Portland F1000 Majors Results

[ghickman]

Under sunny skies and unusually hot temperatures in the upper 90's the last West Coast Major was held at Portland International Raceway over the July 4th holiday weekend.

Six F1000 competitors:
Larry Vollum Phoenix MV14 Portland, Or.
Kevin Roggenbuck Firman RFR1000 Woodenville, Wa.
Tony Opheim Firman RFR1000 Moscow, Id.
James Blackwell Edge F1000 Ollala, Wa.
Brian Snyder Firman RFR09-005 Kent, Wa.
Dave Palmer Stohr MV11 Portland, Or.

The track was faster than expected but too hot for records to fall. The competition was close with several newcomers to FB.
In the first race the fast race times for the entire FB field were within 1.4 seconds and placed consecutively in the group
Saturday Results:
Vollum
Palmer
Roggenbuck
Blackwell
Opheim

The second race showed times were equally close with the exception of Vollum by picking up the pace another second.
Sundays Results:
Vollum
Palmer
Blackwell
Opheim
Roggenbuck

Brian Snyder in his great looking white Firman RFR09 qualified but was a DNS for both races. Obviously some teething problems with a newly acquired car.

Kevin Roggenbuck in his Kawasaki powered Firman RFR1000 was unfortunately unable to take advantage of his good qualifying times suffering from a stuttering engine at the drop of the flag in both races, once it cleared he had an uphill battle, no one was waiting for him. Even after a bad start he was able the salvage third place in race one.

Tony Opheim had the second fastest Qualifying time in his RFR1000 and was very fast in fits and spurts. I heard that he was experiencing electrical gremlins and they were just enough to keep him off the podium.

James blackwell having recently made the jump from FA and buying Gary Hickman's Edge 1000 was enjoying the new competition and became faster as the weekend progressed scoring a third in race two. Blackwell will no doubt be a threat next season.

Dave Palmer was lucky enough to score a ride in Larry Vollum's perfectly prepared Stohr and with Larry's help deciphering driving data was able get up to speed by race time. "After retiring from FB in 2011 I was not sure it was possible in one weekend - but scored Second both days". Nice to have a fast veteran like Palmer in the field, we hope he returns next season.

Larry Vollum driving his NEW Phoenix MV14 was the class of the field, out qualifying everyone by nearly two seconds and racing consistently 1.5 to 2 seconds a lap faster than everyone. Larry was extremely pleased to be able to get his new car up to speed after a few months of development, scoring First place both days.

A hot, hot weekend with fast, clean driving by all.

Thanks to the Oregon Region SCCA for another perfectly choreographed race weekend. We all look forward to returning next season.

[Tyler Thielmann]

Larry, your car looks great!