|
2011
RACE #1 MARCH 13 OPENING DAY 4 HERE WE GO AGAIN!
We had 9 eager drivers turn out for Opening Day 4 on a beautiful March
morning. Two drivers were first timers running loaner cars. PUGSBRA drivers King Arthur
driving the newly bodied Blue By You, and Hedge Hog driving the newly redone DW1386X. Mr. Timmy
was also back after his crash in the fun run last June. That June 2010 race day was his first and only run before this
race. With the card draw, we had Ice Man driving Totally Legal, The Jerm driving
Weekend Warrior 2, and King Arthur in Blue By You on the first row. The second row
was Jola driving the Rolling Roadster, Jolly Roger on his open car and Mr. Timmy driving MrMopar's Taurus. And on the last row we had Drscope driving the Wedge of Doom, Nasty Neal in The Indestructible Monte
Carlo and hedge Hog in the DW1386X. At the start, Ice Man and The Jerm quickly rolled
out side by side with Jola right behind. Drscope and Nasty Neal were able to make their way to
the left and move around some of the slower traffic. At the first corner, it was The Jerm in the
lead followed by Ice Man. Drscope passed Jola for third, then it was Nasty Neal, Hedge Hog, king Arthur, Jolly Roger
and Mr. Timmy who was taking it easy trying to feel out the car and enjoy the ride. Drscope was
charging hard and passed The Jerm at the exit of the second turn. As the field came down
the steep section, Jola was able to get passed Ice man for third. Then as the course leveled out a bit at the bottom
of the steep section, Nasty Neal also got passed Ice man for fourth place. At the finish it was
Drscope followed closely by The Jerm. Then Jola in third, Nasty Neal fourth and Ice man fifth. Then King Arthur
in sixth, Hedge Hog in Seventh, Jolly Roger eighth and Mr. Timmy in ninth.
Race
#1 OPENING DAY 2011 OFFICIAL RESULTS
1 Drscope 10
points 2 The Jerm 9
points 3 Jola 8
points 4 Nasty Neal
7 points 5 Ice Man 6
points 6 King Arthur 5
points 7 Hedge Hog
4 points 8 Jolly Roger 3
points 9 Mr. Timmy
2 points
RACE #2 APRIL 10 Going Down! IN HONOR OF THE RMS TITANIC which set sail on this day in 1912 If you missed Race #2, you missed another great day of going downhill. While the course itself wasn't one of
those white knuckle, pucker up courses, it did put a premium on driver skill and ability. How well the driver could read the pavement and gain every extra bit of momentum would certainly contribute
to the outcome of the race. It was a day of ups and downs.
Several drivers couldn't make it. King Arthur is away in Poland, but he'll be back for the May race. Jolly Roger
couldn't make it either. He is a Marathon runner and may have had a foot race to attend. Mr. Timmy just started
a new job and had a lot of things at home he needed to attend to and Ice man is in Puerto Rico for the next seven weeks. So we were expecting only five drivers. Then I was awakened early Sunday morning by
a call from Nasty Neal that he couldn't make it either. I haven't talked to him this evening yet, but we're pretty sure
he has a case of Welder's Eye. He woke up early this morning in great
pain feeling like someone was pouring red hot sand in his eyes and poking him in the eye with ice picks. He had been
doing some welding on Saturday and from what he described, it sounds like Welder's Eye to me. I've never suffered from that, but know a few folks who have and they all describe it about the same way. Intensely
painful and they are nearly blind. I hope he will be OK and we'll try to keep you updated as we hear something. We have a great hill on the same road as our meet spot which is less then 1/4 mile away
from where we gather. We have wanted to run that hill for 3 years now. But for some reason there is HEAVY speeding
traffic on that road at 6:30 on Sunday morning. I don't know where these folks are going that early in such a big hurry,
but it has kept us from running that hill. The issue is a very slow
roll off area just over the crest of a blind hill. We have always been afraid with out a chase car that we would get
run over before we got up to speed. The hill gets really fast after that and the next challenge would be keeping it
in your lane as we near the bottom. On a test run we hit over 70mph drifting in the old VW after rolling off from a
dead start on this hill! So we had announced we were going to be
running a much slower, easier hill. We had run this hill in 2009 with just Jeremy, Jola and Drscope and it
wasn't very exciting. But after that announcement, I got to thinking, if Susan (Neal's wife) was coming, she has been
driving the chase car and taking photos. So we could run that fast hill and have her protect us from the rear. When Neal called and said he was on his way to the hospital, that idea went out the
