BeaveRun Inaugural SCCA race - 09.29.02

BeaveRun is a racetrack being built in Beaver Falls, PA (about 45 minutes north of Pittsburgh).  This motorsports complex looks very promising and contains a 1.5 mile North section (complete), a 2.0 miles South section (in process) and autocross track, a kart track, all set in the rolling hills of this area, making for attractive elevation changes and scenery.

Check it out here: www.beaverun.com

Anyway, Racers Edge decended upon Beaverun this weekend for the first SCCA race, with 5 Spec Racer Fords, and 3 Formula Mazda's.  

Test day was a complete washout.  We were taken around the track in street cars by our coach, who had not himself ever seen the track.  Then, amidst torrential rain (3 inches or more?), i did one run; and the other guys did 3 or 4.  Thus, i went into qualifying without benefit of having run the track, really.

The north circuit is interesting.  A pretty typical straight ending in a left-hander (unusual) with (unfortunately) pit-out right there at the end of turn one.  Then a challenging technical section leading to a blind right hander onto the back straight, where highest speeds are attained.  This culminates in a hairpin (double apex, but we didn't drive it that way) uphill back onto the front straight.  Overall, not as fast as Lime Rock, at about the same length, with 10 or 11 turns.

The weather improved.  In the morning session on Saturday, i qualified 3rd.  In the afternoon, we had manual timing problems galore and i finished qualifying in 7th place (22 car field, 19 spec racers).  

The race:  the typical SRF start, complicated by the left hander, no one knowing the track, and one very aggressive participant.  But we mostly got through this and i picked up positions, putting myself into 3rd!

Unfortunately, after holding 3rd for 15 laps, i handed it to the guy behind me by overcooking the hairpin, going off into the mud, and then very very fortunately being able to get back on and finish 4th.  A very good result, but i was disappointed over losing my first SCCA podium finish.  Learned another lesson, though ;)

My friend Peter lost positions at the start and in a later spin, but ran very strongly after that and regained many positions, finishing 7th.  My friend Ron suffered a mechanical failure very quickly, and unfortunately had to watch the race from the inside of the hairpin.  He was smart enough to get his car off the track into the inside so that the rest of us could race.

The event was manually timed, and i must say i'll never do that again.  The mistakes were rampant, in all directions, and nothing could be relied upon.  We had never seen errors this egregious before; most of the timing errors we were used to were in the order of 5/100's of a second.  These were 1 second +/-!

All in all, they have done a great job at Beaverun and i expect this to be a wonderful track when the south section is complete.............................................................. 

FINAL RESULTS FOR - Race # 6- CSR DSR S2000 SRF

ABE VESTAL MEMORIAL REGIONAL on SEPT 28 & 29 2002

BEAVERUN ROAD COURSE - Length of Track: 1.53 Miles 15:10:19 09-29-2002 Number of starters: 20 Number of Finishers: 17

OA CL CAR L MEMBERSHIP LAPS RACE-1 PLACE # CLASS DRIVER HOMETOWN ST REGION L YR CAR NUMBER COMP FAST-TIME

1 T1 7 S2000 MARTIN JOHNS COPLEY OH NeOh N TIGA SC84 281851 20 1:02.635

2 T1 08 SRF JOE HORVATH MENTOR OH NeOh N Spec Racer Ford 205986 20 1:06.316

3 T2 14 SRF DANIEL FARIZEL CHARDON OH NeOh N Spec Racer Ford 231724 19 1:07.524

4 T3 13 SRF DON KAHN COLRAIN MA NER D Spec Racer Ford 201995 19 1:06.701

5 T4 24 SRF THOMAS CIRILLO GREENWICH CT NER N Spec Racer Ford 288806 19 1:07.085