Fontana California, home of the California Speedway, was the site of race 3 and 4 in the TCR Motorsports 2008 schedule. Coming off a very satisfying weekend in Arizona, the team was very excited about their chances of coming away with additional points towards the divisional championship.
The forecast called for rain all weekend, but it was not looking like it would come to fruition in the first part of the weekend. During a dry qualifying session on Friday afternoon, Stephen Saslow piloted the SR Racing powered Tsunami to a 3 place grid position for the start of Saturdays race. "Missing the front row by 13 thousandths of a second was a tough pill to swallow, but we knew we had a good shot during the race" commented Saslow after the session.
The race on Saturday was a classic Formula Vee battle. With the front six cars battling back and forth, with nearly all of them leading at some point, the action was intense. Eventually, Mark Edwards and Stephen Saslow broke away from the pack, building a 10 second lead on the field at one point. Mark proved a little to fast however, and finished 3 seconds ahead of the TCR Motorsports #09 car. A second place finish was still a great result, considering the track was new to the team.
Qualifying on Sunday commenced on a damp, but not wet track. With all competitors on slick tires and a dry groove on the course, competitors let it all hang out. Additional track time showed well for Saslow as he qualified on the pole position, clearing the field by a second.
Two hours prior to the race start, the rains came. Torrential rains poured down over Fontana, soaking the track. Saslow, having raced in the rain many times, saw this as an advantage. When the green flag dropped, the field charged down to turn one on full rain tires and another battle unfolded. For the first half of the race, Saslow stayed in the lead pack waiting for an opportunity to unfold. With 7 laps to go, Saslow made a move down the inside of turn 5, going from 4th to the lead. It was at this point when the SR Racing powered Tsunami began to pull away. Building up a 12 second lead over the next 5 laps, Saslow had victory in hand. Slowing for the final two laps, Saslow crossed the finish 5 seconds in front of Mark Edwards for his first national win.
Next up is Thunderhill in March! See you there.....
January 18-20, 2008 - SCCA National - Phoenix, AZ
The 2008 season was not looking too bright when the #09 TCR Motorsports Tsunami rolled onto grid for the first test session and promptly died. This was the start of a tumultuous day that culminated with a total of 2 laps being completed on the Friday day of testing.
Having never been to the Phoenix circuit, we were not expecting a strong performance for qualifying on Saturday morning. However, as the session drew to a close, it was clear that we had found a rhythm to the track and managed to qualify 4th. The race proved very exciting that afternoon with a back and forth battle with Charlie Turner for the final podium position. We were able to hold off a hard charging Charlie Turner to bring home third by a margin of 0.02 seconds. The race was won by Bob "Nuby" Neumeister. Second position was claimed by Mark Felson.
Qualifying for race 2 was not quite as good as the previous day, but overall was a success, lining up 5th for the green flag for race number 2. After qualifying, we made some significant setup changes to help fix some handling issues we had experienced in the closing laps of race 1 and qualifying session 2. About half way through the race we had moved up into fourth position, and remained there relatively unchallenged for the remainder of the race.
The race weekend was a resounding success bringing home a 3rd and 4th for the 09 TCR Motorsports Tsunami.
