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| Huila OnLine - SCCA Hawaii Region Newsletter | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
SCCA's First (and maybe last) Race for 2006With the recent announcement that Hawaii Raceway Park is closing at the end of March, the Jan. 22 regional wheel-to-wheel, long and short track race may be the last one for a while. Attendance and the weather were mixed. The open wheel cars had a fair showing but not so among the closed wheel guys. Various mechanical tragedies held back many of the players, plus the pending rumors about the track closing held off additional investments to make the car actually run. One new car appeared in the form of a very fast Formula 500 driven by James "I have lots of racecars" Kellar. Returning after some time from the scene was Dave Goto in the hot Formula Hawaii. Many of the usual Formula Fords boys were present (Steve Timpson, Gary Hogan, Anders Nervell) and the Maui guys---Doug Fitch and Steven Egger. The hardy closed wheels guys included Carl Debo (RX-7), Egmar Klemmer (240Z) and Ed Kemper in the Sports 2000. Hawaii regions two long track "regulars" also showed in the form of Osamu Manabe (Mustang) and the Jason Hokama (in the right hand drive Nissan Skyline). A fair number of short track drivers were ready to go also, but, as we will see, circumstances intervened. Qualifying was largely uneventful with Formula cars in the 56 to 59 range and Dave Goto having the fastest time of a 56.7, only one tenth of second faster than Doug Fitch. Egger was having trouble with his motor mounts and had to drop out. With Egmar's 240z not ready to run, only Kemper and Debo went out with Kemper turning a 59. After lunch, the long track contenders Hokama and Manabe hit the road with Manabe driving the Mustang turning an excellent 1:00.8 for his best lap and Hokama coming in with slow for him time of 1:10 because of a broken turbo. As usual, the Formula guys decided on 2 ten lap races. Race one had fair number of clean passes. On lap one, Fitch jumped into the lead over Goto, Timpson, Nevell, and the rest. On lap two Goto was ahead, but not for long because he spin in turn one and dropped to the end of the field. By lap 4 Timpson pulled ahead of Fitch and those two ultimately ended up one and two in race one. In lap 8 Goto's rear suspension gave way and off he went into the grass just before turn two, which ended his day. Meanwhile in the middle of the pack, Hogan and Nervell were trading places with Hogan coming out the winner for third place. Race two did not come out quite as well. In an early lap, Hogan and Nervell decided they both wanted the same spot in turn one and the suspensions in both Formula Fords suffered the consequences of that desire. In a word, both were out and the race was red flagged. Timpson gave his car over to Egger for race two and the greatly deleted field finished with Fitch in first, followed by Egger and Kellar. Like the formula troops, the closed racers decided on two ten lappers, which turned out to be a very wise decision. For a couple of laps Kemper jumped out and held the lead, but Egmar passed with easy and the finish on the first race was as expected. But during the cool down laps between the races, rain began---first lightly and then very heavily. The race was red flagged, hoping upon hope that the rain would slow up or stop. It did not. The end result was a ton of water in the sweeper that could not be cleared. Thus, the last race was called and the short track lapping canceled. With next race set for April 1 and that being on or about the closing date of the track, the January race could be the Aloha one or if we are lucky the semi Aloha race. Time and the Hawaii Legislature will tell the tale.
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