October Autocross
By Greg Zajic
Photos by Collin Fat
Attendance was up this for the October Autocross on October 18th. It was part of a 2 day zone 7 autocross event in conjunction with the Redwood region event and we had 49 drivers testing and showing off their skill at the large pad at Thunderhill Raceway. The weather was fantastic and was just shy of 80 degrees.
Design: We had a wonderful design that was a collaboration between a number of people, Martin Messersmith, Kent Treiber, and Greg Zajic that incorporated some interesting challenges. Including a slalom with a changing angle in the middle.
Average Times: As expected, average run times dropped quickly and then steadily through the day as drivers figured out the nuances and areas where those 10ths of a second could be shaved off. At the end of the day everyone was watching the live timing from Clokkr and cheering for the good runs and in some cases simultaneously pouting if their time was bumped down in the rankings.
Top Time of day: The fastest run passed between two drivers for the day. Monty Pack set the bar with a first run of 47.053 and a sub 47 second time in his second run. This was bested by a mere 41/100th of a second in the 4th run by Praneil Prasad with a 46.828. Fastest time changed hands two more times but in the 8th run Pranil secured the top time of 46.171 which held for the remainder of the day.
PAX top time: PAX (Performance adjusted Index) is a way to adjust times to level the times across differing vehicles based on horsepower and performance. Grady Carter set the bar on the first run with a PAX time of 45.602, he bested this in the next run with a 44.711 which held through run five. Competition was closing in but they could not match beat the time until the 8th run when Connie Lu tied all the turns together brining in a 44.681 pushing Grady out of the top spot. Connie then managed to go nearly 3/10th of a second faster in her final run with a PAX time of 44.408 and solidifying her position in in that top spot.
Cone Crushers: We ended up with a reasonable 51 cones bumped out of the box, thrown in the air or downright squashed. We seemed to seesaw through the day with the most dangerous time for the poor cones being the first run of the afternoon session where a total of 29 cones were accosted. The cone crusher title Drue Dunivan who took out 14 cones through the day with groups of 3-4 cones across multiple runs. In second place David Turner finished with 8 (7 in a single run which was fun to watch), and then 7 cones each for Drew Powers Mauro Filho, and Kent Treiber (six in one memorable run).
This is rare moment where we captured cones being crushed by Connie Lu (Top PAX time for the day), I’m sure they jumped in front of her car.
Weyland, Collin and JC Fat in front of JC’s new to him GT4.
SVR’s final autocross of the season will be held on November 8th at the Toyota Amphitheatre in Wheatland, located 30 minutes north of Roseville on Hwy 65. The amphitheater has also been chosen as the site of the CRAB 39 autocross. CRAB is SVR’s big 3 day Porsche extravaganza that will feature a variety of Porsche centric activities including, a crab dinner, autocross, tours, rally, concours and a beer and brats and awards ceremony.
To register go to:https://msreg.com/SVR2025AX9
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