September 2023, Iowa Region SCCA

Sunday September 17th 2023 was a borderline perfect Iowa day. Temps weren’t too bad, wind wasn’t wild, few picturesque clouds floating around, and 48 screaming fast drivers bombing around Hawkeye Downs Speedway in Cedar Rapids. Couldn’t ask for more.

The Course was setup and tested on Saturday morning, Hawkeye Downs always uses a similar layout, this time was no different. We did tweak a couple spots to pinch speed and create a more technical element here and there. I personally really like the 6/8 packs in the back slalom to break up the monotony of the back and forth. This isn’t East Course at solo nationals 2023 afterall.

Sunday morning rolls around and we began the final setup and prep for the event. Competitors began rolling in when registration opened at 7:30. This event we had multiple father son combinations at the track helping with early morning prep. Both 12yr olds were planning on riding along with their dad’s, they both got roped into helping their dad in their work assignments. Good father son bonding putting them to work! haha. Once registration was closed we ended up with 48 drivers!

Racing heats went pretty smooth throughout the day, the course was pretty quick with some nice technical points. Patience and threading the needle was critical. As people tried to push they did hit cones. Course workers got their steps in on Sunday no question. The Novice group was 7 drivers, Isaac, David and Ben pulling out the top 3 spots respectively. It was great to see drivers drop time. Isaac cleaned up from his 1st run AND dropped 4+ seconds. David dropped over 3 seconds from his first run. Ben dropped over 12 seconds over the course of the day! Jeremiah in the Novice class dropped over 14 seconds from his first run! that’s wild. Great driving for the Novices.

Pro Class also had 7 drivers, but they had a combined 66 cones in 49 runs….whoopsie doodle. David Price said “No cones No Cones No Cones” before the event, but I forgot to tell everyone that. Pro Class is organized a little differently from the other classes. For Class points and rankings only your first 3 runs count. This is to emulate the importance of “Getting it done in 3” like you experience at a National Tour, where you only get 3 runs. The other 5 runs from each Pro Class driver still counts towards top Pax, FTD and year end “Soloist” of the year awards but the Pro Class championship is based on your first 3 runs! NO PRESSURE. Top 3 in Pro on Sunday were Spencer, JJ, and Jeff. They were within .7 seconds of each other! Spencer went into his 3rd Pro Class run dirty, which means he had no clean runs and had one chance to pull off not only a clean run but a fast one too! He managed to squeak past JJ and Jeff for the top spot in Pro Class on Sunday.

“You guys built a Kart Course on accident” – KMod driver Eric.

He’s not wrong, we didn’t build it for him on purpose but it worked for him. He ended up with FTD and 4th in PAX for the day. Joe, Bryan, John, Teresa and Leah were also in Mod cars for this event, split into 3 different classes. Joe took the DMod win, John won EMod and Lean took the win in DMod ladies.

Street Classes had 7 drivers Aaron took the win in DS and Aaron took the win in GS (pretty sure they are different Aarons, I’ll let another Aaron confirm). Street Touring had 5 drivers in 3 classes. Fastest of the bunch being Troy in his STU STI. CAM had 7 drivers in 2 classes. We saw an influx of corvettes this event and I’m 100% on board! The Corvettes of CAMS couldn’t catch Chance in his CAMC Camaro though, he took the CAM win Sunday. He kept complaining the course was slippery but he managed a fast clean time! XSA and XSB had 2 drivers each, Brady pulling out the top time between the 4 of them. Rounding out the remaining classes are Andrew in EVX with a flying time and 3rd in PAX, Aaron (pretty sure there were 3 different ones) in his RallyX spec Impreza laying down some very consistent times and lastly Jim in HCS (I keep forgetting to update his class in the main results, it’ll be updated for year end points) Alfa Romeo cracked off a 57.002 just .002 from a 56.

Top PAX was Andrew in his STU STI and I’ve stolen his youtube video from the run, take a look and enjoy. This is a flyer!

Check out where you and your competitors stacked up on the complete results here.

Final Results | Pax Results | Raw Results | Pro Class Results

See everyone in a couple weeks at Iowa City Airport! don’t forget to register there is a cap.

Drew

RE Iowa Region SCCA

Was that a haboob coming through the town of Independence yesterday? No, it was just the Iowa Region rallycross event! Absolutely epic clouds of dust were generated by our racers, thanks to a bone-dry surface that just kept crumbling into, well, more dust. 28 racers braved the choking clouds, having a blast breaking in a new venue, the Independence Motor Speedway. The course used some of the pit area, the 3/8 mile oval, and the infield. The crumbling surface and technical corners rewarded those who gave up speed early to keep tighter lines and stay out of the piles of moon dust.