window. So we ran the easy hill. Actually unloaded on the parking
lot of the new Municipal building that houses the Police Station! The cop shop is on the other side of the building,
but a full parking lot of Police cars was easily visible over there as we unloaded the trailer. In the card draw, Hedge Hog drew the pole position. With only 4 cars, we decided that He could choose his start spot
and the rest of us would simply fall in where we could. We were thinking 1 row 4 cars wide. But we start this
run in the turn lane and as we lined up, it turned into 2 rows of 2 cars. The Jerm got the front row to the right side
of Hedge Hog. Drscope started behind Hedge Hog with Jola behind The Jerm. On the roll off, The Jerm rolled out in front and had the best line into the first corner. Jola followed The
Jerm. Hedge Hog had a brake rubbing and rolled off slow causing Drscope to go wide to the left to try to get past. As they funneled through the first and second turn and into the open road, The Jerm
had a good lead. Drscope had just squeezed past Hedge Hog narrowly avoiding contact with him and the curb. He
rolled into the open with Jola close behind. Drscope had to pull
out all the tricks to try to close the gap between himself and The Jerm. As he closed in, The Jerm defended his line
forcing Drscope to choose the long way around on the right, or to cross the center line. He crossed the center line
in the hopes of no oncoming traffic and pulled out in front. Jola
was gaining speed and closing on The Jerm. She pulled along side on his right and they were side by side as they crossed
the finish. Each thought they had won! It was the finish line camera that showed The Jerm ahead by about 2 feet. At the end of our trophy race, Jerm and Drscope continued on a fun run down through
the center of town. That was really cool. Ellicott City is a historic Mill town that was just waking up at 7:15
AM on a Sunday morning. Then we loaded up and did another
fun run on a really nasty hill that's just too wild to race on. It has a bad down hill finish at a stop sign for
a T intersection. If you don't get stopped, you crash into a caboose at the B&O railroad museum. Things got really strange on this run. As soon as we got rolling, it started
misting so hard the road was instantly wet. Not rain, just a very heavy mist. But at the bottom it was dry.
It was a really cool ride, but poor timing as the church near the bottom of the hill was letting out as we came blasting down.
So we got stuck in traffic as a big line of cars waited at the stop sign at the bottom. It had to be a strange sight
for those folks to see us sitting in traffic! The only bad
thing of the day - one of our stationary course cameras on a tri pod got stolen. I saw it was still in place as we went
past during the race, but when we went to collect it, it was gone. We
did talk to one local kid that we think stole it, but of course he denied it. He was the only person we saw that was
out and about when we set up, ran and after we were done. He did say he saw it, but didn't know what happened to it.
I wasn't thinking about it until latter, but we should of told him we had other cameras that show who took
it and next we were going up to the police station. It really sucks because The Jerm not only lost a camera and tri
pod, but we also lost race footage from that camera. Having a camera stolen has been a concern now for a long time,
so I guess it's no surprise that sooner or latter, one of them would walk away.
From here on out, we need make sure that any time we put out stationary cameras we have another stationary camera
looking at each one. That way we get video of each camera from another camera. The only way for someone to get
away with stealing one would be if they took them all. So with 2
races down and 8 to go, we have Drscope with 2 wins, The Jerm with 2 Seconds and Jola with 2 Thirds!
Race #2 GOING DOWN!
OFFICIAL RESULTS 1) Drscope 10 points 2) The Jerm
9 points 3) Jola
8 points 4) Hedge Hog 7
points
(0 0) RACE #3 MAY 8 THANKS MOM! IT'S
MOTHER'S DAY
This was one of the most exciting and intense races of the year so far!
This run is on a fairly narrow, bumpy road. It's not very long, just under 3/4 of a mile, but it's plenty fast.
In
the past, the most cars we ever had for a race on this road was 6. And even then, the cars starting on row 2 had their
work cut out for themselves trying to get past the front row. This year, we had 9
drivers confirmed for this race. A big question in everyone's mind was how are we going to start 9 cars on this hill?
