Down and Dirty in Tucson (7/28/2001)

Scottracing patched up and hitched up and towed down to Tucson for our first dirt race of the year Friday">

Down and Dirty in Tucson (7/28/2001)

Scottracing patched up and hitched up and towed down to Tucson for our first dirt race of the year Friday, 27 July 2001.  The Tucson club always puts on a good show, but we were pleasantly surprised to see the number of track improvements since our last visit almost a year ago.  Brightly painted fences, off the racing line far enough to not get hit, but close enough to provide great lighting was the most obvious change.  But they also have poured concrete throughout the tech scale and tech area plus built a new snack bar. 

The kart count was just shy of 100 and there were 18 Junior 2 2-cycles ready to do battle.  Some of the old gang, but a lot of new faces replacing Jeremy and Whtiwell with good equipment and desire.

A good pill draw put Carl on the pole for the first heat and he ran away with the race, finishing a half track ahead inspite of several yellows and the ensuing local friendly restart.

Unfortunately, the same pill draw gave him a next to last start in the second heat.   Expecting the same rash of yellows to help move him forward, he was being careful in picking off people.  Unfortunately, there were no yellows and he only advanced a handful of positions.  As a result, third on the grid in the main was a pleasant surprise.

The main was a lot of fun with the track having reduced to less than one groove, making passing difficult.  Because we had not run our engines for quite a while, the 787 new style we chose to run (019) was pretty far down on power and difficult to tune.  As a result, Carl promptly gave up two spots at the start and set out in fifth.  The lead pack was tight and passing difficult.  One great effort included teaching one of the locals how bump drafting works to get both he and Carl by and into third place.  A couple of laps later, he was back to second and then made a nice outside pass for the lead.  Unfortunately, he could not hold on as lapped traffic caused him to choose carefully while second place could just go where he wasn't.  A nice pass resulted and Carl was dropped to second where he spent about 6 laps looking for a way around.   Unfortunately, the leader had a great setup for hugging the bottom of the track and there just wasn't enough track on top in the turns for Carl to get by with the engine he had.  Credit to the winner who didn't put a wheel off even under intense pressure.   At the flag, he was half a kart ahead for the win.

We had a great time and it was fun to pass people using just driving rather than motor.   But we have gotten used to winning down there and look forward to returning.