Our field of racers included racers from four states and three log-booked stage rally cars. We had five rallycross newbies who, based on the smiles and comments, will definitely be back for future events.

Stock FWD was one of our largest classes for the day with six racers, three campaigning GM products. Charles P jumped off to a nice lead with his first run of the day in his ’06 Civic, but one run later, his son, Devin P took the lead from him, putting his new (to him) ’02 RSX through its paces. At the conclusion of the morning runs, Charles had regained the top spot, sitting 1.1 seconds ahead of his son. During the afternoon, Andrew A found his groove in his ’10 Cobalt SS Turbo, clawing back from a 6.3 second deficit to take the class win by 11 seconds and the sixth spot overall. Despite tagging a number of cones, Charles widened his lead over Devin, taking second by a comfortable 3 seconds.

Stock RWD saw a long time autocrosser, Hans V, trying out rallycross for the first time in his 2022 Toyota GR86. Hans definitely takes the award for the best dirt rooster tails. Paraphrasing Hans, it was very difficult to take the fast line around the course as it was so much fun taking the car sideways around the course. By the end of the day, Hans was already scheming about buying a car just for rallycross.

Stock AWD was an all Subaru class, with models ranging from a 1996 SVX up to a 2018 WRX. Always fast Jay K (06 Outback Sport) threw down the gauntlet with his first run and then maintained this gap through the morning runs. Michael G (13 STI) kept nipping at Jay’s heels, taking the lead from him on run five after Jay tagged a cone. Michael ended up first in class and second overall, only 1.5 seconds ahead of Jay (3^rd overall). The remaining four drivers were all putting down times very close to each other in their fight for third, exchanging positions several times. When the dust settled, the big surprises was that sixteen-year-old Ian L had claimed 3^rd in class and 8^th overall, besting his dad for the first time and two other more experienced racers. Nice work Ian!

Prepared FWD was a larger class than usual this event, with four racers mixing it up! Yours truly started off the day with the fastest run and never looked back, taking first in class and first overall by comfortable margins. Second place was a fight between Travis H (02 Civic Si) and Keith B (98 Neon), with Travis jumping off to an early lead. Keith soon learned to trust the grip that his new rally tires were providing and clawed back a large extent over the remaining runs. Travis managed to hold on to second by 7 seconds. Newcomer Jon J (95 Tercel) spent the day learning his new car, dropping nearly 17 seconds from his first run to his fastest, even laying down a run that bested Travis’ best run.

Prepared RWD saw the return of Brent L in his 96 Mazda Miata. Being the only car in class, Brent spent the day paring down his times, dropping over 18 seconds from his first run to his best run.

Prepared AWD saw three racers from three different states. John F used the 100+ HP advantage of his 2022 WRX to jump out to an early lead that neither Kim K or Noah W would overcome. Instead, the battle between Kim (06 Outback Sport) and Noah (Audi TT) was the one to watch. They traded the leading position several times through the morning runs. Sadly, this battle came to a premature finish, as a coolant leak on the Audi was determined to be a head gasket failure. The final results came in with John taking first by roughly 36 seconds.

Modified FWD saw the return of Nick L in his stage rally prepared Civic. Despite carrying around the added weight of the full roll cage, Nick put down blistering fast times, including the third fastest individual run. Nick ended up first in class and fourth overall.

Modified RWD brought Neil T from MN in his stage rally prepared Mustang SVO as the only competitor. This car was my personal favorite of the event, between being a rather rare car to begin with and having the factory asymmetric hood intake for the intercooler. Neil hasn’t had the car for very long, so his goal for the day was learning to drive it well and to shave time off every run. He succeeded in doing so, even getting his last run under the 100 second mark.

Last but definitely not least was Modified AWD, with five drivers slinging dirt. Tire choice on the always slippery surface was the big question of the day, with at least one driver making a tire change in an attempt to gain an advantage. Of our top three finishers, Aaron B (95 Impreza) and Pete S (stage rally prepared 07 Impreza) opted for rally tires while Shane B (95 Stealth RT) tried summer tires. After two runs it became clear that rally tires were the way to go and Shane was making a quick tire change mid-heat. Through the morning runs, Aaron stayed firmly in first, with Pete seven seconds back and Shane five more. For the afternoon, Shane came out swinging and took second place from Pete in just one run. Shane kept widening the gap over Pete, but a couple late cones prevented him from catching Aaron. Final standing ended up with Aaron first (5^th overall), Shane second (7^th overall), and Pete third (9^th overall).

We’re racing next at the Southern Iowa Speedway in Oskaloosa on October 22. Make your plans now to join us, as Oskie is one of our best venues and you’re guaranteed to have fun! You can find more details about all our events on our events page.