We prepared for round 2 of our series by traveling up the California coastline to beautiful Ventura and Scott Salzberg’s Pacific Coast Hobbies on Feb. 3. For those of you that had to struggle through rain and snow to race, you should know that we had sunny skies and temps in the high 70’s on Saturday. Eat your hearts out.

Spray Glue Box Stock

The first race of the day was for spray glue box stock. Bill Taylor was TQ with Chuck Panno and Jason Holmes 2^nd and 3^rd. Once again, we needed to run semi’s to pare the field of 14 down to a more manageable number. Monty Ohren, Sam Rackam, Chuck Panno and Eric Hahn made the transfer from the "B" Semi. Bill Taylor, Scott Salzberg, David Aikens and Alan Trujillo made the transfer from the "A" semi.

The main started with Chuck Panno, Sam Rackam and Bill Taylor separating themselves from the field. First Chuck and then Sam ran into problems dropping them down the field leaving Bill with a 9-lap lead after 3 heats. Bill opened the lead every heat to win by 43 laps. However, it was very different in the field. Monty Ohren, Scott Salzberg and Eric Hahn raced within laps of each other for the entire race. Eric was second after 6 but could not withstand Monty’s pace and fell to third and eventually fourth when Scott made a big charge coming from 10 down to Monty to pick up the third spot, finishing only 2 laps behind Monty.

Box Stock

After we cleaned the track and got a bit of practice, we started the glue race. Jason (I gotta spoil Bill’s fun) Holmes set fast time with Bill (I’m mad at Jason for spoiling my fun) Taylor and Greg Cueva 2^nd and 3^rd.

We had 10 entries for this class and so we were subjected to a round robin race. Jason used the top pick to take the orange lane and used this to his advantage and carried a 1-lap lead over Sam Rackam through 2 heats. As Jason went out, Bill Taylor came in and ran a perfect heat on the tough red lane to equal Jason’s average. Bill quickly increased his average until he started getting involved in other racers accidents and his average started to fall. During this time, Jason was back in and staging a run at Bill until moving into the lead by one lap after 7 heats. But Jason’s charge took its toll on the race car and during one particularly violent attempt to break the laws of physics (you know the one, two objects, one space) he suffered a premature solder failure at the motor during heat 8. Bill retook the lead that he held till the end. Greg Cueva ran a steady race to finish second. Jason passed both Dale Garcia and Rich Curnutte in the last heat to claim the final podium spot.

Cobalt 12

Once again, we had a short entry list for our cobalt group race. Bill Taylor was fastest in qualifying with Mike Graverson and Phil Larcom following.

Phil took the lead on the start with Mike catching him after 2. Mike pulled ahead and stayed just out of reach to win the race by 7 laps. Rich Curnutte and Bill Taylor followed way, way back, both suffering more problems than can be recounted in a Stephen King novel.

One Motor Open

Only 2 of the 6 entries chose to qualify. Carlos Aloise cut Richard Curnutte to take the 7 points.

Pat Ularte led the first 2 heats out of purple and black, while Carlos chose to start on the tough red lane. Carlos got serious during heat 3 taking the lead and stretching out to a 27-lap lead on Jason Holmes after 4. Carlos ran into serious problems on black in heat 5 and this allowed Jason to pull within 5 laps. Jason grabbed 2 more laps during the next heat, but that was as close as he got as he again knocked his motor out. Carlos picked up another win with Mike Graverson and Richard Curnutte tied for 2^nd. Mike took 2^nd place on sections.

Group 7

After a short break, we were on to the Group 7 race. Carlos ran fast time with Richard Curnutte and Phil Larcom following.

The race started with Carlos leading (so what else is new?) and turning what would be the races fastest lap. Shortly after that, we started having problems with the track and power to one of the lanes. Jason found it necessary to add, subtract and multiply laps by the square root of the weight of the sun in grams to make the racing fair. But let it be said that Carlos won 4 of the lanes outright and no one could deny him his win. Forrest Watchers won the other 2 heats and claimed the 2^nd spot with Phil Larcom in 3^rd.

Track Calls

We need to recognize 2 new racers to our region. Alan Trujillo and Darryl Atkin. Alan and Darryl drove in from Elko, NV. Elko is 12½ hours from Ventura. Now that’s dedication!!! Welcome to SoCal USRA.

Another racer to note is Eric Hahn. Eric was a racer out of Elmsford and Nutley raceways in the late 60’s and early 70’s. This was his first USRA race in almost 30 years! For the last 4 or 5 years, he has borrowed a car to race in a weekly race once or twice a year. Eric ran as high as second place in the spray glue main. Good job Eric.

Scale racer Chuck Panno tried his hand at glue racing. I don’t think Chuck found glue style racing much to his liking.

I heard that Jason called the Florida Elections board during the Group 7 main to ask them to certify the results of the race.

Once again the new class’ outdrew the traditional class. The count was 14 to 10 in box stock and 6 to 5 in opens.

We say goodbye to Al Chuck. Al is returning to the San Francisco region. If Al ever puts down the golf clubs long enough, I am sure he will tear them up. Good luck Al.