Third Annual NITRO 

Turkey Trot

Race Report

Saturday, November 8^th dawned crisp and cool as 17 racers from four states converged on Crystal Rock Raceway in Naperville, IL for round three of the 2003-04 NITRO series. 

Along with the usual crowd Ron Reber and John Verbich made the trek from Indiana.  Dan Luna and "Danger" Dan Rothwell were also in attendance.  Iowa’s John Duda was missing but his place was taken by Illinois HOPRA’s Brian and Carol Boehm. Missouri’s Steve "GoGo" Godinez stopped in to see what NITRO was all about and Mike Block and Jim Nagy also stopped by for a visit. Mike would later race in JL.  Jim brought his sons to see if NITRO was what they wanted to get into. That answer appears to be YES!

Super Stock was first up. These monsters have changed from last year. Balanced motors allow more horsepower. These things are now very close to the NITRO cars in a straight line. In the turns they are completely different. The horsepower boost was more than negated by the new body rules and the fact that this year the pickup travel cannot be restricted. More ponies and quirkier handling makes the driver a more important part of the equation than ever before.

When the smoke cleared from qualifying Steve led Jim by two. These two were the only ones in the 90-lap bracket. With qualifying over the mains were up. The mains are scored such that anyone can win from any main and racing the guy next to you may not be the best overall strategy.

Super Stock Qualifying Results

Chuck, Rob, Carol, Dan Luna, John Verbich and Erik Ruud lined up for the C-Main. The win went to Erik. John finished a lap behind with Dan a further lap back. Carol was four laps behind Dan but two up on Rob. Chuck had a terrible time in qualifying with a car that kept cutting out on him. They worked on it but when the power came on the car still wouldn’t go and Chuck’s problems continued. When the car was right Chuck was flying. Unfortunately, it was inconsistent at best and too little too late.

Super Stock C-Main Results

Bob, Jeff, Steve Godinez, Brian and John Lillig were up next in the B-Main. Bob took the race and joined the 90-lap club with a 91. Jeff was close but not close enough with an 87. Steve was next up with a Bob Muys car. Brian and John brought up the rear.

Super Stock B-Main Results

The A-Main featured Steve, Jim, Wayne, Kevin, Bill and "Danger" Dan Rothwell. With the addition of Jeff these are the perennial fast guys in this class. Steve took the overall win with 98 laps. Jim took a fine second five laps back but well clear of the others. Kevin and Danger took third and fourth. These two were on the same lap but Kevin got the position by sections. Wayne took fifth leaving Bill sixth. The cars proved to be just slightly slower than last year and the fast lap time and race totals from last years Deadline Dash remained standing.

Super Stock A-Main Results

The final positions in Super Stock were as follows:

After lunch the NITRO Class was up. The NITRO cars are minimally restricted "Fray" cars. The differences between the 2003 Fray and the NITRO rules are as follows: NITRO has minimum front and rear tire sizes to eliminate issues associated with the pickup "step". The NITRO body rules eliminate "Pan", "Thingie" and "Lower than a Mower" bodies while still allowing purpose-built cast resin bodies. The final difference is that NITRO makes a distinction between armature balancing and turning/truing and while armature balancing is allowed, turning/truing, or a reduction in overall armature diameter, is not.

Qualifying was up first. When the power came on Jim Keen and Erik Rudd took off leaving Dan Rothwell and Steve Medanic smoking tires, fishtailing and sliding wildly. For these two the track was glare ice. The heat was stopped after a few laps in hopes that the problem was just a dirty track. After a quick inspection and tire cleaning the heat was restarted. Steve and Dan were still roasting the tires at will and each made at least one pit stop during the two-minute heat to clean tires while Jim and Erik ran without issue. Needless to say Jim and Erik happily took the heat win over these two. Steve was on White and rotated out.  While poor Danger was to deal with the improving track for three more segments, Steve went back to his pit to change rear tires and wonder.

As more and more racers rotated in the track continued to improve and cars started dipping into the 5-second bracket. Steve Godinez looked like the fast hand with a best of 5.900 until with three segments to go the track owner hooked back up. When the power came on Medanic’s car started flying but the lap counter periodically showed 11-second lap times. Seems that the Trakmate breakout time was set at 5.850 and the car was running under the limit. Controller adjustments failed to slow the beast and Steve’s RRR Mako Shark was to breakout a total of 12-times in the remaining lanes. As the lapcounter was observed to be incorrect the totals were adjusted and Steve would line up fifth on the grid.

Jim Keen, unaffected by the first segments ice took the top qualifying spot with 76 laps. Steve Godinez lined up second with Bob Muys and Dan Luna also ahead of the track owner. These four all finished with 75 laps. Medanic’s totals were corrected to 75 laps and zero sections. With this total, Medanic bumped "Danger" Dan Rothwell down a spot but "Danger" would take the final spot in the A-Main.