3 rows of 3 cars just puts the last row too far back. We can't get 5 wide, and it's even a tight squeeze to start 4
wide. This problem was somewhat solved for us When King Arthur got called into work
Saturday night and didn't get off until after 2am. So he couldn't make it. Then Cropp, forgot it was Mother's
Day and decided he had too much to do, so he didn't come. To be fair, we need to
publically punish CROPP. Because of the high number of drivers who wanted to race, we were short on cars. Since
Cropp requested a car for the race, we didn't have a car for Mr. Timmy to drive. So Mr. Timmy didn't bother to get up
early on a Sunday to come watch the rest of us having fun. The result was we had a driverless car on the trailer and
Mr. Timmy missed a race because that car was reserved for Cropp. So, Cropp,
that means the next time you request a car, you go to the end of the line! And ANYONE who shows up - even at the last
minute can take that seat from you and you have to give it up. This punishment only applies to the next race you
attend. So if you show and get to run, or you don't get to run, the punishment is over. Here's the deal so the rest of you know... It's a LOT of work to get 1 car ready to go. It's a WHOLE
LOT of work when we have to get 6 or 8 cars ready to go. But if you need a loaner and tell us, we'll do it. This
often means we are up very late the night before the race. (this time it was after midnight) And it also means
that we may not have the time to check things on our own cars to get ready. We only
have a limited number of cars to use as loaners. So in this case, all the cars were spoken for when Mr. Timmy wanted
to come race. We didn't have a car available. So he stayed home and didn't get to run. We only ask a few things with the loaner cars. If you request it, SHOW UP FOR THE EVENT. If you break
it, come help fix it. And if you notice anything wrong with it, let us know so we can get it fixed or corrected.
Is that too much to ask? Notice we didn't ask anyone to pay for anything? Anyway back to
the race! Hedge Hog drew the Pole Position and with that came lane choice and the responsibility
to call the start. But he didn't want to call it (doesn't speak English), so Jola called the start. Drscope squeeked out front from his starting position on the front row. Nasty Neal rolled off slowly from the
front row as did The Jerm who was on the far left edge in the rough stuff. On the second row,
Jola, Miss Mike, Solovus and Ice Man got bottled up behind the slow cars. Drscope was able to
break away and roll off into the lead followed by The Jerm who finally got rolling and Hedge Hog who was having a difficult
time keeping his car straight on the bumpy road. Miss Mike found a hole open on the right side
and headed off after hedge Hog. A little farther back, Solovus in the newly completed Bio Hazard was coming on strong
but not being familiar with soap box racing, he used the brakes to keep from plowing into Ice Man. Now
things were getting tight and Jola was rapidly gaining ground with no where to go. She speared her way between
Nasty Neal and Miss Mike then moved left to pass Hedge Hog who suddenly also moved left. Jola went 4 wheels off the
road to keep from hitting hedge Hog and was still gaining speed when she caught Ice Man. With
no where to go, she again went 4 wheels off the road to pass Ice Man in the dirt! This manuver threw a rather large
rock out into traffic where it flew past Nasty Neal's head, at which point he decided to back off and just enjoy the ride. Once clear of traffic Jola set off in hot pursuit of The Jerm leaving the rest of the field in her dust and debris. Up front, Drscope was first one to fly onto the bridge for the win. Then came The Jerm getting BIG AIR as he
shot onto the bridge, followed by the rapidly gaining Jola who once again probably reached the highest speed of anyone in
this race on this hill. If we would have had just another 75 to 100 feet of race left, she probably would have caught
him! The Jerm and Jola crossed the bridge and just before the end of the bridge, Jola attemped
to pass The jerm on the left. She ran out of room and clipped the side of the bridge. That spun her car into the
guard rail as she exited the bridge tearing off wheels and other parts. Then the next group of
4 cars all came to the bridge at the same time. Hedge Hog was closely followed by Miss Mike driving The Jerm's Weekend
Warrior II in his first race, Solovus driving Bio Hazard in his and the car's first race, and Ice Man who just didn't have
room to make a last minute pass for position. Nasty Neal came last in his first race on this hill, just enjoying the
ride and glad he wasn't tangled up in any of that traffic. As this group of cars exited the bridge,
they had to dodge jola's car which was across the road as well as a shower of debris from all the bits and pieces that had
been ripped off her car! We're happy to report that ALL Jola's safety equipment worked perfectly
and although the car suffered major damage, Jola only received a bruize on her itty bitty left pinky finger.
OFFICIAL RESULTS RACE #3 MAY 8 THANKS MOM! 1
DRSCOPE
10 POINTS 2 THE
JERM
9 POINTS 3 JOLA
8 POINTS 4 HEDGEHOG 7
POINTS 5 MISS MIKE
6 POINTS 6 SOLOVUS
5 POINTS 7 ICE
MAN
4 POINTS 8 NASTY
NEAL
3 POINTS
RACE #4 JUNE 12 BATTER UP! IN HONOR OF
THE FIRST BASEBALL GAME PLAYED IN AMERICA IN 1839
We were planning for a
rather large group of racers for this event following the interest that was raised at the cook out and awards presentation.
