mikahb

http://drivenasa.com/championships/2008-STU_SU.html

It's up and ready for viewing. I knew what happened to Danny from reading here, but seeing it on camera makes it even worse!

L98Terror

One more reason that you have to have radios in the car, it really sux that he was racing a lapped car. I know when I spun and James came up behind me I was on my radio frantically trying to figure out if it was James or Danny (damn cars look the same) because if it was Danny I would make room for him to go by but James is in my class.

I didn't realize Brian and Danny were going at it for so long.

Cool video but the coverage suxed, they could cover ST2,PTA or PTA for even a minute? A lot of people put money towards this video and when you don't even get one shot of you car it really sux.

SouthernSon

Bummer! But some darn good driving as always, Danny! Awsome!

Aardwolf

Thanks for posting that! My daughter in the #8 car, recognize the engine?

spazegun2213

LS7 baby

Aaron Pfadt

That video came out great. It agree that it is disappointing that there was no ST2 coverage. I feel that any SU coverage even if it is the race leaders is a little disappointing because of the complete mismatch of the cars.

I feel for Danny in his late race incident. It is the first I have been able to see it since the race. My video quit just before that so I only saw it live. I was charging hard, but could not have challenged him for the lead without a couple more laps.

I am both happy and disappointed that my spin in about lap 10 didn't make the video. It certainly was embarrassing overcooking it into the carousel while working lapped traffic, but it helps to fill in the story about why I was where I was. It looks almost as though I was completely off pace even though I was running faster laps than Danny in late stages of the race and closing the gap quickly. Racing is about being in the game so that you can capitalize on situations.

I'm really looking forward to next season. I hope to see even more competitive ST1 and ST2 cars battling it out all season. With Nationals at Miller in Utah for 2009 we should have more of the west coast folks there to mix it up with.

Look for Pfadt Racing's continued support of NASA with a contingency program again for 2009. It'll support everyone from HPDE to TT and wheel to wheel.

Thanks to all the SU and ST racers for working together to get this video produced. Bob Mayer, Norm Goldrich the Goldberg brothers as well as most of the other racers contributed cash out of their pockets to help make the video possible.

-Aaron

gkmccready

Sure, but if you're down a lap or more on the last lap, why fight with the leader? It's not going to change your finishing position...

PA Z06

Man what a terrible ending for Danny

0Vector Vette

Wow!!! Danny, I owe you an apology. I had heard you tangled with a lapped car with 3 corners to go and thought "what was he doing that for"? After seeing this the question is "what the @#$% was Goldberg doing"? How did you keep from killing him, or did you? That really sucks!

L98Terror

You can't control what other people do, only what you do yourself so the more info you have the better. I do agree that Brian knew he was down a lap and should not have been racing Danny, but if Brain didn't have radios either how would he know Danny didn't go in either and they weren't racing for position?


On that same note why did that ST1 Porsche feel he needed to tangle with me when I was in 1st place (in Class) & I passed him twice on the same lap and he kept powering by me on the straights and in my mind caused the three of us to have contact going into turn 7 with him in last place and me and Dave fighting for 1st place. That guy knew he was in last place and we were fighting for 1st place in a National Championship race and decided to get in the middle of our race rather than just let us go. We were both running faster laps and he never would have seen us again. In my mind he cost me a chance at winning the race.

Webz

Cool video thanks for posting. Congrats to everyone again but particularly to Rafters, Forbis and Popp. Damn shame to see Danny get booted with 3 turns left.

0Randy@DRM

Nice video guys. Congrats to all of you again. This multi class run groups is hard racing and you guys put on one hell of a show!


Randy

96CollectorSport

That's true but if Brian knew that he wasn't in the running why would you try such a big/risky move for what 10th place? Obviously it was a bad decision on his part and I hope he was penalized for it (or will be in the future). Chalk it up as a racing incident an see what happens in Utah.

Nice coverage of a great race, I just wish I could have seen a little more of Ken, Forbis, Matt and Wally, but what can you do.

L98Terror

Red mist?

Unless he was DQ from future races I'm not sure what they could do drop him from 10-11th. I'm not sure what happen but I do know I was taken off the podium for some contact with a car that was racing us out of class and decided to turn in on me, none of the cars substained damage (in the eyes of NASA, they all had some minor damage), none went off track (or even spun) and no one lost a position in Class except for me. Consider how bad I was screwed over I would assume that if you take out the leader running a lap down you should be banned for NASA for a year, anything less just show how screwed over I got.

RAFTRACER

Video is hard for me to stomach.....It would be nice to have people that have car control at the National Championships...

The video was supposed to highlight ST1 and ST2 from what I understood....All of my ST2 buddies got robbed for sure. Maybe not quite as much drama at the finish in ST2 as ST1 or SU, but I know there was some good racing that should have been covered..and was supposed to be.

Painful to watch my car get hit.....Cost of repairing the minor damage to the car is still expensive, but cost of losing a National Championship is priceless....

