The second race of the Midwest Series kicked off on Memorial Day weekend with the opposite weather forecast of the first race in Mentor. The host of this weekend's race was Leisure Hours R/C Raceway. ( leisurehoursraceway.com ) for those of you have not been to this facility you are missing out. Leisure Hours has an indoor and outdoor off-road track that has hosted major national races. It also has one of the smoothest and best looking on-road tracks in the country. The drivers stand is huge with more than enough room and the track even has a raised pit lane.
Saturday morning the crowd starting filing in and there was talk about the latest track layout. I think most on-road racers tend to dislike changes when it comes to track layouts but given the chance I think once everyone got some track time they began to enjoy it. More than a few people still tried to run the old chicane through the middle and found the wall. I know I saved mine just in time to get it sideways into the wall costing me a rear hub. That's one way to learn how to pay attention. The tire wear at Leisure Hours is on par with carpet if not better. It wasn't hard to run 3 qualifiers in sedan with the same set of tires that started small to begin with.
With a good turnout of over 60 people and the weather sunny with temps in the 80's, it was time to start racing. With 9 heats of qualifiers all together everyone was spread out enough to be able to race, Marshal, and pit. The track held up well and stayed consistent in the heat of the day.
After the 3 rd and final round for Saturday the top 3 in each class were as Follows:
200mm Sedan Open – Bobby Flack, Andy Power, and Tom Esposito
200mm Sedan Masters – Mike Garcia, Steve Lazarus, and Pat Morris
1/8 th GT – Mark Borchert, Mike Lyday, and Mike Cooper
1/8 th Open – Wes Lion, Mike McBride, and Greg Tong
1/8 th Masters – Dan Lewis, John Schweitzer, and Mark Unger
Sunday morning provided some cooler track temps for the 4 th and final round. This brought the lap times down and shook up the final qualifying standings. The sedan TQ was dropped by 9 seconds with a battle between Bobby Flack and Andy Power. GT class dropped 8 or 9 seconds with some quick driving and setup changes. 1/8 4WD got on the track when the temps started coming back up so only a few drivers made big jumps in time. After the 4 th and final round of qualifying your Top qualifiers are shown in the picture below with their TQ Pilsner glasses and “Bud pole” award.
The mains kicked off with the Sedan B-Main. Phillip Neiswinger and Mario Liberman battled to the end and swapped places on the final pit stop to finish within about 5 seconds of each other after the 30 minute race. Ken Echols held down third for the almost the entire race to hold off a fast charging Mike Estep who had a little trouble early on. The final results for the B-main are as follows:
1 st Phillip Neiswinger 105 Laps 30:12.238
2 nd Mario Liberman 104 Laps 30:01.104
3 rd Ken Echols 90 Laps 30:10.235
4 th Mike Estep 88 Laps 30:09.979
5 th Gerald Argalas 83 Laps 30:04.056
6 th Mike Parker 56 Laps 30:11.755
7 th James Palansky 31 Laps 22:13.881
8 th Demetris Lanier 20 Laps 6:40.959
9 th Nick Altieri 16 Laps 4:17.421
Next up was the Sedan A-Main. Andy Power and Bobby Flack led the field up front until Bobby has some trouble in the pits. Bobby would have more trouble later in the race dropping him back. Espo held down the 3 rd spot for over half the race before a problem dropped him back. Fabio Evangelista and Mike Garcia took advantage and moved up in the order. Espo made a charge at Garcia at the end of the race only to come up just short. The final results for the A-main are as follows:
1 st Andy Power 121 Laps 30:02.004
2 nd Fabio Evangelista 117 Laps 30:04.535
3 rd Mike Garcia 115 Laps 30:08.453
4 th Tom Esposito 115 Laps 30:12.678
5 th Steve Lazarus 109 Laps 30:00.775
6 th Bobby Flack 101 Laps 25:47.737
