Ashland, Massachusetts January 13, 2018 Twenty-four racers, a new season high, made it to LenJet Raceway for a day of racing “the fast stuff” on Peter Lentros’ Purple Mile
Practicing on the Purple Mile - Fast, fast fun
and Scorpion – both six lane tracks. Racing at LenJet always draws a crowd which usually includes a few guests, this event was no exception as we were joined by Greg Burstein, Bob Jones and Bob Withers. The field was evenly split with 13 Pros and 11 Sportsman in attendance.
Spec Racers on the Purple Mile
First on the docket were Sports Racers on the fast Purple Mile. Get the car set-up correctly and racing on this track is just so much fun; a few blips to get through the fingers, a quick blast around the donut and then down the long front straight into the biggest banked turn in the HO world. Awesome. Per the latest MARC rules, Pros and Sportsman race together for the first race of the day yielding a very long 24 heat round robin. We might want to reconsider combining the divisions if there are enough racers in each category to support separate races – but I digress…
Sportsman
Spec Racer Sportsman Podium - Mike Tiffany 1st, Terry Ayer 2nd, Tom Jahl 3rd and Hal Pierce 4th
The Sportsman’s race was a bit of a run-away for Mike Tiffany, clearly on the road to recovery from his car accident last June. I think this was the most popular win of the season – WELCOME BACK MIKE!!!! Terry Ayer had a fantastic finish coming home in second place followed by Tom Jahl in 3rd and Hal Pierce in 4th. The dynamic duo of Terry and Hal have really upped their game since joining MARC last year – they’ve been a great addition to MARC.
Pro
Spec Racer Pro Podium - John Pileggi 1st, John Reimels 2nd, Ryan Archambault 3rd and Rob Hayes 4th
John Pileggi rejoined the group with his second appearance of the season much to the regret of the rest of the field. Like what Mike did to the Sportsman field, John did to the Pros beating John Reimels to the finish line by 12 laps – that’s a 2 lap per heat advantage… Following John R home were Ryan Archambault, also making his second appearance of the season in third and Rob Hayes in 4th.
Sportsman – Modified
With 6 of the sportsman deciding to pass on the second race of the day, we loosened up the rules a tad and let Greg Burstein run with the Sportsman drivers borrowing a wicked fast
Sportsman Modified Podium - Greg Burstein 1st, Jimmy Colligan 2nd, Hal Pierce 3rd and Terry Ayer 4th
Modified car from Ryan Archambault and we let Bob Withers run his CMPM car – neither Greg nor Bob are members so this decision would not affect the point standings in any way. We now had a full field of 6 drivers to run on Peter’s seldom used Scorpion track. Considering this is probably the first time Greg has driven a car this fast, it’s simply amazing that he was able to walk away from the field amassing an ungodly 73 lap margin of victory. I think the Pros were glad he decided to race with the Sportsman drivers… Coming home “first in class” was “Oh Jimmy” Colligan followed by Hal Pierce, Terry Ayer, Bob Withers and Tom Jahl.
Pro – CMPM
The last race of the day was for Pros running the CMPM class cars on the Scorpion. Dan “I
Pro CMPM Podium - Mr Scorpion DeCosmo 1st, John Pileggi 2nd, Ryan Archambault 3rd and Rob Hayes 4th
Love Scorpions” DeCosmo showed that he knows how to drive this track. If it wasn’t for the Blue and Yellow lanes, John Pileggi might have beaten Dan but Dan’s performance on Blue and Yellow was just amazing – sealing the victory with a 23 lap margin. John Pileggi finished second followed by Ryan “I should have used the car I loaned to Dan” Archambault in third and Rob Hayes in 4th. Since this is the track that will be used at the 2018 Nats for this class, many of us need to get up to speed quickly (especially me… – JR).
Thanks go to Peter for hosting the race. Next up we’re at John Stezelecki’s Nantasket Beach Speedway where we’ll be racing G-Jets on the Nuvolari and Super Stocks on the Lady Gray (no, that’s not a misprint – fast cars on the Lady Gray and slow cars on the Nuvolari…) on February 10th.
John Reimels
MARC Communication Director