Things got off to a rough start on our way to HPT, about an hour from the track as we approached Kansas City we were one of the first vehicles to arrive at this nasty accident on the Interstate. From what we were told by the highway workers no one was killed in this accident, but several people were taken away in ambulances. We were just glad we were about 20 seconds behind and did not end up in the carnage.

Once we got to HPT things calmed down a bit and we were able to unload our rig, get setup in the garages and pick up my tires from the Hoosier people. Last year as you might remember, Niki used Avon tires on his FC and I tried starting out the year on Avon tires with my Formula Ford. Things went a little bumpy early in the year trying to get Avon tires for the Formula Ford and when we finally did, I quickly learned that the Avon tire was not going to work. Luckily I was able to get some Hoosier tires from the Lindstrands to try and I have been on Hoosiers ever since. The great thing about the tire program this year has been working directly with Hoosier tire and especially Bruce Foss. Bruce really was key in helping me test and develop running a combination of 6" and 7" tires on the car vs the normal 7" and 8" combination that has become the standard over the last few years.

Practice got underway for the Runoffs and I was fortunate enough to have three test days with excellent weather to shake the car down after my big crash in August and test several new items I had on the car. The first two days I had a couple little issues pop up like a mounting tab that broke off the valve cover that created an oil leak and a cracked fitting for the oil pressure sensor. Some or most of these issues were caused by either the excessive vibration I had seen previous to the Runoffs and/or the big hit I had at HPT in August that tore the right side of the car off. With those problems fixed, I was set to go and was running some excellent lap times. I was around 2 seconds faster than the track record of 1.39.5 I set in August and it looked like only one other car (John Robinson) was close on pace.

Next up were the four qualifying sessions that are standard for the Runoffs. It is really a long drawn out process for the Runoffs, but I guess that is part of what makes it a special event. As it turns out I went faster almost every session out from the first test day through the last qualifying session. Unfortunately, John Robinson also went faster almost every session out and was able to always stay between .1sec to .2sec faster then me each qualifying session. When all was said and done in qualifying, I would end up 2nd quick and start the race from outside pole. I was very happy with my qualifying sessions, although I fought the car with some minor issues during qualifying like a carburetor bog to a dynamic rear end tow change, the car still worked well and I felt like I got everything out of the car on the track.

One other interesting item of note during the four days of qualifying was going through a protest from fellow competitors John Robinson and Gerald Barrett. Both drivers felt that the rear section of the floor of the car was a diffuser and protested me Wednesday evening. Per the rule sof Formula Ford, our cars are not allowed to have any wings or diffusers. I had to lock the car down in the garage over night and then the tech officials looked over the car in the morning and by noon had called me to one of the court rooms to tell me there was nothing wrong with my car. It was a minor inconvenience for me, but was probably more of an inconvenience to Robinson and Barrett who were being constantly summoned to the officials in an attempt to get them to come up with some kind of explanation to support their protest.

For the race I knew I needed to improve the car slightly, which was really tough because the car was not as consistent as I would have liked. While Nick and I were checking the tow on the rear of the car we noticed that it kept changing on me from session to session. What we found was that the left rear upright had worn out and was allowing the camber/tow block on top to pivot on the upright. The worn out upright was allowing the tow to change while running, which was making the car uncharacteristically inconsistent. So for the race I knew I at least would have the consistency back in the car I had the last few races and was hoping this would allow me to tune the car the way I wanted and could count on it to behave that way. One other issue I was having on and off all week was a bog in the carb, caused by it running too lean. In my last qualifying session the bog was bad and probably cost me the tenth or two I needed for pole. Unfortunately it was our coolest qualifying session and the cooler air made an already lean condition on the low end worse. My engine builder Jay Ivey was there for the race weekend and fixed that for the race with a simple carb adjustment.

