Coronado 04
Race Photos

Page 1 - Story and some Pit pictures
If you have any photos that I can use send them to Craig

This years Coronado event was a blast. It started Friday morning at 9:00 am giving track rides to local VIP's and sponsors. There were 5 of us giving rides, Jay Bittle, Fred Galloway, another Cobra, a Legrand, and myself. I gave about 15 people 3 laps each, which was great practice as we were all driving about 8/10 on the track. It did finish off a set of tires. The track is very abrasive which result in a lot of grip. And it is predicable grip in that it is easy to go into a slide and maintain it under control, makes it a fun track to drive. Friday afternoon was practice and Jim Shield and I had fun passing each other. We were about the same speed.

I noticed during practice that coming out of turn 2 was a low RPM gear three, turn 5 and the chicane was a low RPM gear 2 and the esses leading to the straight were low to medium RPM gear two. It was running 3.89 gears and decided to try 4.33 to get a little more squirt coming out of the corners. The rear end was changed out Saturday morning before practice, and , boy, did that wake the car up. I didn't get lap times but suddenly I was leaving Jim Shield's behind. I'll bet it was 1.5-2.0 seconds a lap quicker. I was grided 3-4 cars in front of Jim for the qualifying race which was uneventful on Saturday afternoon.

For the race Sunday I had new freshly scrubbed tires and was grided 13, right behind Rich Obrien. Next to Rich on the outside was Ken Epsman driving Camee Edelbrock's car. Just outside of me was Tom Sakai in his Tiger. The start was early, I was hard on the gas coming out of turn 11 following behind Rich. We went up the inside behind Rich and he locked it up going into turn one. I cautiously gave him a little extra room which allowed Ken to slot in front of me. We all did manage to pass a Cobra that was in position 6 or so. He must have been asleep. Tom Sakai got the best start going around on the outside. He gained four positions at the start and exited turn 2 in front of Rich Obrien.

We were lining up single file to go through the chicane when John Morton spun right at the entrance enticing Ken to forego the mess and duck around the chicane on the wrong side. I saw a hole and went through the chicane but Ken came charging back onto the track right in front of me at the exit. It was an exciting first lap.

The next few laps were spent trying to catch Rich and Tom, but we were all pretty well evenly matched. I also wanted to put some room between me and this pesky 914, driven by Bill Noon, the owner of Symbolic Motors. He had also been hounding me all through the qualifying race on Saturday as well. I managed to get some space between us but as soon as I ran into lapped traffic it slowed me down enough that the 914 caught back up. If you were there it was clear that I would leave him on the straights, but he could close in the corners.

I had worked up to 10th position, my best since racing with HMSA and Steve Earl's group, and was lapping some of the back markers on lap 11 when coming out of turn 4 the car stumbled. I wasn't sure what it was. Exiting the chicane and through the first of the esses I realized that it was down on power and sounding a little different. I assumed that I broke a rocker arm shaft and pulled off the track making the 914-6's day, I suspect.

I was unceremoniously towed back to the pits where we just put it right into the trailer. I turns out that the problem was a blown head gasket. So it is being replaced in time for COCOA and the head bolts are being upgraded to 1/2 inch form 7/16. It's always something.

Emmy and MAECO Motorsports pit. MAECO has been maintaining my car this past year.