Indy SCCA Runoffs 2017

[jaltaman]

Since nobody has started a thread for this year's Runoffs and I'm not there racing, I guess I will.

Well, it certainly looks like it's intense out at Indy. 18 FBs along with 19 P1 cars makes for busy qualifying sessions. Tough to get clean laps in.

Since practice started on Thursday, Hickman has been the class of the field closely followed by Roggenbuck and Mayer.

Come Monday, the first day of qualifying, the pattern continued. By the end of Q1 the top five qualifiers were Hickman, Roggenbuck, Mayer, Gerardo and Cooper.

Things got interesting yesterday for Q2 as teams had a chance to make changes to their cars and find more speed. And find more speed they did, as Hickman dropped into the 1:34s on his 3rd lap while Mayer ducked into the pits for a tire change. Hickman subsequently put down an even better lap - a 1:34.732, the quickest lap of qualifying to that point. However, it didn't last. Mayer, out of the pits on fresh rubber, turned in a scorcher, eclipsing Hickman by .174 seconds to take provisional pole with a 1:34.558.

So after Q2 it's Mayer, Hickman, Roggenbuck, Hill and Cooper for the top five, with Haas, Beauchamp, Gerardo and Nixon all within a second of each other close behind.

It's apparent that tire choice is paramount and will be interesting to see how this pans out. Look for the lap times to drop even further today, assuming they get a clear track with no incidents.

Good luck to everyone - wish I was there with you!

[Steve Davis]

Seems that getting clean laps is a BIG DEAL in most of the groups. Doesn't matter about "cars per mile" when you have THAT many turns .. more or less one after the other (T1 - T13). Really tough to find a gap that doesn't get you blocked somewhere. A LOT of fast times at the top have been turned on lap 2 or 3, before the cars get so strung out and gaps have closed up so much. The size of some of the groups and the time diff between pole and last car is insane.

[jaltaman]

Agreed.

It's similar to the situation we had at COTA this year - 53 cars in our group was just too many. Was really tough to get a clean lap - placement on track was critical.

You have to bank a good lap while you can.

Between traffic, BFA or FCY the session can disappear at a moment's notice.

[jaltaman]

Q3 Update

Gary Hickman re-claims Pole Position with a blistering 1:34.275 in this afternoon's qualifying session, over 3 seconds clear of the times set by Mayer, Cooper and Hill, who were all within .1 seconds of each other.

Very impressive, Mr. Hickman.

[RussMcB]

Very impressive, Mr. Hickman.

I agree. Thanks for posting.

Here's a link to the privisional grid:

https://dk1xgl0d43mu1.cloudfront.net...pdf?1506551055

As the announcers said, could be a battle for first, and another battle for third.

Nice to see nice guy Mike Beauchamp fairly high up the grid.

[jaltaman]

Absolutely good to see Mike back in the mix. Way to go Mr. Beauchamp!

Okay, time for the Q4 update.

Determined to take the pole from Gary Hickman, Alex Mayer goes out in the final qualifying session and on his second lap lays down a 1:34.289, just .014 off the provisional pole. Hickman, finally free of traffic, responds when two laps later he puts in the lap of the week - a sizzling 1:33.746. Traffic seemed to bog everyone down for the next few laps, until Mayer finally gets some clean air and gets his best lap of the week with a 1:34.063, just .327 seconds shy of the pole.

Making a move in Q4 was Jeremy Hill, who will now be starting the race in P3 after his lap of 1:35.595 moved him ahead of Kevin Roggenbuck, who will line up next to him in P4.

So the top 4 starters in FB are Hickman, Mayer, Hill and Roggenbuck.

Congratulations to Gary Hickman on his first Pole Position at the SCCA Runoffs, and good luck to all the competitors on Saturday!

[jaltaman]

Congratulations to Alex Mayer for winning the 2017 SCCA Runoffs in FB!

It was a heck of a race, with Mayer and Hickman in a class by themselves, leaving the rest of the FB field almost 10 seconds behind as they fought for the win. The race had some attrition, with Mike Beauchamp retiring on lap 5 and then two laps later Jose Gerado suffered a blown engine; thankfully he was able to get out of the car and extinguish the subsequent fire before it engulfed the car.

Mayer and Hickman were nose to tail for pretty much the entire race, with traffic coming into play on the latter laps as Mayer worked to keep Hickman at bay. The lead swapped twice on the 12th lap and the battle raged on until on lap 14 when P1 car spun on the exit of 6B onto the short straight and stalled. Moments later, another P1 car, not seeing the stalled car, exited 6B at speed and had nowhere to go, slamming into the side of the stalled car and bringing bringing out a FCY. Unfortunately, there was too much debris on track and too little time left so the officials, threw a red flag, stopping all cars on track. After a couple minutes, it became clear there wasn't enough time to get the mess cleaned up and they ended the race.

So the podium was Alex Mayer in P1, Gary Hickman in P2 and Jeremy Hill in P3. Next were Glenn Cooper, Kevin Roggenbuck, Joel Haas, Pete Frost and Tim Pierce.

