TOPEKA, Kan. (May 3, 2017) – Strong winds greeted competitors Friday at the 2017 Tire Rack Crows Landing Championship Tour. Thankfully, winds subsided somewhat over the weekend with temperatures rising both literally and figuratively. Ben Martinez designed a course described by Howard Duncan at the drivers meeting as “the most fun to drive course I have experienced in 45 years of autocrossing.” The most distinctive elements of the course were long, fast sweeping turns defined by just a few cones. Sunday’s course was essentially Saturday’s course reversed with the slalom moved from the finish to the start.
Heat 1 opened with an upset. SS National Champion Scott Fraser ended Saturday out of the trophies in fourth. Monty Pack, Karlton Lew and Ambrose Fung were tightly packed at the top, all in Porsche GT3s. Lew edged away from the pack (no pun intended) on Sunday to finish one second clear of the rest. Pack just stayed in front of Fung by 0.06 seconds. Fraser finished with a strong last run on Sunday to get within 0.1 second of Fung but stayed in fourth.
C Street saw an impressive performance from Brian Coulson in the newest generation Mazda MX-5. One week after winning the Pro Solo at Crows Landing, Coulson took first again at the Championship Tour by a final margin of 1.6 seconds. Local fast guy Maurice Velandia snuck past Jeff Bandes on his last run to take second, all in the MX-5.
The expected STR faceoff between National Champion James Yom (Honda S2000) and Ron Bauer (Mazda MX-5) ended differently than the ProSolo® where Yom prevailed. Bauer’s 1.2-second lead from Saturday was too much for Yom to overcome. Praneil Prasad (Honda S2000) stayed close to Yom to finish third.
There was no drama in D Street as Mark Scroggs crushed the class by almost four seconds in his Chevrolet Camaro. His first run of the weekend gapped the class by 2.5 seconds. Competitors in D Street will be searching for something to keep the National Championship from being a forgone conclusion.
STX was 23 deep and the largest class of the weekend. Jonathan Lugod in a Subaru BRZ had a slim 0.2 second lead after Saturday’s runs over Jeff Wong in the Scion FR-S. Steve O’Blenes sat in third, one second behind the leader in his Mazda RX-8. The order would remain the same after Sunday runs, but Lugod would stretch his lead to 1.3 seconds.
STXL was much smaller with four drivers, but the competition between Catherine Tran (Mazda RX-8) and Jessica Pao (Subaru BRZ) was fierce. Pao led after Saturday runs by a slim 0.4 seconds, but Tran came back on Sunday to win by 0.5 seconds on her last run. So fierce was this competition that these two took two of the top three spots in the Ladies Overall Indexed results. But it was Deana Kelley in her CSL MX-5 that would top the index.
The CP Mustang matchup between the National Championship winning 1965 model of Frank Stagnaro and the upstart 2011 from Brian Peters and John Hogan had another contender - the 2006 of Tim Bergstrom. Bergstrom would finish Saturday in second, behind Peters and ahead of Stagnaro and Hogan. The Sunday course must have agreed with the 2011 Mustang as Peters stretched his 1.5 second lead to 5.5 seconds and Hogan would jump to second. Bergstrom was one second behind in third, just ahead of Stagnaro.
Words by Michael Butler
Image by Anthony Porta
