Round Ten Sees Bickers and Fierberg Victorious at Buttonwillow

Buttonwillow, Calif. (July 28, 2013) – Joey Bickers claimed victory in a race that saw the lead change hands no less than seven times in the Formula F1600 group in the early morning race while Ira Fierberg took the honors for the fourth time this season in the Formula F2000 group in round 10 of the Pacific Formula F1600/F2000 Championship Series, at Buttonwillow Raceway Park on Sunday in Buttonwillow, California.

The race was scheduled to begin at 8:00am with the grid positions set by the finishing order of Saturday’s race. Once again the temperature was already approaching 80 degrees as the cars took to the track with the Formula F1600 group led by Colton Herta in the #98, PR1 Motorsports w/BHA Curb-Agajanian entry sponsored by DVS shoe Company, Curb Records, Mygale N. America, OMP, Bell Helmets, Penske Shocks, Mygale/Honda with teammate Joey Bickers, #34, PR1 Motorsports Mygale/Honda alongside on the front row.

Lynx Racing with teammates Andrew Evans, #19 and Alex Keyes, #32 side by side in their Spectrum/Hondas on the second row. They will be followed by Alex Kirby, #81, Fast Forward Components, Piper DF5/Honda and Jim Stewart, #89, Mygale SJ04/Honda.

Bob Negron and Ira Fierberg led the Formula F2000 group, Bob Negron in the #9,Terri Negron Web Design, fengshuimebaby.com, Van Diemen and Fierberg in his #27, Pinnacle Performance, Sparco USA, DFR, Van Diemen.

Les Phillips, #2, Swiss Implants, Porterfield Brakes, Van Diemen and Peter West, #99, Frank Monise Motors, Zombo.com, Kodenko Jeans, T.J. Martell Foundation Van Diemen make up the second row followed by Michael Murphy, #8 Mygale SJ04, Harindra DeSilva, #6, DFR Van Diemen and Tom Hope, #18, H&M Racing, Dart, Carbir.

Hope and his crew with the help of PR1 Motorsports worked until 2:00am replacing the rear half of the car, mating Van Diemen running gear to the back of the Carbir, after the pinion gear trouble that sidelined him on Saturday. Without a morning warm up session Hope’s first lap in the car would be his pace lap and so was facing a huge challenge in the race not knowing how the car would handle.

Bob Negron took the lead at the green flag as the Formula F2000 field headed toward the first turn. Negron was followed by Fierberg, West, Phillips, Hope, Murphy and DeSilva.

Negron continued in the lead until he lost fourth gear and his lead began to dwindle finally losing the lead on lap 10 and continuing to slide down the order until finally finishing in 5th place. Nursing the car he was able to maintain his pace in the tighter sections of the track but lost out on the long fast run from the grapevine, through Riverside and down to the Mazda hairpin.

Fierberg seized the lead on lap ten and went on to the victory, the checkered falling one lap early (lap 13 of 14 scheduled), and was fortunate that it did because he lost the CV joint on the left rear axle on the cooling down lap and just made it back to the paddock. Fierberg also claimed the Master class victory and had the fastest lap of the race.

Phillips drove steadily to finish second and coupled with Saturday’s third place was a fitting reward for the hard work of his crew repairing the car after Friday’s shunt removed the left side front and rear suspension and the front and rear wings.

West dropped a position to Phillips on lap four and another to Hope on lap five but managed to chase down Hope and retake fourth on lap ten. One lap later West passed the ailing Negron while holding off Hope to claim his fourth podium of the season.

Hope finished fourth, a strong effort considering the rebuild of the evening before, claiming the Expert class victory and maintained his championship lead.

Murphy in only his second race after two years away from the series finished sixth and DeSilva finished seventh.

As the Formula F1600 group took the green flag Alex Keyes made an excellent start and stormed into a lead he was to hold for only half of a lap as he was passed by Herta as the pair raced side by side through Riverside and passed once again by Bickers before the end of the first lap to come across the line in third. With one lap completed it was Herta leading Bickers, Keyes, Evans, Kirby and Stewart.

Bickers passed Herta to lead lap two as this pair continued what has become a season long battle with neither driver showing a clear advantage as positions changed from corner to corner for lap after lap, the pair never being separated by much more than inches. In the end, after thirteen laps, the race came down to the last corner of the last lap with Herta defending the inside line into the corner, Bickers chose the outside driving around Herta and with a slightly higher exit speed managed to maintain the lead to the checkered flag to win by 0.030 of a second. Bickers also claimed the fastest race lap.

Herta with another fine performance finished second and in so doing was able to maintain his lead in the championship.

Behind the Bickers/Herta battle it was the Lynx Racing duo of Alex Keyes and Andrew Evans, not so far back, pushing each other forward and staying in touch with the leading pair for the first half of the race until lap eight when Evans car lost power coming out of Sunset and slowly creeping down the front straight and into retirement leaving Keyes to finish on the podium in well earned third place.

Alex Kirby drove his Piper to fourth place followed by Stewart in the Mygale in fifth place.

The series will be returning to Buttonwillow Raceway Park on September 7th and 8th for rounds 11 and 12, joining the Vintage Auto Racing Association for its Oktoberfest weekend event.

The single-seat, open-wheel F2000 cars are powered by 2-liter Ford Zetec engines and run on Hankook tires supplied by Sierra Tire. The F1600 cars will be powered by either the 1500cc Honda Fit engine or the 1600cc Ford ‘Kent’ engine and will run on Hoosier tires.

F1600 Qualifying (based on results of round 9): 1. Colton Herta (Mygale/Honda); 2. Joey Bickers (Mygale/Honda); 3. Andrew Evans, (Spectrum/Honda); 4. Alex Keyes (Spectrum/Honda); 5. Alex Kirby (Piper/Honda); 6. Jim Stewart (Mygale SJ04/Honda).

F1600 Round 10 (13 laps): 1. Bickers; 2. Herta +0.030s; 3. Keyes, +23.534s; 4. Kirby, +1 lap; 5. Stewart, +1 lap; 6. Evans, +6 laps.

F2000 Qualifying (based on results of round 9): 1. Bob Negron (Van Diemen); 2. Ira Fierberg (Van Diemen); 3. Les Phillips (Van Diemen); 4. Peter West (Van Diemen); 5. Michael Murphy (Mygale); 6. Harindra DeSilva (Van Diemen); 7. Tom Hope (Carbir).

F2000 Round 9 (13 laps): 1. Fierberg; 2. Phillips, +0.920s; 3. West, +6.801s; 4. Hope, +7.778s; 5. Negron, +13.930s; 6. Murphy, +25.934s; 7. DeSilva, +1:06.956.

Fastest race lap: F1600 Bickers, 1m53.119s. F2000 Fierberg, 1m47.776s.
Expert class winner (over 35): F1600 Stewart, F2000 Hope.
Master class winner (over 50): F2000 Fierberg.

The series can be followed at facebook.com/pacificformulafracing and twitter.com/PacificF2000.

For more details go to www.pacificf2000.com or contact Les Phillips at 661-764-5333, or by email, lesrace@aol.com.