Congratulations to all the drivers and teams, especially Mayer, Hickman and Hill.

Safe travels to the drivers and teams as they head home. It was a great show!

[RussMcB]

Yes, that was fun to watch.

On Facebook, I read that Mike's car got stuck in third gear, so he pulled in. I think he had gotten up to 5th place with a great start.

It was a little unfortunate that race video and commentators seemed to spend more that 50% of their coverage on the prototype class.

[ghickman]

I had a blast at Indy, great track, super well organized facility.

I got caught in a P1 cars oil dump leading up and into T13 on I believe lap 6. I had a nice gap on Mayer that was increasing every lap but then it vaporized when I hit the oil slick. Took what seemed like forever to get the car gathered up without going off track.

I hope everyone enjoyed the show Mayer and I put on, it was an epic battle.

I'd like to thank Tony Moore, Dustin Wright, and Chris Harrison for giving me a car that was on rails....sorry I blew it. I guess there's always next year.

[kroggenbuck]

Gary, your team and excellent driving was fun to be a part of. Sorry I wasn't able to join your battle with Alex. And you're right, there's always next year. Congrats on a well run race.


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[RussMcB]

...sorry I blew it.

It sounds like the opposite. Driving at the limit, hitting oil and not crashing? I'd say that's a race-saving move for sure.

Yes, we all enjoyed it a lot. You guys had a great battle. I'll bet you can't wait for next year.

[ghickman]

Gary, your team and excellent driving was fun to be a part of. Sorry I wasn't able to join your battle with Alex. And you're right, there's always next year. Congrats on a well run race.


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Thanks Kevin.

We knew Kevin would be a threat from the second we set foot on the brickyard. His crew worked tirelessly for better part of a week chasing an Air Fuel Ratio gremlin that you just simply can not drive around. These dudes worked day and night to make the show. My guess is Kevin will be back at it next year....that Kawi powered car is a screamer and wicked fast.


F1000 is still the best bang for the buck. Nothing like the sound of 18 angry bike motor powered cars taking the green flag.

[jaltaman]

Gary, I'm with Russ.

Hitting unseen oil at speed and keeping it on track?

Let's see, the last time that happened to me at Buttonwillow I came back to the pits via the tow truck.

I'm amazed that you were able to do that.

[Mike B]

Thanks for the kind words, Russ & John! Unfortunately, Tuesday was the highlight of my week, due to a series of mistakes and poor decisions on my part.
More importantly, congratulations to Alex, Gary, and Jeremy. They put on quite a show and all earned the podium finish!

[Blair Robertshaw]

Did any of the cars run American Racer tires? And if so any performance report on the AR tires?
What were the top 5 cars running for tires? Thanks

[jaltaman]

Ah, good question.

While watching the broadcast I tried to take screen shots and zoom in to see, and based upon that here's my best guess:

Mayer ran Avons.
Hickman, Hill, Roggenbuck, Cooper and Nixon used Hoosiers.
The rest of the field wore American Racer Tires.

Apologies for any errors - it's my best guess.

[ghickman]

Ah, good question.

While watching the broadcast I tried to take screen shots and zoom in to see, and based upon that here's my best guess:

Mayer ran Avons.
Hickman, Hill, Roggenbuck, Cooper and Nixon used Hoosiers.
The rest of the field wore American Racer Tires.

Apologies for any errors - it's my best guess.

Mayer (sometimes A/R and when it counted they looked like Avons to me no markings on them)
Hickman Hoosier all the way baby
Hill Hoosier
Roggenbuck (still the mystery but my spies tell me Pirelli radials had all markings ground off)
Cooper Hoosier
Nixon Avon

Anybody like to see some in car video?

[jphoenix13]

Anybody like to see some in car video?

Yes, please.

[jaltaman]

Absolutely would like to see some in car video, please!

[jaltaman]

Oh, and apologies for my errors on the tires.

I did say it was a guess.

[ghickman]

Here's what Alex and I saw at the start. Hill goes by me on my right and Roggenbuck goes by Alex on his left. Was all for nada they both carried way to much into T1 to make the turn.

video soon

[JakeL]

I flew out for fun - couldn't miss the chance to see IMS, and see the ol' ZebStohr run with Giancarlo at the wheel. Great to see everybody after several years being out of the scene.

Highlight of the weekend for me was the start of the F1000 race (which, incidentally, as far as my ears told me, was around turn 13 I think, and not anywhere near the front straight ).

The sound of those 20-odd FB's at full chat, with the engines echoing off of the stands absolutely raised every hair on my body - was absolutely awesome.

Entertaining to watch Gary and Alex duke it out lap after lap, excellent racecraft by both.

Bummed for Coop that we sort of sent him in the wrong direction on setup, but you win some, you lose some when you try something without getting a chance to test it out.

Hoping to see more of ya'll next year, was great to see lots of friendly faces again.

Cheers guys,

-Jake