SCCA RUNOFFS FUN REGARDLESS OF RAIN

Four South Winds Club members braved the elements last Sunday to head up to Topeka for the final day of the Sports Car Club of America's championship runoffs - road racing at its best at a local venue. No SWCC member drove their corvettes, however our friends from Air Cap turned out well considering the conditions, as they ended up with a 6 Vette caravan.

The highlight of the runoffs for Corvette fans was the T1 class which was won by a next to last lap pass of a Viper by the Vette in row 3 in the picture below (also refer to the post below from the SCCA website for more info on that race). The T1 class consists of virtually stock sports cars with the only modifications being safety related (and tires). We looked in some of these and they still had radios, stock shifters, etc. - quite a compliment to the Corvettes performance value when it wins against Vipers and Ferrari's that cost $25k-$100k more.

Now it wouldn't be fair if we didn't show some of the other classes and cars. The first picture below is of the GT1 winning Jaguar that almost literally lapped the field, kicking butt as they say, but they do have a few more cylinders than the Vettes...but everyone seems to have their good days and bad days in racing - for instance, the second picture below is of the American Sedan class which you can see has alot of Mustangs, Camaros and Firebirds. An interesting note on this race - the pole sitting orange Mustang crashed on the first turn. The 2nd grid starting yellow Mustang's brakes would fail on lap 8. The black Mustang went backwards from the race start. The maroon Mustang would run away from everyone....but fail post-race inspection for some seriously "upgraded" brakes. The blue Firebird starting 6th would ultimately win his 4th straight national championship.

For more pictures of the Corvettes that ran, click on the link below.