Written from Justin Hall's Perspective: Practice went well, no big issues. It was decided after the drivers meeting that qualifying grid would be set based on practice lap times which was fine with me and is probably the most fair, but unfair only from the perspective that the decision was made after practice had ended and some were not aware this would happen. Some guys, for example, practiced on flipped tires which take a session to come in, and those folks got the short end of the deal.

Qualifying determined starting position for both races, placing additional premium on doing well. Ken Dobson practiced quickest, followed by me, Roger Foo, Tommy Olivier, Barry Hartzel, and a few more of the usual cast of characters that are typically up front. I came in around 1/2 way through qualifying to cool the tires; Dobson was in as was Tommy O. We were watching the board, Tommy went back out and Ken and I stayed in the rest of the session happy with our positions. Barry stayed out the whole time, but couldn't improve, track was falling off which was the main reason Ken and I stayed in. Ken ended up quickest with 1:48:179, I was second with 1:48:803, Barry third with 1:48:901, then another 9 drivers in the :49:xxx's, so the field was pretty competitive (another 11 drivers in the :50:xxx's). Ken's >1/2 second just shows how good he is, but is not representative of how close the rest of the field is.

Race 1 was pretty competitive and exciting for the first few laps at least. Clean start, I had a nose on Ken into t2, but he had inside and shorter distance to cover through 2 so at exit he had 1/2 car on me. We were rubbing a bit between t2 and 3 and I had to fall in behind or risk losing my 2nd position. In order, Ken, me, Barry, Tommy, Mike Tolman were nose to tail for the first couple laps. Third lap Barry tried to get me inside at t9, I gave him the apex and we went through side by side, giving me the inside into t10 so he had to lift. With Barry and I going side by side, Ken opened up 4 cars, I was out of the draft and that was that..... The following lap Barry went 4 off in 4 allowing me distance between Barry, Tommy, etc. and allowing Mike Tolman to pass them both, we finished in that order. Dobson won by 4.4 seconds and Tolman was 1.5 seconds behind me. Tolman was always close enough to make me nervous, but not close enough to try anything. Lesson for me in this race was, #1 I can go deeper into t2 at the start and #2 not drive in my mirrors, i.e. catch Dobson instead of monitor Tolman.

Race 2, on pregrid I decided to apply lesson #1 from above and outbrake Ken into t2. Unfortunately I think Ken was intent not to let this happen. I decided I was going to wait for him to brake before I did, and hopefully get a car ahead and grab the second apex or at least the exit berm and hold the apex of 3. Unfortunately for me I think Ken was also waiting for me to brake.... We got a clean start and Tommy was pushing me with very nice bump drafts the whole way. Ken didn't brake when I thought he should, and gets on the binders a split second later. We essentially brake at the same time, but this time much deeper than the race yesterday, and we are both locked. Ken tells me later he didn't think he was locked, he thought it was me, and didn't realize he was locked till he tried to turn. I realized in the braking zone that I was locked, modulated, got back in the brakes and still was able to turn in albeit a car length late. Ken, not realizing he was locked, car not turning, hits me behind my door, forward of my rear wheel. Fortunately for Ken, this contact helped him rotate his car, unfortunately for me my car rotated 180 degrees and I found myself looking at 40 SM's bearing down on me. As a footnote, I later watched Tommy's video and there was so much white smoke he couldn't see either of us. Anyway, Ken is a clean racer, he apologized later, it was an accident, we were both being super aggressive, it happens. Back to story, I flip a u-turn drivers left into the dirt not wanting to go right into traffic yet not wanting to wait for the whole field to pass, and resumed in ~30th position. The left front tire from me flatspotting and the spin combined made the car HARD to drive (I see at the end of the race is corded and flatspotted in a 4" section, so pretty bad). The car is driving poorly, but I press on. From this point to race end the video is VERY exciting as I am passing literally everywhere on track. So I get up to about 15th or so after some very aggressive passes and a caution comes out (YES!!!) about 1/2 way through the race which is what I needed. I should note there is some great racing going on mid pack that must be fun for viewers of the race, these guys were going 3 wide out of 5, 6, 11, etc!!!! Back to the caution, we were yellow for 2 laps then back to green I was far enough back that green came out when I was between 10-11, and at this point I make really my only bone head move and go super late into 11 to overtake Johnny Kanivas. My tire found its flat spot, I slid into his car at a deflecting angle and took the position. I felt horrible about this, as I hate body contact, but all I can do is learn from it in the future. So I ended up picking off a few more people, as you can imagine the more up the field I got the more difficult the passes were to make. I probably had the most fun with Roger Foo, he and I battled for a lap before I got him between 4-5. Roger is a hell of a driver and super clean, fun to race with. I ended up in 8th, with one more lap could have been 6th, but all in all happy with my performance both days.

Written By: Justin Hall