Friday’s Chase Races
On Friday, Autobahn Country Club opened up their Festival of Speed race weekend with the Pro and Sportsman classes competing. 18 drivers took the green in the Pro class. After breakout penalties were applied, Mark Basso, driving his Spec Miata was confirmed as the winner for the Pro class, with Ben Hasbrouck in his Porsche got second and SM2 fan favorite, in his #808 Spec Miata, Bob Reisinger finished third and gave winner Mark Basso a friendly kiss on the cheek in celebration.
The Sportsman class had 11 drivers taking part. During the race, we did not have nearly the amount of breakouts as with the Pro class and after penalties were applied, DavidGronke was declared the winner of the Chase race Sportsman field, with Jeff Neumann driving his SM2 Miata to second and Charles Colvin driving his standout Zenos E10R rounding out the Sportsman podium finishers.
Kart League
Five classes happened within four pre-final and final races in the morning and early afternoon after a few rainstorms of July 19th’s Kart Circuit Autobahn member races. To start off, Kid Kart had its battle between its two stars Kaius Venkevicius and Jackson Merwin. Kaius Venkevicius led home the win for both races despite Jackson Merwin keeping him honest and not letting Kaius out of his sight during both races. Next up was Ignite Senior and Master, who raced together to give us a five kart field. Logan Nealis won both races overall giving himself the win for KCA’s Ignite’s Senior class, as Chris Pochon would sweep both Ignite Masters races as well. The Ignite Junior class had the biggest field at seven drivers, with Thomas Greenwood putting on a clinic and pulling off a dominant victory, getting warmed up before he raced his SM2 Miata. Lucas London and Miles Ziesmer would round out the podium in both races, with London second in the pre-final and Ziesmer second place in the final, after Miles Merwin had an upsetting spin at turn 1, costing him a potential podium finish. Ignite Rookie had a six driver field, as Fisher McDonald looked like the kid to beat, scoring pole and winning an exciting pre-final ahead of Harisson Fichter and the Blue brothers of Rhett and Toby in third and fourth. The final race was even more exciting than their pre-final race. Polesitter, Fisher McDonald had spun out from the race lead and would have another spin that would take him out of podium contention. As such, this opened up the door to Harrison Fichter, who pulled off a Red Bull driver performance to hold onto the win and hold off the ever present Blue Brothers of Toby and Rhett as they rounded out the podium for KCA’s Ignite Rookie class.
Wings N’ Things
Shortly after the kart races ended, the car racing got under way as we had Wings N’ Things start as our three race Festival of Speed. Before that, Sophia Jurgis sang the U.S. national anthem to start our Wings N’ Things had a six car field of drivers, with three cars in each class. Brandon Schwartz would start on pole in his Ligier Formula 3 car with Radical Cup’s three class drivers, Ben Blander, Alon Kim, and Wenli Zhao starting second, third, and fourth respectively. Row three had Autobahn’s new Rush SR’s which were driven by Ben Hasbrouck and Tim Miller.
As track conditions had yet to fully dry, some drivers had different mentalities for the race, with drivers such as Brandon Schwartz going from pushing early on to backing off near the end of the race to bring the car home to a dominant overall victory. Ben Blander would win the Radical Cup class, Alon Kim behind him and third in Radical Cup, Wenli Zhao. Ben Hasbrouck was fifth overall and second in class, ahead of sixth overall and third in class Tim Miller rounding out the Wings N’ Things field.
GT
The mid-way point of our races would take place with our GT Challenge races. With 12 drivers overall and three drivers in each class. In an uncommon sight, a GT3 would start from overall pole position, with Bob Noorian scoring pole in mixed conditions. GT2 polesitter and second overall, Britt Casey Jr would start alongside. In a rare sight, the second row was filled with our slowest class, with GT5 racers, Mike Keck and Tony Kester starting in the second row. Ron Rashinski would start second in GT3 and fifth overall, and behind him would be our top two GT4 qualifiers of Scott Benning Sr and Kirk Cordill. John Rante would round out the GT3 cars in eighth overall, with Andrew Talandzevicius and Sean Venckevicius rounding out GT5 and GT4 respectively on the fifth row. On row six we had our other two GT2 drivers Ernestes Puzelis, and Jean Jodoin. Unfortunately, Jodoin would start on the sixth row by himself, as Puzelis had to pull out of the race after an incident he had in qualifying.
