Cody Gerhardt wins season finale

Maria Cofer claims the championship

 

 

Ten of Bay Cities Racing Association’s (BCRA) best pavement midgets were on hand Saturday September 30 at the Madera Speedway for the 2017 season finale. Chad Nichols in the #17N Shanoian Special sped around the 1/3-mile paved oval in 14.193 seconds to claim the top qualifying honors, trailed by Scott Pierovich in the Morris #71R with a best lap of 14.267 seconds.

Cody Gerhardt timed in third fastest trailed by Mark Maliepaard as David Goodwill rounded out the fast five. Leading the second group was third generation racer Davey Hamilton Junior in the Bob Rosen #4, followed by Maria Cofer, JR Williams and Floyd Alvis.  Nick Foster Junior was unable to make the call for time trials in the second Shanoian Special as the #1N suffered from an engine vibration.

Alvis and Cofer led the field to the green flag for the first 8-lap preliminary heat race and Cofer surged into the lead and held the point for the first two circuits. Nichols moved up from his fifth starting spot into second place on the second lap with an outside pass in turn one, then claimed the lead one lap later with another turn one outside pass.

One lap later, Gerhardt charged past Cofer into second place, which dropped Maria in the Arata #88 into third place trailed by Goodwill and Alvis. The running order remained unchanged over the last three laps, all run under the green flag. Foster was unable to answer the call for the second preliminary heat race, which was led wire-to-wire by Davey Hamilton Junior trailed by Pierovich Maliepaard and JR Williams.  

Fastest qualifier Nichols pulled the number “6” pill in the redraw for the starting feature lineup, which positioned Davey Hamilton Junior on the pole position with David Goodwill alongside for the start of the 30-lap season finale feature. Foster was able to take the green flag shotgun on the field but the engine vibrations were so severe that he pulled off as the field entered turn one on the first lap. At the drop of the green flag, Hamilton sped into the lead trailed by Maliepaard Gerhardt Pierovich and Nichols.

Hamilton held a slim lead while the trailing four cars battled among themselves, as between laps seven and ten Maliepaard battled all around the track for second place with Gerhardt finally able to make the high groove work and he began to track down Hamilton. On lap 16, Gerhardt moved low underneath Hamilton as the pair entered turn three. On lap 19, as Goodwill headed down the back stretch his engine went off song, and the #3G came to a stop on lap 20 at the exit of turn two to bring out the race’s first caution flag.

Nichols had a head of steam on the restart and blasted past Maliepaard and Hamilton on the outside of turns one and two to claim second place, but Chad’s evening came to an abrupt end on lap 27 as the #17N coasted into the infield out of fuel.  Cody Gerhardt sped under the twin checkered flags to claim a popular win over Maliepaard, Pierovich, Hamilton, 2017 BCRA season champion Maria Cofer, Floyd Alvis and JR Williams in seventh place. Nichols was scored in eighth position ahead of fellow non-finishers Goodwill and Foster.

 

photo of Maria Cofer by the author

 

 

After the event in the pit area the Arata Brothers’ trailer was a scene of celebration in honor of Maria Cofer’s crowning as the 2017 BCRA champion. Maria continued her family’s tradition of championships, as her father (and crew chief) John was the 1994 United States Auto Club (USAC) Western States series king.

Maria piloted the Arata’s immaculate black #88 #88 on the pavement and drove her father’s red white and black #57 on the dirt portions of the 2017 BCRA schedule. Maria will collect her championship trophy at the annual BCRA awards banquet to be held on January 20 2018 at the Hilton Hotel in Stockton California.  

Nichols blazes to a clean sweep in
2nd annual Tom Manning Memorial
at Stockton 99 Speedway

 

Ten speedy Bay Cities Racing Association (BCRA) midgets took part in Stockton 99 Speedway’s “Night of Champions” on Saturday night August 5 with the second annual Tom Manning Memorial race. Eight of the ten cars posted times in the 13-second bracket in time trials, paced by third generation racer Chad Nichols in the Shanoanian Esslinger as he set a new track record of 13.072 seconds to tour the high-banked paved quarter mile track.

Davey Hamilton Junior, himself a third-generation racer posted the night’s second fastest qualifying lap of 13.165 seconds in Bob Rosen’s midget, which just edged out Alex Schutte’s fast lap of 13.176 seconds in Del Morris’ #71R machine.  Cody Gerhardt, also a multi-generational racer wound up fourth fastest at 13.207 seconds.