NITRO Class Qualifying Results

With the breakout adjusted downward to 5.400 the NITRO class mains were up next. The mains are scored such that anyone can win from any main and racing the guy next to you is not the way to win.

Wayne, Chuck, Erik, Rob and Carol lined up for the C-Main. Wayne grabbed the bull by the horns and took the win with a 106. This good total moved him around quite a few folks who qualified in the faster mains. Chuck was next up but five laps back with a 98. Erik finished third one short lap back from Chuck. Rob was fourth two laps back from Erik. Carol had problems and took fifth with a 85.

NITRO Class C-Main Results

In the B-Main Jeff, Kevin, John Verbich, Bill, John Lillig and Brian went door to door. Jeff took the win with a 108. Kevin kept Jeff honest with a 107. John finished third with 104, Bill was fourth with 102. John Lillig was the last man in the 100 lap club with 100. This left Brian to take sixth with a 94. Wayne’s win moved him around everyone in this main except Kevin and Jeff. Only time would tell if any of these three would move past the A-Main runners.

NITRO Class B-Main Results

The A-Main featured Jim Keen, Steve "GoGo" Godinez, Bob Muys, Steve Medanic and "Danger" Dan Rothwell. This race promised to be very close as Jim turned 76 laps in qualifying and the next four qualified with 75! Danger qualified sixth but was only four short laps back from Jim. When the power came on Jim Keen led the charge into the first turn with "Danger" and Steve Godinez right behind. Godinez got by "Danger" and Jim to lead the second lap. Medanic’s RRR Mako Shark bogged at the start and was bringing up the rear. The situation soon changed and Steve started picking up places. On lap three Godinez spun and went from first to fourth. Godinez would recover and finish the heat in third. On lap seven the Mako stopped the clock with a 5.642 second lap which would prove to be fast time of the day. Ten laps later the Mako demoted Jim to third. On lap eighteen the Mako roared past "Danger’s" NARDO bodied T-jet to take the lead. At the end of the first heat Medanic led "Danger" by 9-seconds on the clock and two laps on the track.

There was a race behind the Shark as the remaining cars were well matched and were running on the same lap. Medanic turned a 5.695 in the second head and at the start of the third segment would lead Godinez by three who, in turn, was one short lap in font of Jim. Bob Muys rotated in and was running right with the others with 28 laps. In the third segment Godinez couldn’t come to terms with the tight inside Yellow lane and turned six laps less than Medanic did in the same lane one segment earlier. The field was strong and try as he might, "GoGo" would never be able to make up the lost laps. Medanic continued to pull away and put another win in the books.

Bob Muys would continue to run strong and would finish second. with 112, 6-laps back from Medanic. "Danger" Dan Rothwell was third with 111. Dan Luna turned a 110 to take fourth. Jim Keen had the slowest car in the main but did an excellent job to finish fifth with 110. Jim missed fourth by feet. Jim was actually running third until late in the last segment when he lost lots of time getting caught up in other drivers incidents. Steve Godinez brought up the rear with 108. While finishing on the same lap as the B-Main winner, "GoGo" had the sections in hand to keep sixth from Jeff’s prying hands.

NITRO Class A-Main Results

The races overall average laptime was lowered by over half a second from last years Deadline Dash.  The fastest lap was lowered as well but by nowhere near that amount.  The fast laps were as follows: Steve Medanic 5.642 backed up by 5.695; Steve Godinez 5.800 backed by 5.826; Dan Luna 5.824 backed by 5.876; Dan Rothwell 5.886 backed by 5.920; Bob Muys 6.007 backed by 6.008; Jim Keen 6.025 backed by 6.046. All of these times were well clear of last seasons Deadline Da$h lap record and the top four had beaten the overall lap record set during this summers NITRO Enduro at CRR. An interesting observation is that Bob turned the fifth fastest lap time but was very consistent and finished second. Consistency rather than raw speed paid off for Bob.

The overall NITRO Class results are as follows:

Seven racers entered the JL support race.  With the exception of a limitation on front tire size (0.370") and allowing the rear tires to be replaced with slip on silicone tires on stock JL rims these cars are out of the box stock. The JL cars are seriously over powered and need detuning in both the motor and pickup departments. With the excess horsepower removed the cars can be made to behave quite nicely. Most of the cars in this class were wall to wall specials as they had way too many ponies for their tires. Steve’s JL cars are the slowest in the straight but they are easy to drive and have dominated this class since its inception. The results demonstrate the above:

JL Support Race Results

Siberia Racing Home Page

December, 2003