I got a call from Jeff Braun the morning of the race and we talked about the strategy for the race which was basically to get the jump on the start and try to pull out a lead. If I could not get away or we got a yellow, then I would just run my pace and see if tire management would put me in a position to pull out the race win. Well, things went almost exactly to plan, starting with getting the jump on the start and leading into turn 1. While I got a better start then Robinson, his straight line speed allowed him to stay almost side by side with me as we crested the hill heading into turn 1. I am not exactly sure why there was suge a huge difference in our straight line speeds, but I am going to take a guess it's the very narrow and sleek shape of the Swift chassis. The Swift has no side pods nor an external intake scoop reducing the amount of surface area in comparison to my Van Diemen. I always have a braking point picked out for turn one on a start and it was deep enough for me to take the lead into turn 1. However Robinson's nose hit my rear tire which sent me wide on the exit and through the grass. I was able to get the car pointed straight and never lifted to come out in first place and with a little bit of a lead. Who said you can't go off-roading with a Formula car! <VBG> :-) From there I started to pull out a little of a gap only to have a double yellow come out stacking up the field again.  I got a great restart and quickly opened up a couple second lead and was feeling very comfortable in the car as it was handling the best it had all week. Unfortunately I was watching my lead shrink a little each lap and it was not long before Robinson ran me down.  Again with the big difference in straight line speed as soon as Robinson picked up the draft off my Van Diemen I was a sitting duck and he flew by down the front straight. At this point i went to plan B and just found a comfortable speed to let him either make a mistake or burn off his tires. Plan B worked out perfectly, as I could watch the rubber peeling off the front and rear tires on Robinson's car. As I started to close in on Robinson, he started making mistakes locking up the brakes and missing the apex in several spots. Once I got up behind him I wanted to be patient and continue to fill his mirrors as my tires were like new yet. After a couple more laps, Robinson had slowed up so much in the fast turn 1-2 complex that I got a huge run on him and passed him into turn 3. I quickly started to pull out a gap on Robinson especially once he went off in the other high speed turn 8-9 section. Unfortunately, this is where things stopped going to plan, with just over a lap left in the race I went off track at the tightest and slowest corner at HPT.  I went into the corner hitting my marks and no faster then normal, yet the back end of the car kicked out big time and when I corrected it, the car was pointed off the track on the exit. I brought the car gently back on track keeping it from spinning or hitting the wall, but Robinson was able to get by. I closed back in on Robinson and set the fast lap of the race on the last lap, but would end up second place.  It was a really tough way to end what was one of my best race weeks ever. I am really interested to see the SPEED coverage as it was a really exciting race.

I need to thank a bunch of people that put a huge effort into my program. First I have to thank my family. For those of you that know me and my family, without my family I would not be racing. We have a lot of fun together and I can't think of a better way for the family to spend it's time together. I also want to thank my girlfriend Callie who flew out to the race and helped kill the boredom that is a week and a half in Topeka, Kansas. Next I have to thank Bart, AV and the inflatable deer. Yep, another boredom killer!!! Now for those people that helped make my black rocket the fastest Formula Ford in the US. Jay, Susan and the gang at Ivey Engines. Jay and Susan Ivey are some of the nicest people I have ever worked with in the racing business. I have never seen people who care more about their customers than the Iveys. Bruce Foss and Hoosier Tire, an incredible tire company to work with. Bruce, his engineers, and dealers all put a lot of effort into working with me on testing tires and making sure I had what I needed for the Runoffs. Next year I think garages 15 and 16 will be officially labeled as Formula Hoosier!! I also want to thank Alan Oleary for the help the last couple years on several items from Dampers to Transmissions. I am pretty lucky to have met Alan and get to pick his brain about racing, he knows his stuff and has been a huge help in making this car do almost everything better. Last but not least is the Braun family and in particular Jeff Braun. Jeff is one of my best friends and easily the closest thing I have to a race engineer. Without Jeff, there is no way I would have been in the position to win this years SCCA Runoffs. Jeff is one incredibly bright engineer and a great friend. For me personally I love to win races and absolutely hate to lose and it does not matter if it is a regional race at Blackhawk Farms or the SCCA Runoffs. I really did not put that much more emphasis on this race other than I really wanted to win it for the people I listed above who worked so hard to put me in the position to win. Thanks for all the help and hopefully we'll go one better in 2008!

2007 SCCA Runoffs Results