Maria Cofer in the Arata Racing #88 led the early laps of the first heat race, as Nichols picked off car after car as he moved up from his fifth starting position. Late in the six-lap event, Nichols slipped past point leader Cofer on the low side of turns one and two to grab the lead which he held to the drop of the checkered flag trailed by Cofer, Schutte, Randi Pankratz, and Mark Maliepaard.

Pole-sitter David Goodwill immediately jumped into lead at the start of the second heat race with Hamilton in close pursuit, trailed by Floyd Alvis, Gerhardt and JR Williams. As Hamilton exited turn four on lap four, he spun the Mr. Espresso #4 machine in the oil-absorbent left over from late model time trials.

Hamilton locked down the brakes and spun harmlessly to a stop backwards at the head of the front straightaway. After he restarted, Hamilton stormed back through the field to challenge Gerhardt for second place but had to settle for third place.  Goodwill won the heat race as he led all six laps ahead of Gerhardt, Hamilton Alvis and Williams.

Fast qualifier Nichols drew the #6 pill to set the invert for the 30-lap Tom Manning Memorial feature race, with Goodwill and Maliepaard sharing the front row, Gerhardt and Schutte in row two and Hamilton and Nichols side-by-side in row three. The first attempt at a start was called back, as Goodwill proved a little quick on the throttle. Goodwill led away in the second start, trailed by Gerhardt, Maliepaard, Schutte and Hamilton.

As the race settled down, Nichols began his march forward and ran in third place on lap three, and then moved into second place on lap four.   Hamilton had had contact with another car which bent the front axle and negatively affected the handling for the rest of the race but on lap six Hamilton and Cofer battled for sixth position, which was settled in Hamilton’s favor but he could not make the expected threat for victory.

Nichols stalked Goodwill for several laps, then on lap twelve he began to press for the lead. At the end of the fifteenth lap Goodwill and Nichols crossed the start-finish line side-by-side. On lap 17, Nichols in the orange #17 machine surged past into the lead trailed by Goodwill, Gerhardt, Maliepaard and Schutte. Hamilton rode in sixth place followed by Cofer, Alvis and Pankratz, as Williams had pulled in the pit area with handling problems. As Nichols cruised to victory to complete his “clean sweep” of the evening, in the closing laps Schutte slipped past Maliepaard to claim fourth place in a race that was completed in six minutes.  

On August 29, the BCRA midgets will return to action in Stockton, but this time across town at the Stockton Dirt track located on the grounds of the San Joaquin County Fairgrounds.

USAC Silver Crown Copper Cup 

race report

On Saturday afternoon, a field of sixteen United States Auto Club (USAC) Silver Crown cars and drivers took the green flag for the “Copper Cup,” the 115^th USAC race held at the storied Phoenix International Raceway in Avondale Arizona.

The makeup of the field had changed a bit since Friday afternoon time trials, as the Gene Nolen Racing team had affected repairs to the transmission in Jerry Coons Junior’s #20 car but without posting a qualifying time Coons had to start at the back of the field.  Patrick Lawson stepped out of the seat of his previously qualified Rebel Smokers Beast in favor of Chris Windom, whose Kazmark Racing entry was sidelined after it had been damaged beyond repair in a crash during the second Friday practice session.  With the driver change, Windom started alongside Coons at the tail of the field.  

At the drop of the green flag, pole-sitter Bobby Santos III led the field into the first turn with Kody Swanson, David Byrne, Justin Grant and Aaron Pierce all in close pursuit. By lap 9, Windom had carved his way through the field to run tenth, while Damion Gardner in the Klatt Enterprises Best moved into sixth place on lap 10 as Davey Hamilton Junior coasted into the pit area with fire and smoke trailing from the left side of the Mopar engine in the RPM/Fred Gormly Beast to become the race’s first retiree. 

A disappointed “DJ” reported that he had no warning of trouble before there was a loud bang as the #98 car raced down the Phoenix backstretch followed by fire and smoke.   Shortly thereafter, Tanner Swanson brought the Nolen #201 into the pits with terminal mechanical issues.

On lap 12 Gardner moved into fifth place and then Windom moved into ninth of lap 13 behind the lead pack of Santos, Kody Swanson, Grant, Gardner and Byrne. On lap 16, Joe Axsom made the first of several extended pits stops with Nolen Racing #120, and as the leaders closed on backmarker Toni Breidinger, Byrne slipped past Santos to take the lead on lap 22. 

