went off song
after one lap. He came in and discovered a very dry rocker shaft and a
mushroomed push rod. The needed spares were located and we went to task
getting more oil flow to the rocker shaft. Mark took it around Sunday
morning in warm-ups and turned a couple 1:53's. All looked good for the
feature, as Mark was trying to figure out who to bribe to get a better grid
spot! His only lap in the Qualifying race turned a 1:58, so he started
towards the back.
Our feature race was pretty exciting on lap 1, with Dave Jahimiak spinning
his cheating dog Sprite on turn 1, then on the first trip around the
keyhole Rick Gurolnick and one of the 911's spin to opposite sides of the
track. Luckily no carnage, and a fast Midget and I went side by side down
the back straight trying to hold back the "insanely fast on the straights
but no where else" Allard. The strategy worked for one lap, as the Allard
blew the doors in the second trip down the back straight. But winning the
race means finishing, and the Allard retired a couple laps in as he thought
a head gasket was going. I'm thrilled with a 10th place finish out of 28
starters in front of three 911's, Gurolnick's 356, four Mustangs, a
Corvette and the ailing Allard. Mark battled his way up to 15th with a
great drive.
I bested my best time at M-O by a second, turned a 1:51.8, two tenths
slower than Randy Williams in his TR3. Randy, we are expecting great things
from here on!
Oh, and it was cold. And sometimes wet. And sometimes the precipitation
that fell from the sky wasn't wet, it was hard. But the wind was blowing so
hard it blew the hail right off the track, so we were fine!
Am I going back next year? You bet! Thanks to Bob Wismer, Bill Dentinger
and the rest of VSCDA for putting on the event.
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