[gemery]

If I do all the West Coast events, it looks like I'll be going to Vegas (Tour), Fontana (Pro), Crow's Landing (Tour), Crow's Landing (Pro) , Packwood (Tour), & Packwood (Pro). It seems to keep the miles traveled in a reasonable range, I'll need to stay on the road for a week between Vegas & Fontana and again between the two Crow's Landing events. Anybody in those areas have a couch or spare room I can sleep on?

 

[gemery]

I'm registered for the Las Vegas ProSolo in G Street. It was changed from a Tour to a Pro about a month ago. Crow's Landing is only a ProSolo on the Tour date with the original ProSolo date being replaced by the Tucson Tour.

Registrations for west coast ProSolos aren't as hectic as they are on the east coast. Only 19 SuperPass holders had registered before today's general registration was opened. After an hour of general registration, a total of 122 people are registered. GS needs two more entries to make a class. S4 (Focus RS lands here) & S5 (STH Focus ST lands here) have both made their class.

 

[gemery]

Las Vegas ProSolo - still need one more GS entry to make the class or else we go to the Bump class. Plenty of room for more entries before the event reaches its cap, but don't delay if you have any interest.

Fontana ProSolo - registrations are accumulating like treacle dripping. After 3 days, still less than 80 entries, which is below the threshold for even holding the event! So far, I'm the only GS entry. S5 is one of the few with enough entries to make a class.

Packwood - the site was sold two days ago. We still don't know how that will affect local clubs' schedules. For the Tour & ProSolo in July, I believe there is a backup venue available (Bremerton Motorsports Park) on the dates required if Packwood becomes unavailable. The new owners have reached out to the national SCCA office.

 

[bobharly]

OK, I'm new to solo this year. How do you sign up for Fontana Pro Solo? I keep checking my Cal Club events and I don't see it. Is the event restricted to drivers who have a points standing or am I looking in the wrong place? The search function on motorsportreg.com isn't playing nice.

 

[freakin_elrod]

Search ProSolo, all one word.

 

[gemery]

Well, so much for the Las Vegas ProSolo… I think it's likely the Fontana ProSolo will see the same fate. Not sure if having the decision taken out of my hands is good or bad...

 

[freakin_elrod]

Still holding on to hope for the AZ champ tour to pull through, but it wouldn't surprise me if they canc'd it as well.

 

[gemery]

Well, at least watching GS in the Dixie Champ Tour has been exciting. Josh Wheeler, in first national-level competition, has been pressing Tommy Pulliam quite hard. They're separated by only a tenth of a second after Day 1. The top 6 of 9 competitors are separated by only 0.722 seconds. The only Ford Focus ST is being driven by Thomas Simon (7th at the moment) and Ashley Weaver (9th). Jack Burns was the only one to bring his Honda Civic Si on Yokohamas and it has not helped him.

STH has only two entries (a Subaru WRX and a Fiesta ST) and they're being raw-timed by most of GS (sigh).

 

[freakin_elrod]

Well, at least watching GS in the Dixie Champ Tour has been exciting. Josh Wheeler, in first national-level competition, has been pressing Tommy Pulliam quite hard. They're separated by only a tenth of a second after Day 1. The top 6 of 9 competitors are separated by only 0.722 seconds. The only Ford Focus ST is being driven by Thomas Simon (7th at the moment) and Ashley Weaver (9th). Jack Burns was the only one to bring his Honda Civic Si on Yokohamas and it has not helped him.

STH has only two entries (a Subaru WRX and a Fiesta ST) and they're being raw-timed by most of GS (sigh).

I saw that. I was surprised that none of the faster STH drivers were on hand, but with covid19 on the rise, I dont blame them for dropping out/not showing.