Shortly thereafter, Grant began to pressure Kody Swanson for third place, but his challenge ended with the #91 Hemmelgarn-Carli Racing #91 against the wall in turn four. Grant emerged unhurt and immediately departed the track to race a USAC Southwest Series sprint car later that evening at Arizona Speedway.

Under the five-lap caution period, the running order was Byrne, Santos, Kody Swanson, Gardner and Davey Hamilton Senior with Aaron Pierce in sixth position.   When the green flag re-emerged, Santos challenged for the lead and the lead pair ran nearly half a lap around the Phoenix one-mile oval side-by-side before Santos led laps 31 and 32. 

Byrne reasserted himself at the head of the field on lap 33 and he quickly built up a ten-car length lead over Santos, Windom’s quest for a fourth straight USAC Silver Crown victory ended on lap 40 as the Rebel Smokers #2 coasted silently down pit lane.

As the race entered its middle stage on lap 42 the running order was Byrne, Santos, Kody Swanson, Hamilton, Pierce, Coons and Gardner. 

On lap 43 Swanson ran a 26.695 second lap to close on Santos, but Santos responded a few laps later with a 26.519 second lap. At the halfway point of the race, Byrne passed Shane Butler a second lap down in the #15 as Butler still struggled with apparent engine difficulties, which left eight cars on the leader’s lap.

The yellow flag flew for the third time of the day on lap 59, as Damion Gardner slid to a stop in the fourth turn after the right front wheel had broken off the Klatt Enterprises Beast. Gardner did a skillful job to bring the crippled machine to a halt without significant wall contact.  Under what proved to be an extended ten-lap caution period as track personnel put down “speedi-dry” to clean up oil on pit lane. 

The green flag flew again on lap 69 but that restart was called back. On the second restart, once again Santos challenged Byrne for the lead as the pair ran over a half a lap side by side before Byrne pulled ahead. By lap 73, Aaron Pierce had moved his Sam Pierce Chevrolet Beast into fourth place ahead of Hamilton and over the next few laps both Kody Swanson and Hamilton ran laps in the 26.5 second range as their cars’ fuel load began to burn off.

After a quick yellow flag in for a stalled car on the backstretch on lap 79, Jerry Coons’ #20 Nolen Racing Beast began to fall off the pace, as Coons later reported that the car’s handling went to “dead loose” but he maintained his fifth place position. Attrition continued to mount with eight cars still running on lap 85 as the pack of the top five cars tightened up as Swanson, Pierce, and Hamilton all ran their best laps of the race but with the running order unchanged.

On lap 92, the cars of Byrne and Santos crossed the start-finish line side-by-side, and Santos then moved into the lead on lap 93, as Swanson began to pressure Byrne for second place. On lap 94, Pierce’s care coasted to a stop on pit lane the victim of ignition failure. 

Bobby Santos III 2017 Copper Cup winner

On lap 98, Kody Swanson moved alongside Byrne on the front straightaway and the 2014 and 2015 USAC Silver Crown champion made the pass stick to claim second place behind Santos at the checkered flag, trailed by Byrne, Hamilton Senior, Coons and Shane Butler. Aaron Pierce finished seventh ahead of Toni Breidinger USAC’s winningest female driver who turned in a determined performance in her first Silver Crown start and first start on a track larger than 3/8 of a mile.

In addition to the unique trophy, Santos banked $10,000 for his Copper Classic win, with the KSE Hard Charger contingency award going to Jerry Coons for his charge from fifteenth stating position to finish fifth. Chris Windom undoubtedly the weekend’s hard luck driver received the Wildwood Brakes award for his 13^th place finish. The USAC Silver Crown series made a triumphant return to Phoenix Raceway after an absence of over seven years and put on a terrific race; hopefully the “Copper Cup” on the superfast one mile oval will become an annual event.  

Kody Swanson moved into the lead for the chase for the 2017 USAC Silver Crown championship presented by Traxxas trailed by Coons and Windom.  The next race on the schedule is the historic Hoosier Hundred which will be held on May 25 on the one-mile Indiana State Fairgrounds dirt mile. 

As a postscript, in other USAC action in Arizona on Saturday, the author, Patrick Sullivan and Dick Jordan traveled east to attend the USAC Southwest sprint car action presented by Sands Chevrolet at Arizona Speedway. RJ Johnson won the first heat race, Nick Aluto won the second heat race and Stevie Sussex won the third heat race. 