As far as the race goes , we had a great run at the beginning over taking all of the SU cars except for two in the first 3 corners. Those guys all "parked it" on the inside of madness, and I wasn't down with that ...passed them all the hard way, the long way , around the outside. 3rd overall after the third corner was all but expected, but I was elated to say the least. I ran the car @ 85% from that point , I knew I needed to conserve tires and no time like the present to start conserving the car. I was very cautious not to spin the tires anywhere on acceleration. Making A6 Hoosiers last for 35-40 minutes on a car with as much power as ST1 cars make is no easy task. We came up to the start and received the full course caution and then the red flag. I hadn't seen the accident between the to Panoz's , but after seeing the carnage , I was not suprised. Seemed like the majority of situations in our race group all week were involving one of the two including me getting hit during qualifying in the rain on Saturday when one of them passed under a waving yellow , and then parking the car trying to get myself and the other guy that he passed to go back buy. I was suprised when watching the video that those two got together so early in the race. At the restart of the race , I ran the car at 90-95% still trying to conserve the tires , but I didn't want Kohler to hold me up so I made the move on him entering T1 , which I dont think that he expected. Kohlers car makes BIG power and was nearly impossible to keep him behind me on the straights. I ran the car at the same level and then I decided that racing with him was a bad idea and that I was just using the tires up trying to run in 2nd overall. When he got by the 2nd time, I just let him go. From there I just ran at my own pace, a comfortable pace in which I thought that I could make the A6's last. Which seemed to work for about 10-11 laps. Aaron had disappeared and was not even in sight in the mirrors. I saw the Goldburg Panoz approaching and I was completely unaware of what position he was in .......as you all have guessed, I have no radios. I started looking at the score board every time up the front straight , but it was never synchronized with what I needed to see when I came up the straight. My rear tires were done....at No fault of Hoosiers or mine, I have some rear suspension issues that I haven't sorted out yet...as I said we were still testing at Nationals. The car had been apart all year and this was only the 2nd weekend out. The Panoz was better than I was at the end of the race and so probably was Aaron. I wasn't aware of what place the Panoz was in so I wasn't just going to give it to him, and I didn't . I raced the Panoz clean for the last several laps and he was able to go buy me on the exit of the keyhole with two laps to go as seen on the video. What you didn't see is that he ran out of talent yet once again at the end of the back straight and went off minorly allowing me to go back buy. ( just how many times were those Panoz's off the track that weekend?) I wasn't going to wait for him to come back up on the track so I went back by. BTW those two Panoz's are very light and were running on non-DOT Michelin radial slicks, two heavy pwr/wt modifiers. They should have been somewhere in the nieghborhood of 1 pt higher power to wieght than I ........that car did not go down the straight like it was 6.5:1 on that day.....the day before things were different when I passed them all at the start from the last position like they were painted on a post...whatever. Unless my car was down on power that car was not legal at the time. Anyhow I was running the last two laps and the Panoz was able to get back to me. We went side by side on a previous lap through the same corner that he hit me in . I am very aware of were people behind me are and I race people the way I would like to be raced....some people dont conduct themselves accordingly and it may come back to haunt them. I was vunerable due to the rear tire situation ( they had 2" wide blisters on the inside after the race), but was able to stay in the lead until he ran out of talent again , lost the car under braking and bashed into the side of my car. This was the only time I was off track over the week including all of the rain days. Control is paramount and some people need to gain more. This particular individual was involved in two accidents and was off the track at least once that I know of all during the same race. There probably were more occurances. This is the best part....The driver of the Panoz was defending himself telling the race director that it was my fault. I was summonzed by the race director to get my video so that I could defend myself.. the damage on the car shows who was at fault. I even gave the jack-a## room to make the pass when the collision happened, I knew he was there.....It probably says "Cracker-Jack" on the backside of his comp license.......

Greg Greenbaum (the race director) had us both in his garage talking to us about the situation and Greg slapped him on the wrist and awarded him no penalties that I know of. From what I understand L98 terror was dealt with more severly. This maybe why I take a step or two back from NASA. A normal racing incident OK, but what the Panoz boys created all week was not a lesson on how to drive or race and how NASA dealt with the situation is inexcusable in my opinion. SU,ST1 ans ST2 cars are not Spec Miatas and are very expensive race cars. They need to implement the 13/13 rules that are in other race groups and series to deal with these kind of situtations. If there were 13/13 's in NASA , I am fairly sure that the Panoz boys would not be racing very long.

As far as the Panoz not knowing who the leader was, I know for fact that they/he have radios..............I have no idea what he was thinking when he attempted the "low percentage pass", may be it was malicious, maybe it was incompetence or maybe he was just trying to be in the video production....who knows..............

In hindsight NASA Nationals was still a positive. Kid yourself not, we were there for the trifecta, but Saturday we acquired 2 National Championships (TTU and TTS) and set 2 new track records including being the fastest car at the event period (1:27.4). 2 National Championships and a 2nd place in the race is not so bad............

I still need to get my in-car video up loaded fom that week , as soon as I do I will post a link, it will be very entertaining and the audio clip is awesome.

0Randy@DRM

Hey Danny, were the corner works waving flags during those two or three laps???

Randy

RAFTRACER

no..........

wallyman424

Danny, I feel for you man. Let there be no doubt that both of those Panoz guys cannot drive safely at all. I'm SERIOUS when i say this. They were each off track at least 5+ times in the week that we were there.

its really unfortunate that this incident went unpunished.

RAFTRACER

Real unfortunate.........Somehow we all managed to stay on track and not cause incidents.....The only time I was off track was hit and then trying to get back to the finish with a flat... In fact I think that was only the 2nd time ever I have been "off" at MO and the first time in my car.

What do you other ST SU guys think about 13/13 rules being implemented for us ?????We could start a petition.....none of our cars are cheap. It assuredly would penalize people that conduct themselves wrecklessly.

wallyman424

I have no problem with a 13/13. It works well in GTS, and ANYONE that says a 13/13 rule precludes a class from having real competitive racing is being foolish (or just doesnt know much about car control).