 

[gemery]

Great Lakes ProSolo had a very tight GS battle, with Brian Anthony getting leapfrogged on Sunday. Less than 0.1 second covered the 3 trophy positions. S4 (awd) had no STH cars though David Lineberry was there with his DS Focus RS and S5 (fwd) had Jason Tipple's STH Civic Si with the usual cluster of HS Fiesta STs. Pro driver Tom O'Gorman shared Jason's car and took the win over perennial nice-guy favorite Alex Piehl driving his wife's HS Ford Fiesta ST by 0.18 seconds.

Tom basically showed the autox world that the STH Civic is not an underdog by placing 13th on the index, but without any of the S4 STH cars, not much knowledge was added as to whether fwd STH is competitive with awd STH.

 

[freakin_elrod]

Jason Tipple's SI was also under tired, running a 235/40/18 vs STHs max allowance of 265.....some food for thought there. What's even more alarming is how many SSC cars on the new falken RT660s indexed in the top 10, with the top car being an SSC car. I think I may have to try them out.

 

[gemery]

Heh, SSC earned themselves an immediate new ProSolo index, too

Before COVID knocked schedules around, I was planning on testing the Falkens right about now to make a decision before the Packwood Tour. Ain't gonna happen for me now.

 

[freakin_elrod]

I too had plans of testing soonish, but cant test if you have no events, and traveling out of state for a TNT just isn't viable for me right now so it will have to wait.

 

[gemery]

Looking at Nationals entries... 33 GS entries, mostly Hondas with 4 FoST. Of the FoST entries, Brian Anthony is the most talented, but probably not enough to be champion. Alex Piehl has entered in GS, but doesn't know what he'll be driving. Only 9 STH entries so far: WRX vs. Civic Si vs. Audi TT with a Chevy Cobalt SS as the underdog.

 

[gemery]

Bristol ProSolo... Alex Piehl driving an HS Civic Sport for the first time raw-times (by a very small margin) Brad McCann's GS Honda Civic Si. Alex won S5 and Brad won GS. To put Alex's win in perspective, Brad was 15th of 188 entries on index, so Brad was by no means slow at this event!

 

[freakin_elrod]

Bristol ProSolo... Alex Piehl driving an HS Civic Sport for the first time raw-times (by a very small margin) Brad McCann's GS Honda Civic Si. Alex won S5 and Brad won GS. To put Alex's win in perspective, Brad was 15th of 188 entries on index, so Brad was by no means slow at this event!

Both Alex and Brad are really fast. Alex seems to be faster when he wears his naked body shirts though. When he drove my car a few years ago, he had some kind of naked dad bod sweater and ended up being 10th fastest overall raw time which is pretty impressive considering the car was still under powered/prepped for STH and he had never driven the car.

 

[gemery]

GS at Bristol Tour was tight. 1.1 seconds covered 1st through 7th, with 9 competitors in the class. GS was also very competitive, with the first 7 placing 12th-37th in PAX out of 228 competitors. Chris Kirkland was the highest placing FoST at 5th.

Big question from afar is what was up with the tires? Everyone shows an asterisk on their tire brands which normally indicates something else was run and Brad McCann seems to have mixed his Yokohamas with Bridgestones.

No STH competitors. Bryan Hertweck ran in a DS Audi TTS.

Alex Piehl was back in his wife's FiST and finished second in HS. Hmmm, I wonder if there will be a Honda in their driveway soon?

 

[freakin_elrod]

GS at Bristol Tour was tight. 1.1 seconds covered 1st through 7th, with 9 competitors in the class. GS was also very competitive, with the first 7 placing 12th-37th in PAX out of 228 competitors. Chris Kirkland was the highest placing FoST at 5th.

Big question from afar is what was up with the tires? Everyone shows an asterisk on their tire brands which normally indicates something else was run and Brad McCann seems to have mixed his Yokohamas with Bridgestones.

No STH competitors. Bryan Hertweck ran in a DS Audi TTS.

Alex Piehl was back in his wife's FiST and finished second in HS. Hmmm, I wonder if there will be a Honda in their driveway soon?