7 th Shih-Hang Lee 98 Laps 30:14.843
8 th Greg Tong 86 Laps 28:14.944
9 th Pat Morris 34 Laps 9:26.893
10 th Rick Vessell 18 Laps 4:27.975
Sedan was followed by the GT B-main. This Main had some of the best racing of the weekend between Karl Ennulat and Jose Morales. Jose used the slow and steady approach while Karl used a bit more of the throttle and curb technique. After passing back and forth right up until the end they were only separated by a little over 3 seconds. James Palansky fell into the third spot and never let it go. The final results for the GT B-main are as follows:
1 st Karl Ennulat 79 Laps 30:04.603
2 nd Jose Morales 79 Laps 30:07.947
3 rd James Palansky 77 Laps 30:02.250
4 th Bob Rexrode 73 Laps 30:18.141
5 th Ken Echols 44 Laps 30:16.461
The GT A-Main was the Mike Lyday show. Mark Borchert hung with Mike for the early part of the race but fell out and couldn't get his motor fired back up. Mike Cooper tried a 3 pit strategy to gain time on Lyday but Mr. Lyday had his car working so good it just pulled away to the win. The final results for the GT A-main are as follows:
1 st Mike Lyday 100 Laps 30:02.350
2 nd Mike Cooper 95 Laps 30:01.851
3 rd Thomas Fears 91 Laps 30:01.461
4 th Pete Barton 85 Laps 30:15.723
5 th Gary Waldhelm 84 Laps 30:18.187
6 th Jim Saulinskas 60 Laps 26:46.734
7 th Mark Borchert 59 Laps 17:54.467
8 th Mike Frazier 24 Laps 7:40.935
9 th Scott Takacs 12 Laps 4:25.109
10 th Jerry Rogers 0 Laps
Next up was the C-Main for the 18 th 4wd Open class. Mike Chiappetti Led this one most of the way until about 84 lap mark when his pitman “allegedly” ran him out of fuel and that let Allen Broecker slip bye to take the win. The final results for the 1/8 th 4WD C-Main is as follows:
1 st Allen Broecker 110 Laps 30:13.906
2 nd Mike Chiappetti 109 Laps 30:08.904
3 rd Demetris Lanier 89 Laps 30:02.395
4 th Wayne Broecker 88 Laps 30:12.526
5 th James Boyd 65 Laps 30:15.200
6 th John Mullen 21 Laps 5:51.658
7 th Wilson Man 0 Laps
The 1/8 th B-Main opened up with Ryan Ramsey leading for the first 5 laps before falling out completely 2 laps later. Mark Unger took over the lead from there and never looked back on his way to the win. Dennis young made a late race charge to jump into third ahead of Mike Becker. The final results for the 1/8 th 4WD B-Main is as follows:
1 st Mark Unger 116 Laps 30:14.546
2 nd Dennis Young 114 Laps 30:08.900
3 rd Mike Becker 111 Laps 30:05.769
4 th Mike Saputo 109Laps 30:01.390
5 th Randy Ramsey 76 Laps 20:31.418
6 th John Schweitzer 58 Laps 30:01.668
7 th Ron Trobaugh 15 Laps 4:01.357
8 th Ryan Ramsey 7 Laps 2:39.086
The final race of the day was the 1/8 th A-Main. The TQ Wes Lion took the lead at the start and never looked back until he picked up the checkered flag. Art Carbonell who has probably been racing longer then Wes has been alive tried to track him down but had to settle for second. McBride, Sweeney and Lechel swapped the next three spots late in the race with McBride coming out in third. The final results for the 1/8 th 4WD A-Main is as follows:
1 st Wes Lion 129 Laps 30:10.269
2 nd Arturo Carbonell 125 Laps 30:07.514
3 rd Mike McBride 123 Laps 30:05.576
4 th Kurt Lechel 120Laps 30:08.707
5 th Mark Sweeney 113 Laps 30:06.675
6 th Greg Tong 103 Laps 28:55.250
7 th Rick Vessell 93 Laps 30:03.845
8 th Dan Lewis 35 Laps 9:55.511
Leisure Hours Raceway provided great weather, great track, and a great facility. One other thing that has to be mentioned was the announcing done by Mike Nelson. Mike was awesome in calling out leaders, lap times, and the race action making each and every race full of excitement. I hope everyone had a great time and will be at the next race in Portage, IN to support all the hard work Team NITRO has put into giving us another track to race at.
Thanks, Bye.
Andy Power – Series Director
Email: andyp.323@gmail.com
Mike Cooper – Webmaster, GT rules author.