During Wednesday’s opening heat on the West Course, much of the attention was paid to the battle in F Street. Bryan Heitkotter earned his sixth National Championship jacket, but had to come from behind to do it. Extremely wet conditions during Tuesday’s runs favored those drivers later in the queue, of which Matthew Ales was one. Ales took advantage of this and put down a fast time on his final run from Tuesday. With Wednesday’s perfectly dry conditions, on the more technical of the two courses, Heitkotter flashed his skills by laying down a second lap that was 1.8 seconds clear of the field, and built off of that momentum on his final run of the event. Ales tried to answer on his final run, but took out a cone on a lap that would have been the only one in the same zip code to that of Heitkotter’s.
Tamra Hunt conquered the Tire Rack National Championships in her first trip to the event in C Street Prepared Ladies. Hunt was the day-one leader and was able to keep the momentum rolling through Wednesdays three runs cruising to a 3.251-second win over the rest of the field.