But things began to quickly deteriorate when The Jerm announced he was going to travel north to visit family, and Ice
Man was going to Monteal to attend the Canadian Grand Prix.
Then just a few days
prior to the event, the PUGSBRA folks announced they all had to work so they wouldn’t be attending. To make matters worse, Nasty Neal and his wife awoke early race day morning to stomach
illness and couldn’t make the event. So we had just 5 racers
show up for the start of the race. Miss Mike was planning on driving The
Jerm’s car II, but it was up on the rack of the trailer. Neal’s car had to come off in order
to get a few of the other race cars off the trailer. So Miss Mike decided (agreed) to drive Nasty Neal’s
Indestructible Monte Carlo in order to cut down on the amount of time and effort to unload and reload Neal’s car to
get II off the trailer. Jola, who will now be known as Tygrys, was
excited to have her newly reconditioned car ready to go following her crash in the May race. Mr. Timmy stepped up to take the wheel of the DW1386X once again. It was this
race weekend last year when he crashed the DW1386X on Middle Point Rd during the Fun Run. Solovus was once again driving Bio Hazard in it’s second ever race. And Drscope was at the wheel of The Wedge of Doom. Miss
Mike drew pole position in the card draw with Drscope drawing last place in 5th. At the start Miss Mike rolled out in front. Tygrys was having difficulty with
badly dragging rear brakes. Solovus tried to help tygrys get rolling which in turn held him back. Drscope was able to get around the group on the left and wasted no time reeling in Miss
Mike and taking the lead. Mr Timmy was right behind Miss Mike,
but couldn’t get close enough to make a pass.
At the finish, it was
Drscope making MISFITS history as the first racer to ever win 4 races in a row during a single season. He
was followed by Miss Mike in Second, Mr. Timmy in Third, Solovus in Fourth and an unhappy Tygrys bringing up the rear to take
the skunk. OFFICIAL RESULTS RACE
#4 1st
Drscope 10 points 2nd Miss Mike
9 points 3rd
Mr. Timmy 8 points 4th Solovus 7
points 5th
Tygrys (Jola) 6 points
RACE #5 JULY 10 SUMMER SPRINTS to Honor
the RIDE OF LADY GODIVA IN 1040
Race
#5 SUMMER SPRINTS 2011 OFFICIAL RESULTS 1
Drscope 10 points 2 The Jerm 9
points 3 Solovus
8 points 4 Ice Man
7 points 5 Tygrys
6 points 6 Nasty Neal
5 points 7 Evil Erin 4
points
RACE #6 AUGUST 14 SUMMER SLAM A DAY IN THE PARK WE START THE SECOND HALF OF THE RACE SEASON!
Race #6 A DAY
IN THE PARK 3 OFFICIAL RESULTS
1 DRSCOPE
10 points
2 JERM 9
points
3 SOLOVUS
8 points
4 TYGRYS 7
points
5 MR TIMMY
6 points
6 HEDGE HOG 5
pointd
RACE #7 SEPTEMBER 11 NEVER FORGET! WE HONOR THE MEMORY OF THE 3,000 PEOPLE WHO DIED AT THE HANDS OF ISLAMIC TERRORISTS
ON 9/11/2001
On September 11. 2011, we paid respect
to the 3,000 people who lost their lives at the hands of Islamic terrorists 10 years ago, and to those
who have fallen protecting our freedoms. We had 7 drivers
show up for this event held on one of our favorite hills. At the card draw, King Arthur driving
Blue By You, got the pole position and the honor of calling the start. He choose to start on the left side
of the front row with Nasty Neal in the middle and The Jerm on the right.
Row 2 was Drscope on the left, Tygrys
in the middle and Cropp on the right. Hedge Hog and Ice Man were on the back row. At the start, Drscope and Tygrys were able to pull to the left and passed the front row as the tight field started
to go single file. At turn one it was Tygrys in the lead followed by Drscope and King Arthur. The Jerm who had rolled off slower then the rest of the front row was now gaining speed and coming on quick.
He shot past Nasty Neal on the inside of the corner for fourth and set off after the three leaders. Cropp was right behind Nasty Neal while Ice Man and Hedge Hog were bringing up the rear. At
Dead Mans Curve, Tygrys hit the man hole covers. A few feet latter the rear of her car stepped out.
She tried to catch it, but it snapped back the other way and she left the road going backwards at a high rate of speed. That put Drscope in the lead as he started down the steep section. His mirrors full of King Arthur
in Blue By You. The Jerm’s car went through Dead Mans Curve in a 4 wheel drift as he tried to close
on King Arthur. At the bottom of the steep section Drscope could still not shake King Arthur off his tail.
