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MotoIQ Pacific Tuner Car Championship Round 3 – Sonoma Raceway
By Justin Banner
You know, people accuse road racing of being boring with little action on the track and what seems like very cut and dried drivers that don't throw around any drama. Well, I can tell you that isn't true. These guys have a passion for racing that is unmatched in many series. You have Michele Abbate coming all the way out from Las Vegas to run in our series. Edik Stepanyan's entire effort is all family. And even our very own Project Infiniti G20 Racecar is just a two man effort from our resident nerds Steve Rockwood and Martin Gonzales. Every racer who competes in the MPTCC is out here because they love roadracing and the nearly unlimited ingenuity of the series. However, that can catch some off guard, very off guard.
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| What people tend to forget is that MPTCC is a part of the multiclass racing that is grassroots motorsports. So we get to see interesting cars like this Thunder Roadster. They are designed and built by the same company that designs and builds the Legends race cars, U.S. Legend Cars International. While they race in NASA, they are governed and sanctioned by INEX. They run full tube-frame cars with Yamaha 1250cc motorcycle engines, so they aren't likely to die. |
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| Speaking of Legends cars, they were raced in Group C along with the Thunder Roadsters, which was also the Group that the MPTCC ran in this weekend. Seemed like this time they had a good group as there were no full course cautions and vehicle to vehicle contact was kept at a minimum, but they also didn't have Honda Challenge to deal with either. |
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| However, that wasn't to say stuff couldn't happen… |
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| This happened during qualifying on Steve Rockwood's lap, though the Legend car stayed out of the way and Steve's run didn't seem like it was affected by it. |
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| In Qualifying for Race 1 on Saturday, Edik Stepanyan gained Pole Position in the DA Acura Integra. It was several seconds ahead of the second place qualifier. His time was a 1:51.176. |
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| Second Place went to our Project Infinit G20 Racecar piloted by Steve Rockwood. He recorded a time of 1:57.701, nearly 6 seconds off the pace of Edik. He complained to me about not having a feature car like Edik and Michele. Hmmm, you know, there are the BUILD ARTICLES. |
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| Third Place went to Michele Abbate in the Gruppe-S/Autosport Dynamics Scion tC. I didn't get all over the track this time, but she didn't have the wheels up as often as she did at Fontana. Shame, I wanted her to embarrass the WTAC guys in wheels up action. Oh, well, there is next round. Her time was a 1:59.508 |
