Mini Cooper Invitational II went pretty well overall. Practice ran a little late, so we got off to a late start, but things moved along OK after that. Dust seemed to be the enemy for this event, I just couldn't get the track clean enough. I thought wiping down the track between qualifying and practice would help, but when Mario went out and qualified first he thought the track was even more dirty than in practice. Nevertheless, qualifying went on and a new track qualifying record was set by Henry "The Champ" Harnish!

Qualifying Results:

The qualifying order determined the starting lineup in the IROC race. I supply 4 nearly identical tjets, all sporting Vincent rims and custom-made Mini Cooper bodies from Fandango Racing, done in the style of "The Italian Job". (See race photos) Drivers each use their own controllers and race 2 minute heats. I spent a fair amount of time in the days leading up to this race tuning up these cars this year, to correct issues we had with the cars last year. We had a slight delay after the first heat because of a lap counter glitch, which required me to take apart the dead section and clean the dirt out of the gap. After that, no more lap counter issues the rest of the day. Congrats to Dave "The Connecticut Kid" Lockwood for winning this race by just 4 track sections!

IROC Results:

The results of the IROC event determined the starting order for the main, in which drivers finally got to race their own VHORS Super Stock Minis. We run 3 minute heats for this class, and the racing was fast and intense. In the end Henry came out on top again!

MAIN Event Results:

Special thanks to:

Fandango Racing - for donating four $25 gift certificates, custom building the 4 Italian Job bodies for the IROC race, and supplying almost all of the Mini Cooper bodies in the race field!

Also thanks to Ian and JoeRinn for hanging out and helping with the cleanup after the race was over...

...and finally, thanks to my wife Nancy who kept us all well fed throughout the day!