RJ Johnson dominated the 30-lap feature race followed across the finish line by Sussex, Charles Davis Junior and Shon Deskins.  Justin Grant who had competed in the Silver Crown race in the afternoon dropped out late in the feature while he was running in third place. 

A dramatic day for the USAC Silver Crown cars at Phoenix International Raceway

The single-car qualifying session held in the heat of the day at the Phoenix International Raceway capped off a dramatic day of action for the United States Auto Club (USAC) Silver Crown series which returned to the one-mile oval for the first time since 2009.

Chris Windom the winner of the last three Silver Crown races and the defending series champion set the early pace in the Kazmark racing #92 in the first practice session with a best lap of 26.243 seconds, as seven cars in the seventeen car field broke through the 27 second barrier.  

Before and after shots of Chris Windom's #93 shows the significant damage

Kody Swanson in the #63 Radio Hospital Special set the day's fastest lap in the second practice session at 25.450 seconds. During the second practice session, Windom's car appeared off the pace then he crashed in turn three. USAC competition director Levi Jones said the group suspected could not confirm that a right front tire failure caused the Windom crash. Windom was uninjured but the car was heavily damaged and was finished for the weekend. 

left to right Kody Swanson, fast qualifier Bobby Santos III and Davey Hamilton 

USAC sent the field of cars out for single car qualifying in reverse order with the fastest cars on the track at the end of qualifying, so the speed of the cars steadily increased as the session continued. Bobby Santos III topped the field with his second lap of 25.362 seconds, just .045 seconds off the track record set by the David Steele in 2004, though it should be considered that the track configuration has changed since 2004. Second place in time trials fell to two-time USAC Silver Crown titlist in 2014 and 2015 Kody Swanson while 54 year old Davey Hamilton claimed the third starting position for tomorrow's 100-lap "Phoenix Copper Cup."  

Santos said later that he felt he "got a pretty good lap," as the car was tight on the first lap and then the handling came in better than he expected for the second faster lap. Hamilton remarked that it was an exciting opportunity to race with his son this weekend, as he recalled racing in past Copper Classic supermodified events at Phoenix with his father Ken Hamilton.  

Hamilton shared that the layout of the Phoenix track is a lot different since the last time he drove a Silver Crown car there as only the front straight is the same. On a very windy day, the top three qualifiers said that the wind did not upset their cars at all, and Davey Hamilton brought laughter the press conference when he compared the aerodynamics of a Silver Crown car to a brick. 

When asked about the Silver Crown series returning the Phoenix, Kody Swanson stated that this is an example of how the series is building momentum and that it was personally exciting for him to race at Phoenix. Kody noted that the importance of the "Phoenix Copper Classic" was demonstrated by the fact that his younger brother Tanner who is not a series regular went out an found a ride with the Nolen team.  

Thinking about tire wear for tomorrow's 100-lap race which will be held in the heat of the day, Bobby Santos remarked that he felt like Hoosier brought a "pretty hard tire," but that drivers have to be careful not to overheat the tires and make them "greasy." The veteran Hamilton noted that the tires he qualified on had twenty laps on them, and that it will be challenge and that "tire management will be key for the 100 laps."

Davey Hamilton Junior had a eventful day and revealed that his car lost its brakes midway through the first practice session and were not repaired in time for him to turn any hard laps in the second session.. "DJ" reported that he did not any brakes on his first timed lap which was an off the pace at 27.072 seconds, but the brakes returned for the second lap and "DJ" will start tenth tomorrow after he posted a 26.656 second lap. 

Nolen Racing teammates from left Joe Axsom (back to camera), Tanner Swanson

 and Jerry Coons Junior compared notes between the two practice sessions 

Tucson Arizona's Jerry Coons Junior was unable to qualify as the transmission input shaft broke, but the Nolen crew was optimistic it could be fixed in time, provided that they could locate the needed parts to affect repairs. USAC's all-time winningest female driver Toni Breidinger will start fourteenth, but she showed steady progress throughout the day in her first appearance in a Silver Crown car and her first appearance on a race track longer than 1/3 of mile. 

Photos by the author 

Pre-practice photos of USAC Silver Crown cars at Phoenix

Warming up Toni Briedinger's car 

Putting the numbers on the nose of Henry Clarke's Bill Rose owned entry

Davey Hamilton leans on his RPM entry and chats with fans, 

his son DJ is his teammate this weekend

A close look at AJ Russell's Ted Finkenbinder machine

Chris Windom check his phone while his crew works on his #92 car

Aaron Pierce's car is powered by a 770 horsepower Chevy engine

All photos by the author