The Jerm was doing all he could to try to catch a draft off King Arthur, and Nasty Neal was doing his best to stay
ahead of Cropp. Drscope took his 7th win of the year driving the Wedge of Doom! Just behind him, The Jerm closing in on King Arthur pulled out at the cross walk to try to make the pass.
But he needed the finish line moved a few more inches down the road. King Arthur beat him to the
finish by just a couple of inches! Once again we had to go back to the finish line camera to determine
finishing positions. So King Arthur took Second in Blue By You with The Jerm driving II in Third right along side. Nasty Neal in the newly re-bodied Bio Hazard was next across the line in Fourth with Cropp driving White Lightning
right on his tail in Fifth. Then came Ice Man in Sixth driving Totally Legal, followed by Hedge Hog in Seventh driving
the DW1386X with sticking rear brakes. Tygry’s car suffered a broken wheel, trashed
inner tube and bent rear axle.
1 Drscope
2
King Arthur
3 The Jerm
4
Nasty Neal
5 Cropp
6
Ice Man
7 Hedge Hog
DNF
Tygrys - crash
THE 2011 EAST COAST CHALLENGE IS SCHEDULED FOR
THE WEEKEND OF OCTOBER 1 & 2
RACE #8 OCTOBER
9 FALL
FLING LOOK
AT ALL THE PRETTY COLORS! It's Leif Erikson day
OFFICIAL RESULTS Race #8 1
DRSCOPE
10 points 2 JERM 9
points 3 ICE MAN 8
points 4 TYGRYS
7 points 5 SILENT STORM
6 points
RACE #9 NOVEMBER 13 GOBBLE KNOCKERS THE
RACE TO EAT TURKEY
We only had 4 cars for this race and that was too bad because
it was a GREAT day for racing and this is one really spectacular hill. It was clear, dry, warm and beautiful as we gathered
at the top of the race hill. And this is in an area with a lot of fun run hills. We lined up 4 across.
Ice Man was on the far left over the double yellow line, with Drscope to his right, then the Jerm and Tygrys on the
far right. At the start, both Ice Man and Jerm rolled out faster then Drscope & Tygrys did. And as soon as they
got clear of the front of Drscope's car, the hole between them got skinny! Jerm was a little faster the Ice Man, so
as drscope began to gain speed, he pulled in behind him and thought about trying to make a move to his right, but they are
running with guard rail right at the pavement's edge and he was afraid if Jerm moved over for the corner, he might get pinched
between the guard rail and Jerm's car. Drscope was gaining speed, but had nowhere to go, so he had to hit the brakes
just a bit to keep from hitting Jerm. From that point on, all Drscope could do was follow Jerm and hope Ice Man wasn't
closing in from behind. Then down near the bottom Drscope was able to pull out and get back in front. Jerm immediately
popped right over behind him for the draft. As the two cars approached the last left hand curve, Jerm was able to slip
stream and pulled out to Drscope's left. The two cars were side by side going into that last corner, but Jerm's advantage
of being on the shorter inside line allowed him to take the lead once more. There was nothing Drscope could do but follow
Jerm to the finish as he handed Drscope his first defeat in a Championship race this year! Ice Man finished third and
Tygrys brought up the rear in fourth. Jerm's victory was made just a little more important by the fact that his Father
had come to watch him race!
OFFICIAL RESULTS RACE #9 1) JERM
10 Points 2) DRSCOPE
9 Points 3) ICE MAN 8
Points 4) TYGRYS 7
Points
RACE #10 DECEMBER 11 LAST CHANCE 103 MAY FLOWER PILGRAMS LAND AT PLYMOUTH ROCK IN 1620 LAST CHANCE TO FREEZE YOUR BUNS OFF RACING IN 2011!
OFFICIAL RESULTS RACE #10 1) Jerm 10 points 2) Drscope 9 points 3) Ice Man 8 points 4) Tygrys 7 points
OFFICIAL 2011 CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS STANDINGS AFTER 9 RACES 1) Drscope 98
Points 2) Jerm 82
Points 3) Tygrys 65
Points 4) Ice Man 45
Points 5) Solovus 28
Points 6) Hedge Hog 27
Points 7) Nasty Neal 22
Points 8) Mr. Timmy
16 Points 9) Miss Mike 15
Points 10) King Arthur 14
Points 11) Cropp 6
Points 12) Silent Storm 6
Points 13) Evil Erin 4
Points 14) Jolly Roger 3
Points
|
