Members Eric W. Posted February 26, 2012 Members Share Posted February 26, 2012 With large fields and close racing, GTS Mid-Atlantic is the place to be. Going into the event, GTS was one of the largest groups with GTS3 topping out the entries. We had a couple new GTS drivers fresh out of comp school as well! Congrats and a collective welcome to Peter Kamarchik, Ron Hougham and Ron Boustedt. On Saturday, we had beautiful 60+ degree weather as the backdrop where GTS1-2 raced in Stinger-Bahn group. Birthday boy DJ Fitzpatrick (E36 M3) didnt slow down from his eye opening 2011 rookie year by taking a decisive GTS2 win. The heated battle for 2nd to 5th place in GTS2 allowed DJ to take an early gap. Sporting hot pink graphics, DJ won in style. In his first race debut, Ron Hougham (E36 M3) maintained 2nd place for much of the race before veteran Jason Crist (E36 M3) took advantage of lap traffic to take the 2nd spot away from Ron. Despite pressure from Michael Dayton (E36 M3), Ron was able to hold off for the last podium spot. GTS1 saw freshly minted Kamarchik's Sneeds-sponsored E36 with the full aero package put the pressure on Jason Franklin's Ballerworld E36. Jason managed to maintain his position to the finish earning him the win. Kamarchik would finish 2nd in his first race, followed by Joe Boschulte in a Porsche 944. Thunder race was made up of the GTS3-4 crowd. GTS3 saw Jeff Curtis's brand new TrackRocket racing Porsche Cayman S. Curtis went on to add, "this is the new hot GTS3 car". Time will tell whether this will prove true. With Nathan Beck in his VW R32, they both prevented an all BMW GTS3 field. The GTS3 race was a tight one with NASA Midwest region hotshoe Chris Orr in his Orr Autosport/Frozen Rotors E36 M3 jumping to an early lead. 2011 NASA GTS3 National champion Josh Smith in his Bimmerworld E46 M3 and Eric Wong's Brakeswap.com/Bimmerworld E46 M3 were hot on his tail, with many laps of nose to tail racing. A minor off in T10 would result in both Orr and Smith taking damage to their cars. Orr would eventually lose position due to the damage and Smith held off Wong to take 1st by 0.2 seconds. In GTS4, 2011 NASA Mid-Atlantic champion Omar Lopez's Induktion Porsche GT3 took the lead and never looked back. Max Fischer in his GearHead Camera E46 M3 gave a heroic fight but could not give BMWs a clean sweep of all GTS classes. JB Knopp in his JBK Racing S54-powered E36 M3 would round out the top 3. With the forecast calling for sleet and snow Sunday, most competitors who decided to stay and brave the weather changed to full wet setups the prior evening. To their surprise, the GTS1-2 group would actually take a dry track! Some frantically changed out their wet setup to dry and some gambled hoping it would start getting wet later on. Once again, Fitzpatrick would take the early lead. Dayton and Jim Khoury's RRT Racing/Brakeswap.com E36 M3 battled it out for the 2nd spot. Khoury took advantage of a slight bobble by Dayton to get around and maintained for 2nd place. In GTS1, Kamarchik took the early lead but a spin in T3 put him square in the middle of a swarm of cars narrowly missing him. He would escape unscathed but would lose many positions. David Gibson in his itROX Racing Team Porsche 944 took advantage to take the win, followed by Boschulte in 2nd. The rain/sleet did manage to arrive just in time for the GTS3-4 race. With both Fischer and Knopp packed up, Omar took the easy win in GTS4. In GTS3, five brave souls took the green. Orr jumped out to the front with Wong not far behind. After some real close racing, Wong would eventually go agricultural doing damage. Orr takes the Sunday win back to MidWest region, Wong maintained 2nd and also from NASA MidWest Dan Huberty in his newly acquired Bimmerworld GRM UTCC Orr Autosport/Frozen Rotors E46 M3 rounded out the top podium spots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maynor Posted February 26, 2012 Share Posted February 26, 2012 Turning on the prose I see. Nice write up! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CARVAL Motorsports Posted February 26, 2012 Share Posted February 26, 2012 Enjoyed Eric, good write-up! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSG1901 Posted February 27, 2012 Share Posted February 27, 2012 Nice write-up Eric! Thanks for sharing...wish I'd been there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
D_Eclipse9916 Posted February 27, 2012 Share Posted February 27, 2012 Nice write-up Eric! Thanks for sharing...wish I'd been there. I like the write-ups. I think stuff like this adds to it and hopefully will want to get people to jump into GTS! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Eric W. Posted February 27, 2012 Author Members Share Posted February 27, 2012 My 4th grade English/Grammar teacher would be proud considering I nearly failed that class. This article should be making its way to the new online NASA SpeedNews magazine. Will be cool to see! Not sure if they will print your hot pink graphics through DJ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
D_Eclipse9916 Posted February 27, 2012 Share Posted February 27, 2012 My 4th grade English/Grammar teacher would be proud considering I nearly failed that class. This article should be making its way to the new online NASA SpeedNews magazine. Will be cool to see! Not sure if they will print your hot pink graphics through DJ... Pshhh, its totally PG.......13. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pmk Posted February 27, 2012 Share Posted February 27, 2012 Nicely written up - thanks, Eric! I really enjoyed my first race, and am looking forward to lots more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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