click here for full gallery

click here for full gallery

It’s finally here! As of today, Turtle Trax is officially open! Even though today was just a “shake down” race, we still managed a healthy 24 car field with 13 2wd buggies and 11 Slashes. The competition was tight all day, and there were many fierce battles. Thanks to everyone who came out and made today a huge success! A more detailed race report is soon to follow, so keep checking back througout the week.

for now, check out the gallery!

click here for full gallery

Dirt Outlaw

Kicking off the day on the Daytona would be the Dirt Outlaw class. With 16 entries, the class had to be split into two races. Race one proved to be a race of attrition with 6 of the 8 racers having to go to back up motors throughout the race. But even with all the motor changes going on, the racing was still close. Defending champion Roy Hogan was fast throughout the race and managed to avoid engine failure to secure a 376 lap race, putting him atop the leader board. Jeff Causey would finish second with 357 laps, and Shaun Fitzgerald rounded out the top 3 with a 319 lap finish.

Race two would be the most talked about race of the weekend. Unfortunately, not because of the close racing. A minor computer error caused an extended track call which cost the racers an estimated 10 laps.  Add to that the increased amount of track calls and it is easy to see why the lap counts were much lower in the second race. Mike Fitzgerald showed a great deal of speed throughout the race to finish first with 335 laps. Second was Joey Edwards with 332 laps, and series newcommer Melissa Urguhaut finished with 308 laps.

Overall results:

1. Roy Hogan 376
2. Jeff Causey 357
3. Mike Fitzgerald 335
4. Joey Edwards 332
5. Shawn Fitzgerald 319
6. Melissa Urguhaut 308
7. Jon Kwasniki 303
8. Lanier Gazaway 276
9. Bart Merriman 375
10.Daryl Byrd 273
11.Stephen Campbell 356
12.Eddie Cordle 169
13.John Forrester 104
14.Jerry Mertz 82
15.Rick Langdon DQ
16.Terry Kelley DQ

Nastruck

The next race on the schedule for the day was the 4 inch Nastrucks on the Windsor track. Having recently been the victim of flooding, the racing surface was a bit on the rough side. Many racers expressed concern about the conditions and a vote was held to decide fairly which track was to be run. After the vote was taken, the Windsor was declared the “winner” and the race was to resume as planned. As the racers stepped up to the driver’s panel, a mixture of nervousness and excitement was in the air. But the race proved that even under unfavorable conditions, a close race was still possible. Roy Hogan would suffer gear issues throughout the course of the race and would fall deep in the standings. The closest battle of the race was between series “veteran”  Shaun Fitzgerald and series newcomer Keith Fitzgerald. At the end of the race, they would both finish with 201 laps. However, Keith would fall a mere 2 feet short and finish a respectable 4th place. Jeff Chalmers ran a consistent race considering the circumstances and took the win with 217 laps. Only 3 laps back was Ken Wood with 214 and Shaun Fitzgerald came in third with 201 laps.

Overall results:

1. Jeff Chalmers 217
2. Ken Wood 214
3. Shawn Fitzgerald 201
4. Keith Fitzgerald 201
5. Eddie Cordle 195
6. Roy Hogan 188
7. Lanier Gazaway 53
8. Joey Edwards 5
9. Daryl Byrd 1

click here for full gallery

Took a trip out to PNB2 with a few buddies to check out some offroad racing and came home with some killer shots! Big thanks to Chad for the ride and Kevin for the company. More shots will be up once I get them processed.

On the pole is the green Alpha of Chad Sharp, 2nd is the blue and silver Alpha of Andy Wallace, 3rd is the Red MLP F103 of Richard Hall, 4th is Keith Fitzgerald in the blue and yellow CRC, and 5th is Kent Ball in the red F201.

At the start it seemed like a sure win for Chad Sharp, but after catching the inside of the first corner and collecting Keith Fitzgerald he had to push hard to catch up. Meanwhile Richard Hall and Andy Wallace battled hard for the top spot until a collision between Andy and Kent let Richard retain a commanding lead with Chad sharp following closely in second. While recovering from the collision, Andy went wide and allowed Keith to slip by and take third place. Chad was closing in on the leader when a costly mistake forced him to retire his TQ ride due to mechanical trouble.

With Chad out of the running, the pressure was off Richard and allowed him to turn some of the fastest laps of the race. Unfortunately, while coming around to lap third place driver Andy, the two got together and allowed second place driver Keith Fitzgerald to close in on the leader. With about two minutes to go, Keith was right on Richard’s wing and knocking hard on the back door. The back and forth battle continued until Richard went a little wide in the second corner allowing Keith to slip into the lead. However it would not last long as Richard unintentionally tagged Keith in the rear sending both cars off line. Richard, being the good sportsman that he is, let Keith continue on in the lead and the two battled the rest of the way to the buzzer.

click here to view the results

click here for full gallery

USVTA A Main

Touring Stock A Main

Touring Mod

Videos by Mike Outlaw of Waltuo Productions