Lime Rock Weekend Notebook

Penalties Galore

Series officials weren't messing around at Lime Rock. Kyle Connery came into the weekend with a one race ban for an incident at Mosport. Following a race one accident, HP-Tech’s Robert La Rocca was sat down for race two.

Race one’s grid order required two web postings – one for the actual qualifying times, and then one with the penalties reflected as it seemed the paddock agreed to ignore various flags during practice. The Series noticed.

Onboard - Race 1 - Lap 1 - Turn 1 - Onboard with No. 31 Brendan Puderbach

Tim Paul Podium

Tim Paul found the podium for the first time in his F2000 career at his home track in the No. 06 SMR/GTP Motorsports Van Diemen. Paul finished a career-best fourth earlier in the season at Watkins Glen.

“It feels great to finally grab a podium, it was a long time coming,” said Paul, after the race. “I knew we could do it, and especially at Lime Rock. The weekend was very easy. I was frustrated after the first race. There was another first-turn pile up that took out all the GTP cars except for me, and then later in the race the oil in the downhill took us out of the top ten.”

Continued Paul: “The entire GTP team really put a lot of effort into getting us onto the podium. The car was really good out of the box and we only made a small aero adjustment over the whole weekend.”

Championship Points

Can be found here. Things are getting interesting, but this PDF will require a basic four-function calculator as drops are not calculated.

Fat Boys Arrive in Style

Hard-Charger

Dave Weitzenhof continues to lead CellMark Paper Hard Charger standings – with 63 positions improved in 10 races. Weitzenhof was not at Lime Rock and isn’t expected to be at Watkins Glen.

Craig Clawson is the only one in realistic range, with 52 positions gained, and will be at his home track for the season finale. A cash prize will be awarded at the Series awards gala.

Check out the Hard Charger points here.

HP-Tech Cook Book

Ft. Lauderdale-based HP-Tech Motorsports had a weekend at Lime Rock they probably wouldn't mind forgetting. La Rocca suffered through two (relatively significant) crashes, and teammate Giancarlo Potolicchio also went off in Saturday morning’s race.

That left the team scrambling for parts, essentially taking their remaining spares and turning two non-complete RFRs into one RFR for Potolicchio in the final race of the weekend.

A Big List

• Series photographers (the Valets) are producing an awesome end-of-the-year coffee table book that summarizes the entire season for both the F2000 Championship Series and F1600 Formula F Championship Series. Contact Dennis to buy one – or more. Dennis.Valet -AT- gmail.com  - expect more information on it soon.
• Connery said he won’t be racing at Watkins Glen, but expects to run for the 2012 F2000 Championship Series title.
• The Series is sending a personalized, hand-signed Thank You card to 2006 Champion Matt “Fast-Matt” McDonough for helping on in the public address booth at Lime Rock. It is unclear who may have to pay the FCC fine.
• Radon counting. By Watkins – there should be three or four – one for Blake Teeter, Peter Gonzalez in chassis no. 2, and Bob Wright in the third car.
• If the fourth Radon chassis gets finished by the season finale, it will have a mystery driver in it.
• Will SMR expand for 2012? Marketing materials for the team distributed at Lime Rock said so…