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Qualifying for Race #6 looked very much like the qualifying for Race 5. Well, except for Project G20's improved starting position. Turns out that the car's timing was a bit off causing it to lose power. After some simple diagnostic time, the team of Steve Rockwood and Martin Gonzales were able to find some much needed power and would now be gridding in 4th position ahead of the Scion Racing tC and APM Racing FR-S. Amazing what a car will do with proper timing, isn’t it?
Position | Name | Time | Difference | |
1st | Andrie Hartanto | 1:52.838 |
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2nd | Edik Stepanyan | 1:53.204 | 0.366 | |
3rd | Justin Taylor | 1:54.263 | 1.425 | |
4th | Steve Rockwood | 1:56.893 | 4.055 | |
5th | Michele Abbate | 1:57.103 | 5.265 | |
6th | Richie Ho | 1:58.299 | 5.461 | |
It would appear that most of the cars had slowed somewhat in qualifying for Race #6, With most everyone off Race #5 qualifying pace by roughly half a second. Well, again, save for Project Infiniti G20 which had improved its time.
Whatever problems Richie Ho had in the APM Racing Scion FR-S during Race 5 didn’t seem to surface during Race #6 qualifying, but was still over 5 seconds behind class leader Andrie Hartanto. With the addition of a turbo you’d think he would have had a better pace at Auto Club since the track favors high power cars. Race time, though would tell a different story.
Edo had mentioned during the break between qualifying and the race that his tires were starting to fall off and his brakes had begun to fade a bit. Rockwood had also begun to complain about brake fade, but had mentioned the brakes had not been bled since the Willow Springs race. So, he and Martin Gonzales performed the procedure as there were nearly 4 hours to kill between qualifying and race time.
The start for Race 6 began with Andrie pulling ahead of Edik in Turn 1-2 of the big speedway oval and the superior braking strength of the S2000 allowed Andrie to hold the lead into the inner road course. Edik and Justin Taylor weren’t falling behind and began clawing at the lead of Hartanto.