He said he thought the Civic sport was a pretty good drive. He's still unsure of what's next for him though. Next year I may be bouncing back and forth between STH in the FoST, or a GS or FS car.

 

[gemery]

Honestly, I'm a bit worried about the future of STH. Chris Thorpe has possibly sold his, David Hedderick's Audi is for sale, Alex Piehl hasn't driven his, and only Bryan Hertweck & Jason Tipple have brought new cars to STH at the national level.

On the other hand... this is the year of the plauge, so 11 STH entries at Nationals isn't too bad.

 

[gemery]

Setting the scene for 2020 Packwood Championship Tour

12 - Dieter Beldi is last year's Tour winner. His codriver from last year is running a FiST in HS this year. His name is not recognized outside of the Pacific Northwest because he doesn't travel and has never attended Nationals. Dieter's Civic Si is the one Des Toups used to dominate the West Coast in 2018. No matter what Dieter drives, he is usually at the top of PAX results.

62 - Thomas Bennett remains my codriver for the Tour. He normally drives a vintage Honda Accord in local HS events and has had no seat time in Pepper since last year's Tour. He is at least as fast as I am, provided he gets enough seat time in the Test & Tune to be confident. Last year it only took him 5 runs at a practice event prior to the Tour to beat my time.

66 - Des Toups won practically everything on the west coast in a Civic Si in 2018, but fumbled badly at Nationals in 2018. Ran DS at the start of 2019 in a Civic Type R, but halfway through 2019 he switched from the Type R to a CS Miata to prepare as tire warmer for Mark Scroggs (Des often codrives Mark). Still owning the Miata, he purchased the current Civic Si around about February 2020. Annie Gill is his codriver this year.

81 - Clay Larson is significantly faster than his codriver Tom.

97 - Jeffrey McVey has proven to not be fast.

162 - Myself. I have beat Des the three times this year we've met and beat Annie the one time this year we've met (she coned the one run that was 0.5 sec faster than mine). I haven't run against Dieter since last year. It is likely no one has as many runs so far this year as myself, though Annie Gill might have.

166 - Annie Gill won GSL at Nationals by many seconds last year in a borrowed car and her times were good enough to be 2nd in GS had she chosen to run the Open class instead of Ladies. After Nationals, she did buy a Civic Si (the second time she has done so), but got rid of it after 34 days. As I recall, the first Civic Si only lasted 8 days. Like Des, Annie buys and doesn't keep a lot of cars!

181 - Tom Larson is not fast.

I think Dieter Beldi or Annie Gill will be the winner, but the battle should be 5-ways between Dieter, Thomas, Des, myself, & Annie. There will not be room to recover from day 1 mistakes in this crowd. Clay Larson will be keeping us honest, with the capability to pass anyone slacking. Tom Larson and Jeffrey McVey will bring up the rear.

No Chris Thorpe/Jessica Podhola (they're running a 2019 Ford Shelby 350GTR in CAMC), no Crystal Stegman.

30 - Dick Willy has proven not to be fast.
33 - Perry Keller is almost up to my GS times.
33 - Andrea Keller is almost matching Perry's times. A few decades ago, she could beat his and it appears, as she gets back in the seat more often, that she is back in form.

***
Other notes

Charlie & Dorothy Spirka will be marking their FoRS national-level debut in SM. They're gonna get squashed by Dallas Cutler & Tasha Mikko in the Evo, but it will be interesting to see how they fare overall in the class.

In DS, the Dantons (FoRS), Chris Beets (FoRS), and Michael Meyers (WRX) all return, with Garret Cogburn debuting his Civic Type R purchased last August (?). Not returning to DS are Ryan & Lacey Otis, Des Toups, Lorin & Jenn Mueller, and Annie Gill, so that leaves the path to trophies a bit easier.
[Edit: Having made a last minute decision to switch to the Tour instead of the ProSolo, Patrick Woodmency is entering his first national-level event with a FoRS in DS. He's good enough to dice it out with this crowd.]