We had our fist Texas race weekend of 2011 on Jan 29/30th, a new high water mark for Texas Spec944 racing with 5 starters on Sunday!!! Kevin Webb was there with his absolutely spotless blue/white car. All of the tech inspectors commented on how clean and neat everything was. This is no small complement given Tech was failing somewhere around 30% of cars on their first pass! Todd Covini and myself were there with out new-to-us cars ready to shake them down for the first time. BJ Meyer made a heroic effort to get his car together and arrived around 11pm Saturday night. The last car was the borrowed pink/green Colorado car, into which we put Texas Race Director Clifton Winkleman.

Saturday was a gorgeous, cool sunny day. Kevin showed me and Todd what these cars can do by effectively walking away from us both races and picking up two wins. Todd and I battled non-stop for both sessions with Todd taking the 2nd place spot legitimately in one race and inheriting the spot in the other after I got taken out by a Miata driver. Thankfully the damage to my car is only cosmetic and I was back in the hunt after only having to pull the passenger side fender out.

Sunday we awoke to sporadic rain. It never rained very hard, but it was wet the entire day. NASA set us up with our own qual session and it was awesome to see our small fleet of 944s on grid and then skating back and forth on the wet track for a time. I picked up the pole but since we dont have a pole bonus I couldnt use that to make up ground in the championship. I have to talk to the rules committee about that The 40 minute race set off in solid rain and Todd, myself, and BJ were nose to tail, swapping positions, and quickly dicing through Spec Miatas. An incident brought out a full course caution, bunching up the entire field. BJ timed the start perfectly and sped around Todd for the lead which he kept to the flag, while two turns later I spun exiting a corner. I got around a couple of Miatas, then Kevin who was putting on a great drifting exhibition (which while fun, doesnt result in good straight away speeds!) and catch up to Todd all on the same lap. I tried making a move on the last sweeper while Todd defended and we flew across the line side by side. He had a fender on me still and took a very well deserved 2nd.

In the paddock we were treated to a catered dinner by NASA and did our part to empty the two kegs! We had a lot of attention from folks that are looking into the class or already building cars, and it was great to meet our soon to be friends and competitors. Big thanks to Chuck Taylor for putting together Todd's and my car in record time and for loaning us another to round out the field. Next event is only six weeks away!!!

Awesome - great start to the season for you guys.

Awesome! I was hoping to make it out there to check things out but had some scheduling conflicts.
Hoping to have my car done in time to participate sometime this season...still need to sell the Harley and work schedules radically changed as of late. Put things here behind the power curve. At least the car is now in the garage and the chassis getting stripped down.

Sounds like fun out there...can't wait!

Great write up!

Sounds great - you guys are on your way!

Congratulations Texas on your inaugural 944-Spec race!
Have a great season!