Our wonderful and Legendary Grand Marshall Tom Bagley gave our GT drivers the most famous words in motorsports, “Drivers, start your engines” before they rolled off for their 10 lap race against each other. 11 drivers took the green flag, Britt Casey Jr wasted no time to get out front to the overall lead, driving away from the rest of the field before you could blink. The standout moment after the green flag was dropped, was the battle for GT4 as Sean Venckevicius clawed his way up to GT4 leader Scott Benning Sr, which would turn out to be a battle which would last almost the entire race. Elsewhere, GT3 had its battle for second overall and GT3 class victory during the first half, with Ron Rashinski quickly getting around both GT5’s of Tony Kester and Mike Keck before reaching Bob Noorian. Shortly after the halfway point, Rashinski made his move exiting turn 12, powering ahead of Noorian, to second overall and to lead in GT3. Back to the GT4 battle, Scott Benning Sr was defending from Sean Venckevicius, perhaps a little too hard, as the flagman gave a warning to Benning Sr. Coming to three to go, Venckevicius pulled off a daring move at turn 1 to get ahead of Benning Sr, however just a few laps later, Sean Venckivicus had come to a stop at turn 16 after running out of fuel! This propelled Scott Benning Sr back into fifth overall and first in GT4, giving him a potential sigh of relief coming into the final lap. In the end, Britt Casey Jr would take home the win both in GT2 and overall, 52.961 seconds ahead of second overall, and GT3 winner Ron Rashinski. Second in GT3 Bob Noorian would finish third overall, with Tony Kester pulling off an impressive fourth overall and more importantly winning GT5. Scott Benning Sr would come home fifth overall, getting himself a hard fought GT4 victory, with second place in GT2, Jean Jodoin making his way up to sixth overall after starting on the sixth row. Mike Keck would finish second in GT5 and seventh overall as the last car on the lead lap, with Kirk Cordill finishing as the first car a lap down in eighth overall and gaining second in GT4 on the final lap. Rounding out GT5’s podium was Andrew Talandzevicius who scored ninth overall with John Rante rounding out GT3’s podium, and our finishing drivers in the top 10 with tenth overall.
Spec Miata/SM2
Both Spec Miata and SM2 combined gave us a 35 car grid for Miata’s Festival of Speed’s one hour race, giving us 16 Spec Miata starters and 19 SM2 starters. Gavin Gleitsman would score pole in mixed conditions, with Mike Ryan starting alongside in second. Brandon Collins, who missed Spec Miata’s previous race, would start third, as Ethan Tyler would start alongside him. GT Challenge grand marshall, Tom Bagley would start the Spec Miata class from 13th position. In SM2, Conor Ryan would start from pole, with third from the Chase race Pro class, Bob Reisinger alongside in second. Eamon Ryan would make it a Ryan brothers sandwich starting in third with Eli Dysart alongside him starting fourth in SM2. A split start ensued with Spec Miata getting the green flag with Gavin Gleitsman keeping P1 at the start. For SM2 it was not quite the same, Bob Reisinger for the second race in a row, made an impressive pass around the outside and would take the lead in SM2 after getting through turn 1. It took only half a lap for the first incident to happen, Scott Bowman spun around at turn 14, which would subsequently end his race after one lap. Both the Spec Miata and SM2 classes had moves being made every lap, showing us the excitement of Spec Miata racing, even considering all the battles throughout the track. 10 minutes in, Gary Traverso and Matt Kopecki got involved in an incident, when Traverso ended up getting spun out. Thankfully for Traverso, he was able to get back going, the same could not be said for Dave Yong, who spun at turns 11-12 and got stuck in the middle of those two corners, thus ending his day in 34th. This gave us our first full course yellow. This full course yellow bunched up both Spec Miata and SM2 classes together for the restart shortly after the race reached its 2/5ths of the way through. 32 drivers took the green after the first caution period ended, as Jason Greenwood pulled in to retire from the race, right as the field went back green. With a beautiful restart, Eli Dysart cut through the field like Moses through the Red Sea and gained positions ahead of Spec Miata drivers, thus giving him a buffer between himself and second in SM2, Conor Ryan. Ethan Tyler took second place from Brandon Collins, and Josh Dale would have a lockup while attempting a pass on Jackson Wolny at turn 11, thankfully keeping his car on the track, but losing ninth to Eli Dysart. Dale would get back ahead of Wolny, as Wolny would dip his left side wheels in turn 16’s grass, losing eighth and ninth to Dysart and Wolny. A couple minutes after commentator Jensen Benet said “it does not look as though we will have another yellow…” we had Scott Benning Jr lose a wheel at the final corner, thus bunching up the field for a Green-White-Checkerd finish. As the drivers battled on to gain as many positions as possible, Gavin Gleitsman took the white flag while Ethan Tyler battled Brandon Collins for second, giving Gleitsman exactly what he wanted to see in his rearview mirror. As the checkered flag fell on this hour-long race, Gavin Gleitsman took home the overall win ahead of Ethan Tyler in second with Brandon Collins rounding out the Spec Miata podium in third. Matt Keck would finish fourth ahead of Taro Kushida rounding out the top five. Mike Ryan would place sixth, ahead of SM2 winner Eli Dysart finishing seventh overall. Spec Miata rookies Josh Dale, Samuel Bowman, and Jackson Wolny rounded out the top 10 finishing eighth, ninth, and tenth overall.
This year’s Festival of Speed was full of excitement as shown by our announcers, fans, and Autobahn staff this past weekend. The next two race weekends will take place on the North track. Spec Miata will be on Sunday, July 27th for our North track double header. After that, we have our next GT race on Saturday, August 2nd, which will also be a double header on the North track. The next livestream for our YouTube channel is on Sunday, August 10th, where Miata and GT will race the South track. Next Kart Circuit Autobahn members race will take place on Saturday, August 16th with Saturday, August 23rd and Sunday, August 24th serving as South track double headers for Spec Miata and GT Challenge respectively. Rain or shine, we hope to see you all during our next few weeks of racing!
